The Penny Black Remedy (UK/KRO/NED)
Kort
tid før han flyttet fra hjembyen Edinburgh til Nord-London, dyrket
sanger og tekstforfatter Keith M Thomson ideen om å danne et band
med internasjonale musikere med sikte på å realisere sin unike
blanding av country, punk, ska og Balkan Folk.
Etter å ha flyttet til London fikk han kontakt med akkurat den type
likesinnede og talentfulle musikere som kunne gjøre hans idé til en
realitet: "Drikk har ofte gitt meg mot til å forfølge mine mange dag
drømmer, noen med positive resultater, andre mindre. Heldigvis,
denne gangen viste seg å være positivt strålende. "sier Keith.
Vi presenterer bandet:
The Penny Black Remedy består av Keith M Thomson på vokal, gitar og
sang-skriving, klassisk utdannet, kroatisk vokalist / perkusjonist
Marijana Hajdarhodzic og rytmeseksjon av den nederlandske
trommeslageren Wilco Van Eijk og bassist Steve Nelson, fra London.
Som Keith uttrykker det, "Det var iøynefallende fra vår aller første
øving at dette ikke bare var tenkt å fungere ufattelig bra
musikalsk, men at vi delte samme lidenskap, drive, sans for humor og
en forbløffende kollektiv evne til å fremdeles utføre mens beruset."
Les meir om bandet på engelsk: The
Penny Black Remedy’s symbiance of darkly comic, unpretentiously
intelligent, stubbornly genre defying and catchy songs and their
exhilarating live shows have been wowing audiences and promoters
alike in places as far afield as London, Holland and Croatia,
building a loyal following of dedicated fans, as a result. Keith
ponders, ‘We’re just trying to take people back to the days when you
can have a good old fashioned sing-song and a knees up around either
a camp fire or an old piano. The fact that most of my songs are
about death, lost love, brothels or just trying to live in a
constant state of crippling paranoid fear and cope with the daily
grind of everyday life is irrelevant. If anything, encouraging
people to sing loudly and out of tune about the absurdity of general
existence seems to instil a sense of comfort and unity. I think.’
Highlights
so far include winning the Gibson Guitar Best Alternative Act at the
2008 UK Indy Awards, sharing bills with such distinguished acts as
The Buzzcocks, Starsailor, The Boys, Joanna Newsom, Alabama 3 and
many others at legendary places such as The Kentish Town (HMV) Forum
and The 100 Club, and selling out premier London venues such as The
Borderline, Charlotte Street Blues Bar and The 12 Bar Club (3
nights). They have also performed to thousands at festivals such as
Stokefest, London, The Valkhof Festival in Nijmegen, Holland and a
run of shows at the 2009 Edinburgh Fringe Festival, including one in
the notorious fringe venue, the Udderbelly. They also recently
travelled to Amsterdam in September 2009 to perform to a packed
house in one of Europe’s greatest venues The Melkweg.
Impressively, in between the constant gigging, they managed to find
time to record their debut album “No One’s Fault But Your Own” in
Zagreb, Croatia. Released in 2009 on their self-managed record
label, Soundinistas, the album has international distribution (both
physical and digital e.g. itunes etc) through Cadiz Music. On
release, the album was received with rave reviews;
Robin Denselow from The Guardian claiming that the track I Won't
Argue When I'm Dead was "Quite simply, the finest country
sing-along I've heard on the vexed pop topic of how one's body
should be disposed of after death." The album has also already
featured on Steve Lamacq’s BBC Radio 6 show, ‘winning’ the ‘song
title of the week’ award for the track Come Back When You Have
More Ambition.
