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People, Parties & Panels

Artist Showcases

Live from London - One last night on the MUSEXPO Europe band trail..

The final night of gigs at MUSEXPO Europe 08 kicked off with Hertfordshire band Jukebox Vandals. The five-piece follow a long tradition of skippy, danceable indie pop bands from Britain. They won the Xfm Uploaded unsigned band competition recently after enjoying some airplay on the station. Theirs is certainly a formula that could find an audience outside Britain too.

The Travelling Band play a lovely country-infused goodness complete with flawless harmonies and some very decent songwriting. Their debut album 'Under The Pavement' is released in a couple of weeks and they've sold us on pre-ordering a copy already. Former winners of Glastonbury Unsigned competition, we were in disbelief that these guys are from Manchester, England - it's the kind nfo astute twang-pop that drips with Americana authenticity.

Natalia Lesz is a Polish pop star who peddles a convincing guitar-led euro pop. It's accomplished stuff, as well it might be given that she's recently worked on an album with two of the world’s best producers: Greg Wells (Celine Dion, Mika, OneRepublic, Katy Perry) and Glen Ballard (Alanis Morissette, No Doubt, Shakira, Michael Jackson). Her first two singles “Fall” and “Power of Attraction,” made it to the top of the Polish singles chart. It's difficult to see where something so euro-pop might be placed in any particular market, but with the right songs we're sure she'll be heard above the noise.

Laura Izibor blew us away at Borderline. We've been fans of the Dublin-born soul singer since hearing some of the tracks from her forthcoming album 'Let The Truth Be Told'. Signed to Atlantic, her powerful voice was enough to silence the normally chatty industry crowd. She sang three songs that sound like out-of-the-box hits, first single 'From My Heart To Yours', 'Shine' which will be a single in the new year and 'If Tonight Is My Last', which is essentially a re-imagining of Whitney Houston's 'Your Love Is My Love'. Fantastic stage presence, great songs, backed by a fine band- what's not to love?

Danish band Dúné played a rapid-fire set at the Metro. They're a bunch of annoyingly good-looking 18/19 year-olds whose heavy riffs and screaming, soaring vocals bridge a gap between electro and sex-pop. They played their MUSEXPO Europe show with conviction, and seemed to be having a lot of fun. Having listened to their album 'We Are In There, You Are Out Here', we're happy to say their live prowess translates to the record. Ones to watch.

Melbourne band Young Lovers brought proceedings to a close at Metro with their high energy synth--driven rock. The influences and comparisons were too many to count: Depeche Mode, a poppier Foals, one song even had a similar intro to U2's 'With Or Without You' before veering into a properly banging dance-rock song. Call it hybrid music if you like, one thing is certain,Young Lovers are an invigorating live act. A fittingly thrilling end to Musexpo Europe's live programme for this year.

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[All Photos Courtsey of KC Morse]

Global Radio Forum

MUSEXPO Europe's final panel of this year's event had the good fortune of a line-up which included the most relevant men in radio from around the world. Jeff Smith, head of BBC Radio 2 couldn't have picked a better time to get out of the office, given the current Russell Brand/ Jonathan Ross 'Sachsgate Scandal' that's dominating the front pages in the host country at the moment. Co-moderator Andrew Phillips told the audience from the off that that prickly issue was off-limits during this panel, as news filtered through that Brand had resigned from his Radio 2 show.

Not that we needed to pick over the titillating tabloid stories when there were more important things to mull over.

“Is radio still relevant?” Phillips asked a bunch of men who were always going to fight their corner, with London's Capital FM, Australian station Triple J, KROQ Los Angeles and UK station Absolute all represented on the panel. Jeff Smith noted radio's role as “more important than ever before in a sea of music” with Yahoo's John Lenac agreeing that, given the ubiquity of choice for music everywhere, filters for the music are more needed than ever.

Lenac later berated some radio stations for not understanding how to integrate social networking understanding into their programming. Stations with large MySpace presence didn't help, simply resulting in more traffic, and more money, for Mr. Murdoch.

In the age of exploiting radio content for as many uses as possible (podcasting/ events/ video streams) Mark Findaly of Capital FM said the biggest danger facing them was “not forgetting about the original radio content”. Richard Kingsmill of Triple J followed by giving an example of his station's role in exploiting the content that tests well on-air. Currently their comedy series about the US Elections (which has aired previously on Triple J), is now the No1 podcast on iTunes Australia.

Clive Dickens of Absolute warned of radio stations “narrowcasting music”, featuring it simply because it was signed to a large label. It was certainly encouraging to hear the COO of a large commercial station talk about playing music irregardless of whether it's signed, unsigned or has a 'plot' or not. He also got a plug in for an unsigned band added to Absolute Radio last week – Jersey Budd

As the panels closed, the assembled delegates got their networking shoes on for a cocktail party hosted by Natalia Lesz at Carbon Lounge, presumably exchanging them for dancing shoes later on for the final night of the live showcase schedule – of which, more later.

In Conversation: The Music Men

Another day, another couple of music industry legends to grace the stage at The Cumberland. This time the turn of XL MD Richard Russell and Mute Records President Daniel Miller.

Both of them admitted that one of the ways of making their engagement with the business more interesting was to still make music themselves, or as Miller put it “I just like mucking about with synthesizers.”

Russell feels that in the time since XL began he's become more uncompromising about the people he works with, and in the past 10-15 years has got back to doing it largely on instinct.

Daniel Miller admitted that he doesn't like many different types of music and doesn't have a large record collection at home. In the mid nineties, he said he went through a fallow signing period, being disinterested in a lot of the music coming out then, until he signed latterly influential electronic act Add N To (X).

When the topic turned to dealing with the difficulty of getting an artist away in the face of a disinterested public and media, Richard cited MIA as an example of an artist who provoked an “overwhelmingly negative” reaction from media when she first surfaced.

“You've got to feel you're right in the face of evidence that you're wrong”, said Russell. And how right he was with MIA, whose single 'Paper Planes', he revealed is now the biggest selling single on XL ever, worldwide.

Miller cited Moby as an artist he had to let explore their own ambitions,even if it wasn't attuned to the rest of the music coming out at the same time. When artists like Prodigy were emerging, Moby went off and made a “lo-fi punk-rock album”, an effort when latterly enabled him to make the massive unit-shifting 'Play' album. “Sometimes doing nothing is the best input you can give” Miller said.

Miller also revealed that he passed on Nine Inch Nails even though Trent was desperate to be on Mute.

Global Live Entertainment Forum

The Live Entertainment Panel (co-moderated by RotD editor Nicola Slade and ILMC's Allan Macgowan) was a predictably no-nonsense affair.

With panelists such as Harvey Goldsmith and Australian promoter Michael Chugg in attendance, it was hardly a surprise that straight talking would be the order of the day. The panel touched on many subjects in a lively and personable fashion: 360 degree deals, which Ossy Hoppe (Scandinavian booker) decried with enthusiasm, while Goldsmith surprisingly defended (to a point);brand sponsorship as a means of investment in live music (AEG Live managing director Jessica Koravos revealed that O2 invest £6m in the AEG-run venue in London each year).

New technologies was also broached as a subject (all agreed that webcasting and the like have failed to take off owing to the simple fact it is hard to replicate a live show). However, the real hot topic of the hour was addressing the growing problem that middle-weight acts (Goldsmith cited Sheryl Crow as an example) are failing to reach the 'upper echelons' of touring where they might sell out arenas or stadiums.

A lot of the blame was aimed squarely at record companies who are often seen to give up on an act too soon. CAA agent Emma Banks was brave in suggesting that the public's need for immediacy has meant that acts only tend to get one shot these days. In conclusion though, the general feeling about the live sector was upbeat and optimistic, suggesting that even in times of economic difficulty the industry still has the strength to survive.

Global A&R Forum

A wealth of A&R experience gathered to discuss the finer points of the decisions and methods used to spot and shape talent in an ever-competitive and always-changing environment.

Discussions were moderated by Ajax Scott of Woodshed Media and Mike Walsh, Head of Music, XFM. Getting around to the level of expectations heaped upon artists to sign deals to majors, Martin Dodd (VP of A&R Worldwide SonyBMG) thought that it was a shame that artists who sign 300-500k copies aren't considered a success and talked about 'setting the ambition level' realistically with each signing.

Nick Raphael, MD of Epic saw A&R's role as people who are in essence “opportunists”. He also pointed out that the role is increasingly about spotting movements, trends and the momentum within. With The Priests (who Nick signed to Epic in a flurry of publicity last year), he said he saw the Catholic Church as a movement with quite a momentum, and that he will “pray for success”.
This led Mark Jones from Wall of Sound to quip that he's signed an act named The Qur'an.

Corny jokes aside, the issue of the spiraling costs of deals was raised. Christian Tattersfield from 14th Floor said he'd never been involved in a bidding war and wouldn't ever be. A&R men hitting each other on the heads with wallets is the thing to be avoided, agreed most of the panel.

Before they made phone calls to The Temper Traps' manager to put in a ludicrous offer. (We jest).

Sleet 'n' Success: Musexpo Europe 08 Showcases - Night 2

After another cocktail reception, hosted by the kind folk at MCPS-PRS, it was time for the MUSEXPO Europe faithful to venture out into the cold, wet and later on snowy London weather to watch another night of handpicked bands.

Hailing from Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada, Domenica are a hard rock quartet fronted by former teen model Bekki. But there's nothing postured about their fiercely aggressive live show at Metro tonight. Reminding us of bands like POD and Evanescence (in that they have some pop hooks as well as strong rock riffs), their metal chops come to the fore in the live show, which almost split it up. 'I Love My Gun' is the recommended listening from their MySpace.

Fabienne Holloway was a revelation for many at her Borderline show. Previously signed to Roc-A-Fella/Def Jam, this 17 year-old English girl is now out of that deal, but already has a wealth of experience in the business and it shows in her confident, at times effortless performance. Her cover of Etta James' 'I'd Rather Go Blind' was spine-tingling, even if some of her original material might need fine-tuning. On that note, songwriter Diane Warren has chosen to work with her - little wonder given this fine display. She mastered the slow jams and the uptown Motown-esque numbers didn't go down too badly either. A huge voice, and masses of potential.

Another Winnipeg band followed at Metro. Floor Thirteen make high-energy rock in a classic rock vein. Singer Jeremy Koz has quite the voice on him, a rasping rock voice that would have Robert Plant reaching for the throat lozenges. They immediately struck us as owing a debt to Jet in their commercial sound. A refreshingly energetic show to warm the cockles of the frozen crowd, they also win the 'Rock Posturing' award for shapes thrown.

Swiss band The Bianca Story were an interesting prospect. Not quite new-wave nor post-punk, they blended a mish-mash of genres, never settling on one (even throwing in the odd bit of synth, which we approved of). Dark, moody art rock to melodic, danceable indie-pop, they're almost unnervingly erratic in their broad-minded approach to musical style. Recorded looping sample of the Musexpo crowd -participation could have gone horribly wrong, but instead showed they had a sense of fun too.

British Ska/Punk outfit The King Blues are that rarest of things, a young band with a genuinely political approach to their work. They were born out a creative squat in London's east end and vocally support anti-racism and anti-capitalism agendas. Happily they deliver their anger with protest songs that have a raucous reggae-tinged sound. Now signed to Field Recordings/Island in the UK, The King Blues have a special blend that deserves to spread to other territories too – seek out their forthcoming second album 'Save The World, Get The Girl' when it arrives.

Melbourne band The Temper Trap attracted many an A&R down to Borderline. It was worth the trip, if only to prove that there's much more to Australian music than Jet and Wolfmother. Singer & guitarist Dougy’s sweet vocal drives the sound, which we couldn't begin to find comparisons to. Pitchfork, those arbiters of fashionable music, did try though and said that their new single 'Sweet Disposition' was "an elegant, radio-friendly anthem, with ringing U2-style guitars and portentous Chris Martin-style vocals". Smart song progression, entrancing vocals and some standout songs make us want to hear their full length debut even more. They recently completed the album with UK producer Jim Abbiss (Bjork, Placebo and Arctic Monkeys).Check out the video for 'Sweet Disposition'. We hope those A&R folk brought their chequebooks.

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[All Photos Courtsey of KC Morse]