Fused have produced a new Area Student Guide and a guide to Chinatown.
- Keeping it local: regional theatre needs new media | Stage | guardian.co.uk
“The challenge for arts organisations outside London is to embrace the blogosphere, and fast. I think we need to work hard to nurture the brave souls who are often spending their free time running what’s-on sites and blogs – invite them to our shows, treat them like proper journalists, buy them lunch, encourage our suppliers to buy advertising space on their websites, link to their sites from ours and so on. If we help listings sites and blogs to grow, we’re safeguarding the future of arts criticism.” - Sky Arts launches Ignition investment scheme
£200,000 cash investment for six chosen projects, and bursaries of £30,000 each for young, talented individuals - GZA/Genius (of Wu-Tang Clan) | Hare and Hounds
The GZA. In a pub. In a Birmingham suburb. For a tenner. How? - Fireworks, intrigue and change
A thoughtful piece from Friction Arts’ Sandra Hall. Turning Point West Midlands are apparently lining up some specially commissioned essays from a range of people – looking forward to the rest - “Brum band The Toy Hearts had the following stolen last night: STOLEN GEAR – 6th April 2011 2 x…”
Ouch. Have a look at the list, see if you happen see any of this stuff anywhere - Staffordshire Hoard
New website for the hoard. Hat tip D’log for spotting it - Support Sound It Out (SIO)
Petition for Sound It Out’s ACE National Portfolio application to be reassessed - Highbury Studio – Birmingham’s Top40 Artists
A list of Birmingham artists who have had a Top40 record somewhere - Fullrange – Colman Getty
Good follow-up from Lee Kemp on the Library of Birmingham PR contract thing. Includes an interesting bit on tender documents - The Catapult Club celebrates 10 years at Birmingham’s 02 Academy « Area Culture Guide
Impressive stuff - Birmingham’s £25m academy
“The academy, which is adjacent to Millennium Point in central Birmingham, is being created in partnership with London’s Brit School and Maverick TV” - We Are « Nomad Projeckt
“The Nomad Projeckt is an artistic collective which specialise in the producing audio and visual work of all kinds inspired by old and new hip-hop movements, for details of our work have a look around the site.” - Twitter / David McAlmont: Birmingham is also confoun …
“Birmingham is also confounding one’s expectations with its hot male totty count. I’m warming to the place.” - Turning Point West Midlands – Artists’ News & Opportunities Bulletin, 31 March 2011
Loads of stuff in this. Worth subscribing to (it’s a PDF, btw) - Bank your thoughts: artists access to technology?
“iShed (www.ished.net) is conducting a feasibility study, supported by Arts Council England, into the potential of a web-based ‘Technology Bank’, where tech and related software can be advertised and offered on loan to creative projects in return for accreditation and shared learning”. Looks like it could be a good thing - The Blue Orange Theatre – Birmingham
Funny – I was wondering about this place the other day. New theatre in Birmingham, due to open 13 April with ‘What The Butler Saw’ although I think there may have been a launch event last night - Fused Magazine – Fused at SXSW 11
Fused went to SXSW and pointed a camera at bands and people dancing in the street
It’s actually a little tricky to find out about local music around the city, I find. This is the stuff I know about, feel free to add other stuff in the comments.
News
Brum Notes is the website for the free, monthly music and lifestyle magazine (Nov issue out now, Oct one online here).
The Birmingham Post have news and reviews here and the Birmingham Mail do rock/pop news.
Fused Magazine‘s site does the odd bit of music news, as does the website for sister magazine Area.
Surge Music takes a wider, Midlands-wide view of things, with articles and lists of gigs, bands and venues.
Cul-de-Sac turned out to be a false dawn for this sort of thing, but may come back one day.
@birminghamlive and @brumpunks are good sources for concert info too.
Reviews
Birmingham Live is the obvious choice here – someone from their ranks of volunteer reviewers and photographers will be at a gig in Birmingham pretty much every evening. Steve Gerrard organises this one (Lee Allen and I have also chipped in occasionally).
The Hearing Aid is a blog by someone called The Baron who goes to an impressive number of local gigs.
The Birmingham Mail do gig reviews too.
Get-togethers
The Birmingham Music Network meets monthly at the Department of Technology, Engineering and the Environment (T.E.E.) at Millennium Point. Their website has a good range of resources too.
Audio
I’m on shakier ground here – which radio shows promote local talent There’s Brumcast on Rhubarb Radio and Introducing on BBC WM. I don’t know enough about the shows on New Style Radio, Aston FM or any others.
Are there any Birmingham-based mp3 blogs worth talking about?
Anything else?
Let me know in the comments. Just to be clear, we’re not looking for bands/venues/promoters to plug themselves but if that’s you, where do you look to get featured?
Oh, and see also Birmingham listings.
(pic – The Editors by Steve Gerrard from the opening night of the new Academy)
- Fused Magazine – final call for delegates
If you are a manager of a band, promoter, record label owner, music journalist, A&R, Label, DJ – anything related to music in the region and are interested in attending the SXSW festival at a subsidised rate contact Kerry Thomas on 0121 246 1946 / kerry@fusedmagazine.com. - Burn fm’s Battle of the Bands
Burn fm is holding a BOTB with a few other societies (Rock Society, Band Society) and Vale Fest, a charity festival entirely run by students. Any profits from the £5 ticket price will go towards the Vale Festival charities. - Punch Records are looking for an intern
The successful applicant will be working with the Bass Festival’s marketing team. Interested? Call Sophie in the Punch office on 0121 224 7444 or email sophie@punch-records.co.uk - Joanna Geary on Social Media
Insightful presentation from Development Editor Jo Geary on some of the lessons she’s learned while building the Birmingham Post’s presence in social media. - Art Connect
Created in Birmingham has been profiled and reviewed on the website Art Connect. The site looks at the importance of arts blogs, and said some very nice things about this one!
Fused Magazine is working with UK Trade & Investment, getting together a group of music industry types to visit this year’s South by South West Music festival, held in Austin Texas this March. Fused are also offering £500 towards expenses for the chosen promoters, Labels, Managers, etc. Last year Fused rounded up some up and coming UK bands and flew them over perform at a Fused @ SXSW event.
Why apply?
The SXSW MUSIC AND MEDIA CONFERENCE showcases hundreds of musical acts from around the globe on over eighty stages in downtown Austin. By day, conference registrants do business in the SXSW Trade Show in the Austin Convention Center and partake of a full agenda of informative, provocative panel discussions featuring hundreds of speakers of international stature.
The fund covers up to 50% of your costs. These costs can include: your event pass or ticket, travel expenses and accommodation costs. Costs will be reimbursed upon production of receipts up to a maximum of: £500.
Applications close on 20th January, to apply fill out the short application.
Fused Magazine have just launched their revamped website, and a lovely thing it is.
For those that don’t know Fused, they produce a quarterly publication that covers fashion, music, arts, etc and so on. They also produced a rather good students’ guide to Birmingham, a responsible for the Ltd Edition affordable art market and promote local bands overseas at showcases like SXSW.
The magazine’s distributed internationally but their blog tends to throw in lots of local mentions with posts about Plus+ and Eastside Projects recently.
Here’s what the site looks like:
Made Media made it.
Last year at LTD Edition, an affordable art market organised by Fused Magazine, 30 artists sold their work to over 100 visitors in one weekend. Kerry from Fused has written to say that this year:
We are bringing a touch of culture (not that it doesn’t have bundles already) to the Custard Factory with 4 art markets planned from July onwards, all happening as an addition to the Sunday Flea
If you’re an artist and want to take part then see the site for the contact information. The blog will carry updates on the artists involved and pictures of their work/what’s going on generally.
