MORE! than we could have hoped

Back in November last year a bunch of great friends who all love a bit of punk rock did something amazing. We created the template for our ideal scene, one where people can be be themselves and love music and have the most fun. More Of This! Fest was born and it was good.
Then in February we showed that this wasn't just a fluke. Once again we met under the banner of kickass punk rock and had a blast and made a bunch of new friends and even started a record label. All in all something really impressive was happening and last Saturday was the Triumphant return of the best day out a punk can possibly have in London. For those who were familiar with how MOT works it was everything that came before but amped up. This year we had the best crowd, the biggest bands, the coolest nutters and the most fun you can squeeze into 10 straight hours of punk! Those that were new to proceedings were quickly swept up in being part of the 13SX scene, one where you are judged solely on how little of a arsehole you are and nothing else. Personally I had the most fun this time as this was the event where Thirteen Stitches Records was a real thing and it felt like family, welcoming new members into the fray.

And enter they did, in fantastic style.....

Tindall

A huge amount of why the show in general was so good can be attributed to Tindall. It's often a small

washout playing first but they had a meaty crowd for 3 in the afternoon and greatly impressed all who watched. Cool punk-pop is their mode-de-jeur and they pulled everything off with nary a missed beat (that I noticed) they had energy and enthusiasm and got everybody in the perfect mood for a day of rocking the hell out. Arguably one of the best bands of the day, Tindall are welcome back anytime and should be on everyones radar. Getting members of Demon Smiles up to sing with you is also easily the most efficient way to make sure the MOT regulars love you!!

The Drunken Ramblings

"The Hungover Ramblings" came next and are best described as utterly unique to watch live. If you wanted to pigeon hole TDR musically I would say something along the lines of whimsical melodic street punk with heavy Hellcat Records influences. If you were to ask guitarist Vic however,  he would swear he was playing in a late 80s NY hardcore band, making full use of his radio jack by flying through the air at every available opportunity and generally making me feel sorry for his guitar which took considerable punishment as he slammed it around whilst still keeping up the melodies to the tunes. Definitely not an experience to be missed!!!

The Twin Dracula

Nobody knew a lot about these guys before they came on, having been a last minute addition after an unexpected drop out. It's also true that nobody expected one of the best melodic hardcore bands anyone has heard to be blowing us away three bands into the show!! These guys are the full package for me in every sense. Fast as fuck, tight as fuck, crunchy sounding as fuck. All the best things punk bands should be. They impressed everyone so much that record deals flew at them and they instantly became part of our family and will now be a regular fixture at anything baring a 13SX logo.

Vice Like Grip

Pop-punk needs a few key ingredients to work well, those are super fun singalong choruses, great harmonies for the vocals and catchy riffs. Vice Like Grip seem like they wrote the book on all of these things and pull them off without barely breaking a sweat in the process. The day was about to move into the Thirteen Stitches Showcase and VLG set the bar for us all ridiculously high.

The Real Quaid

If there are people on this earth that don't enjoy listening to the Real Quaid then they are people I don't want to acknowledge existing! They are the nuts and this was the best I've seen them. For anyone who hasn't had the pleasure they are street punk without being sloppy, crudely humoured without it being a gimmick, heavy without getting too metalish and technical whilst staying relate-able for non muso types. They are in other words the 13SX all rounders and they smashed it.

RxR

The band is dead, long live the band!! RxR have now left acoustic shows behind them and I think

we've shown all and sundry what the future holds. Having taken on Mike Hulbert of Mug fame and borrowing Steve from Demon Smiles RxR are now the 13SX super group of the family and this was the best show we've done so far. Steve did us proud and all the songs were a shit tonne of fun to play. Sometimes when I used to play solo shows I would get bored halfway through because I was sick of the sound of my voice and tired but I could have stayed there all goddamned night!! It was a blast from start to finish and a cheeky Taylor Swift cover and a Demon Smiles song at the end meant there was plenty for everyone to enjoy. I had so much great feedback and it was a total blast.

Probably worth mentioning were are still looking for a permanent drummer so if you came down and enjoyed it then hit me up!!!

DROPTHIS

When DROPTHIS came blasting into my life last MOT they became my instant favourite 13SX band, even before being on the label and every time I've had the pleasure of seeing them since just re-affirms that. This was no exception and was a massive highlight of the night. DT play a melodic hardcore/pop-punk cross that is as infectiously catchy to listen to as it is blisteringly fast. We got a mix of time tested classics and brand new bangers to feast our ears upon and the crowd went batshit crazy from start to finish. DROPTHIS look right at home in New Cross and they work the place lie putty in their palms.

The Rocco Lampones  

One of the best street punk bands in the UK today, rivaled only by our own Dynamite Dynamite, The Rocco Lampones school everyone on how to have the most goddamned fun you can possibly have on a stage. I'm not sure whether they have just found some clever way to be shit faced and still play perfectly but nobody is having as good a time as them on stage and that rampant enjoyment affects everyone in the near vicinity!! whether they are kicking out their greatest tunes (available on www.13sx.co.uk) or winding people up with a Black Sabbath cover that nearly burst into life a few times, everyone who watches these guys feels better than when they started.

Mug

I love Mug. The guys in the band don't like it when I gush about them to their faces so this time I've bottled it all up and am about to unleash it here:

Mug are perfect in absolutely every sense I can care to mention. Songs? The best. Riffs? The best. Ability to play note perfect? The best? Presence on a stage? The best.

They are a group of insanely talented individuals who only enhance each other to new levels every time they play and they are one of the true hidden gems of music in the UK. On bass duties was (the also insanely talented) Gray Charles, a fantastic musician in his own right and maybe one of the few people I could think of good enough to keep up with these guys. It doesn't matter that every member in the band are all my good friends I still lose my shit every time they play and for that brief amount of time they are on the stage they are a little better than human!

Darko

Rarely have I been more excited about seeing a band. I discovered Darko fairly recently but they

have been one of the only bands I've had on my stereo for a good few months now. Heavily influenced by the greats of melodic hardcore such as A Wilhelm Scream, Darko may be a lot to take in for the non musicians in the world but are a wet dream for a fan of the genre like me. even given the limitations of New Cross Darko can blast out a set that matches the power and technicality of their stellar EPs without sacrificing quality. I blame Darko for the fact I lost my voice now as I was going pretty goddamned mental while they played and they showed off what makes them top of the crop of the melodic hardcore scene right now. Also it's entirely worth mentioning that they got down early and partied all day and were the nicest guys to have filled the top slot in many a gig that I've played. I had thought that being so talented yet down to earth was a trait only seen in Mug but I'm so happy to know that they also fly the flag for awesomeness too!!!

The Guy with Gold Shoes

Not a band, but possibly the top NX nutter we've ever had the pleasure of entertaining. This gentleman of indeterminate (but roughly wizard) age came in and paid his entrance fee whilst fishing out of his bag the most elaborate pair of gold patterned loafers I've seen in my life. These were serious fucking shoes right here so I needed to ask this man who could have been anywhere between 80 and
9000 what his deal was..... and I wasn't dissapointed!!

So in his building live two scag heads (his words) and they had apparently been harassing and bullying him for some time. Well he had decided that enough was enough and he stormed into their flat, and took pictures of their habit all whist being physically threatened by these ass hats. Undeterred he finished his sweep of the place and sent the photos to the local police who then planned to arrest the couple the very next morning. Because of this hard won victory the guy had decided that he was going to get his bestest dancing shoes on, bring along his nicest elephant t shirt, get absolutely shit face drunk and dance the night away to the best punk rock New Cross has to offer.

I bloody salute you drunken wizard man. I salute you!!

Anyway that about wraps it up for what was once again the greatest time. I don't want to repeat myself in blogs too much so read the previous MOT blogs for how I feel about the atmosphere of the shows, they hold up just as well for this as they did back then.

Come to More Of This!, find your new favourite band, meet your new best friends, have the greatest time. 

Photo thanks to Liz Miss-Daisy, full album is available here

Cope with a broken band family with dignity

Many of us have been there. I don't know too many souls that are gigging with the first (or sometimes even third) band they started playing with. I liken a lot of musical scenarios to having real world relationships and that's because when you are in a band it's like having a significant other. You pour your heart and soul into songs, you need to make concessions to the rest of your life to allow time to let the band flourish and above all else you need to devote love and attention and a lot of effort into maintaining it or it will fall apart.

Just as with many a relationship not every band goes out with a bang, those big blowouts are actually most often the exception and instead bands die of other more mellow things, like members moving away from each other, or often just that the inspiration kind of drys up along with gigs. However it happens it is a regular pattern and when things go sideways however it went down, there is a tendency to lay the breakdown of a band on to people or individuals. Often when a single person is to blame the band will manage to carry on without the rotten element, but if things go south and you are call it a day try not to:

Say it was your band.

This is especially difficult to do when you were the primary songwriter, but a band is a by its very nature a collaborative engagement and every member is as important as the next. If you don't feel this way then you have a bad band and that should be addressed. As I said bands can continue without certain people if they are not pulling their weight. But bragging that it was all you and you did everything just heaps more failure onto you. If you feel that the rest of the bands were just tools for your blinding brilliance then again you fail all by yourself because a good workman never blames his tools. The worst is when several people are all having the same conversation. When you hear people arguing about who was the most important part of a band then all that goes through a persons head is "well I see why they split up".

Talk shit about the others

When you split up with a girlfriend nothing makes you look like more of a jackass than airing every quibble you had with their lifestyle and personality. Being in a band means spending excessive amount of time with other people and part of making it work is finding a way to co-habit while being accepting of the others life. This sort of thing can be seen in student houses. When a person has never had to live with other people before and then gets chucked in a small house/flat with six other people in a bad house each of those people will see themselves as superior and hate the living habits of the other. The same can be said of bands. listening to someone hate on another members timing or inability to tune properly or whatever just means there was no communication in the band and it was doomed to fail. Once more if someone really is a poisonous influence and whatnot then they should not be in that band. That should not have been a reason the band split up forever.

Keep the songs

One of the biggest difficulties when deciding to call it a day for a band is the fact that you have put so much effort into those songs. Literally years of your life could have been spent perfecting the tune you love and when things don't work out then the effort is wasted. Thing is though that song was something that a group of you created and it's not for anyone to take away and keep on rehashing with other people. At best it shows that you have no regard for the previous band and you start falling in to the "it was all my band" territory, at worst it paints you as a one trick pony who you doesn't have the creativity to do something new with a brand new group of people. There are clear exceptions here, if you have a solo side project then you may have reworked a band song to be solo/acoustic and One off performances of popular songs by previous bands when audiences demand it are of course reasonable, but treat them like you would any other cover, something to pull out the box every now and again when you know an audience will appreciate it and don't just create <yourOldBand.0.2>. I knew a guy once that created the same band THREE times. Every time the songs (which were totally his) were the same and he was the only common factor. The band failed every time and still the man can't accept that the only thing constant in each iteration of his group failing was him. That's an extreme case but members from each iteration have other bands now that are successful so there you go. If things change then so should the songs.

I write a lot of words on this blog but they can almost always be concluded with a short soundbite quote.  This time that quote is "have respect for the people you put all that time in with". Ex members of bands are something a little different and something I might cover another time, but yeah, you spent all that time making something you all loved. when it doesn't work out just let it go the way of the buffalo and above all don't be a dick!

Postscript.

Bands I have been in and how they failed:

The Harmaniax - We all went to college and stopped hanging out

Open Ending - Didn't have the guts to tell our lead guitarist he was rubbish so just stopped playing shows

The Valves - Bassist moved to Australia, just generally got bored of the pub circuit

CJD - were too drunk to write new songs/got barred from most venues in Brighton

Another Day Lost - Guitarist fired drummer in a fit of drunken rage, I walked out with him, others left soon after to form successful skapunk band.