A gig here is often compared to like being in someone’s living room. So come and rediscover your love of music this year with us.
Often going to see live music can be a bit hit and miss. But at The Art House, we’ve worked hard on making the whole experience something to remember. We take every effort selecting some of the best emerging talent there is so that you can be confident that whatever you come to see here, you know you’ll have a good time. We want you to be impressed enough that you will need little persuasion to just drop what you’re doing and come to a gig, whoever is playing and whether you have heard of them or not.
We started the year off in style with pounding beats from the streets of Brazil from Southampton’s very own Bat2k ushering in the new year with with infectious songs and rhythms.
On 3rd January we welcome back our lovely friends, Willowen ably supported by the Bumbleberry Folk Collective.
Here’s a clip from the night:
Up close and personal performances are our trademark, with great sound quality (we are often told by artists that we are their new favourite place to perform, for this reason.. that, and the lovely friendly audiences.) A gig here is often compared to like being in someone’s living room. So come and rediscover your love of music this year with us.
Coming to the Art House in January.
Skull Kids + Noah’s House Band \\ Art House \\ Sat 10th Jan
The Art House Gallery, Cafe & Venue
Saturday, 10 January 2015 from 19:30 to 22:30 (GMT)
Southampton, United Kingdom
Tickets and info: https://skullkids1501.eventbrite.co.uk/
THE SKULL KIDS
With nostalgic references to the whimsical psychedelia of the 1960’s, mixed with a variety of more contemporary alternative rock influences, The Skull Kids’ are vocalist and guitarist Jonathan White (Don), bass guitarist Will Scott-Hartley, drummer Ross Gordon, keyboards player Alfie Pugh and graphic artist Eloise Rose. Their music focuses on strong melodies and dramatic ebbs and flows of sound, allusive lyrics blurring the distinction between reality and fantasy.
NOAH’S HOUSE BAND (EP Launch)
From within the hull of Noah’s Ark; comes a quirky series of two to three minute folkesque tunes unlike anything ever heard before. Using vocal dexterity, honky instruments, household implements and the furthest reaches of imagination the cast of characters regale us with their enchanting tales including a hydrophobic Whale and a Duckbill Platypus with an identity crisis. Think the Muppets, old fairy tales, Tom Waits, David Attenborough, Woody Allen and a badger snuffling around in the long grass… all together on the Ark.
Soho Grant presents: Coffee Or Not @
The Art House \\ Support from Mike Vaughan \\ Thur 15th Jan
The Art House Gallery, Cafe & Venue
Thursday, 15 January 2015 from 19:30 to 22:30 (GMT)
Southampton, United Kingdom
Tickets and info: http://coffee1501.eventbrite.co.uk/
COFFEE OR NOT
Coffee Or Not is a Belgian band based in Brussels. Soho and Renaud record music quite electric but where vocal harmonies have an important place. After two albums, their third record, ‘SoRe’, is now darker, more tense, even stormy. From introspective loops to cymbals bursts, or from ethereal pads to shouts, this is now more about tickling the guts than the ears.
They perform captivating concerts, including last year’s gigs at Botanique, Ancienne Belgique, Brussels Summer Festival and Réservoir Paris in 2013.
MIKE VAUGHAN
Mike Vaughan started life, as many do these days, as a fertilised embryo. It is rumoured that he came out of the womb clutching a pair of drumsticks and did a glissando on a nearby piano as he exited his mother. He hasn’t actually seen the evidence, and many questions remain unanswered, like, why did they have a piano in the hospital? But given no evidence to the contrary, let’s assume these are facts.
Mike has played for many local Southampton bands and enrolled in Drumtech in Acton, part of The London College of Music and Media. During this time Mike played for the band Karmic Jera who won several awards including The Best Unsigned Band and were featured in Kerrang magazine, Metal Hammer et al. They toured the country extensively and released one album ‘Zombies Blood and Go-Go Girls’ which was a heady mix of ballads and odes to our mothers.
He likes to write songs rich in metaphor and deeper meanings. He likes cheese on toast. And movies about gladiators. Mike Vaughan – Vocals, Piano, Guitar, Bass, Drums
Andy Billington’s SlugCat + Stuey Goodeve \\ The Art House \\ Sat 17th Jan 2015
The Art House Gallery, Cafe & Venue
Saturday, 17 January 2015 from 19:30 to 22:30 (GMT)
Southampton, United Kingdom
Tickets and info: http://billington1501.eventbrite.co.uk/
ANDY BILLINGTGON
Andy’s songs are journeys — melodic, thoughtful and different to most other artists you will have heard. Colourful music and beautiful melodies accompany hope filled laments.
Think Pink Floyd meets Alan Parsons Project.
The Mexican (Part Juan), for example, is an epic tale of a superhero, with extremely temperamental super powers, called Solar Powered Solar Plexus Man who is constantly harassed by his arch nemesis, the evil and powerful ‘Mexican’. It is a Spaghetti Western world where The Mexican terrorises anyone who stands in his way. Will The Mexican succeed with his evil plan? Will Solar Powered Solar Plexus Man survive to the end of the song?
The band are, loosely, folk / indie / alternative with influences like Sufjan Stevens, Queen, Coldplay, Doves, Beatles, Radiohead, Gloria Estefan, Beck, etc.
Stuey is a singer-songwriter, fingerstyle guitarist and guitar teacher from the South Coast, UK.
Stuey currently performs both solo and with his good buddy Oli Tong (formerly of The Happy Places) in and around the South Coast. Stuey performs a mixture of his own compositions along with his unique versions of classic tunes old and new. Stuey is also known for his unique percussion-guitar style, which when in full effect transforms him into a bona-fide one man band!
ArtfulScribe & The Art House, presents: Dizraeli \\ Tue 20th Jan 2015 (An Art House fundraiser) The Art House Gallery, Cafe & Venue
Tuesday, 20 January 2015 from 19:30 to 22:30 (GMT)
Southampton, United Kingdom
Tickets and info: http://dizraeli1501.eventbrite.co.uk/
Rapper, singer, multi-instrumentalist, poet, person: the half-daft missionary who forced folk to marry hiphop… scooting into new territories that rappers aren’t supposed to enter. MC Dizraeli has won the BBC Radio 4 Poetry Slam and the Farrago UK Slam Championships. He’s written several hiphop plays, including the award-winning The Rebel Cell with Canadian nutbag Baba Brinkman.
He’s part of the Menagerie, the sprawling Brighton-based hiphop collective that aren’t normal, and he does all types of collaborations with hiphop and other artists… Including the unmatched English folk institution and 2 x Radio 2 Folk Awards winner that is Chris Wood. Dizraeli has performed solo spoken word shows all over the world, from Inverness to Zimbabwe. The words stripped bare.
Your host tonight will be Matthew West from Artfulscribe. Artfulscribe is an arts organisation that aims to develop and promote poets through educational workshops and events. Matt will be introducing a glittering array of local talent this evening, including novice performers from his ESF workshops, creative writing / spoken word workshops for people who are long-term unemployed, funded by the European Social fund. The ESF supports employment, helps people enhance their education and skills and improves job prospects.
Supper Club Fundraiser with Billy Kidd; Magician, Street Performer, Entertainer
The Art House Gallery, Cafe & Venue
Friday, 23 January 2015 from 19:30 to 22:30 (GMT)
Southampton, United Kingdom
Tickets and info: http://billykidd1501.eventbrite.com/
For one night only, a little change from our program of music, to bring you some world-class magic and food.
A night of gorgeous food and dazzling magic to raise some funds to help the Art House continue it’s good work! At our supper clubs, we let our chef’s out to play for the night to come up with some of the freshest and most delicious vegetarian and vegan dishes you will ever find and the freshest, most original, entertainers. Come on your own, with your partner or with friends. We have tables for two or three, or join a table for eight and make a new friend!
Tonight, Chef Eadie is taking us to North Africa:
Starter: A selection of breads, olives, home made hummus, vine leaves (+ more!)
Main: Vegetarian tagine (or tajine is an historically Berber dish from North Africa that is named after the type of earthenware pot in which it is cooked.)
Pud: Baklava
We’ll be setting our our big tables and covering them in colour, candles and platters of organic tapas-style tasties that you can eat ’till you’re full.
We will be pausing throughout the evening for some wonderful magic, as we are very excited to welcome magician Billy Kidd! Billy, star of “Breaking Magic .. Magic Meets Science” On The Discovery Channel and guest on Wizard Wars with Penn & Teller, she brings to magic what most magicians don’t or can’t…..magic with a female twist!
This is a highly energetic show filled with mind reading, a hilarious routine based on Houdini’s straight jacket escape, lots of audience participation and one of the oldest magic tricks in the world.
Billy Kidd was born and raised in Edmonton, AB, Canada where she trained extensively in Ballet, Jazz, Tap and Hip Hop with Dance Alberta. Billy is also classically trained in Piano, Sax and Violin. By the age of 12 she was working as an actor in Theatre, Film and Television. At 18 she got accepted into one of the top theatre schools in Canada earning her a BFA in Acting from the University of Alberta. Not only was she heavily working in theatre she also created, choreographed and conducted Canada’s Slappyfeatherwhistle Nose Flute Ensemble with her friend, Emma Hooper AKA Waitress For the Bees!
It was the summer of 2004 in Canada where Billy witnessed a magician entertain a crowd of people on the street, passed his hat, and then did more. Two years later Billy left her job, her friends and her country to become one of the few female magicians working in the world today!
Hot Feet + Jonny Phillips (Willowen) ♬ The Art House ♬ Sat 24th January, 7.30pm
The Art House Gallery, Cafe & Venue
Saturday, 24 January 2015 from 19:30 to 22:30 (GMT)
Southampton, United Kingdom
Tickets and info: http://hotfeet1501.eventbrite.co.uk/
“Truly nothing short of fabulous… really wonderful” – Marc Riley, 6Music
“I predict great things for Hot Feet” – Guy Garvey, 6Music
“Beautifully progressive and original with a nod to some of the greats. They are one of the best bands out there today.” – Folk Radio UK
Formed and based in Stroud, Gloucestershire, Hot Feet may be partly inspired by their rural surroundings, but their eclectic music hints at a darker and more complex world than the pastoral paradise you might expect. After the success of their debut EP, Wood House, the band are currently out on the road again with their second release, Mist Is Dust.
While touring extensively across the UK, taking up a year long London residency and picking up radio support from 6 Music’s Marc Riley and Guy Garvey, the band have shifted gear, moving well beyond traditional singer-songwriter territory to incorporate a range of disparate but complimentary influences. You’ll hear echoes of everything from delta blues and the pulsing rhythms of world music to 60s envelope-pushers like Pentangle, Davy Graham and Bert Jansch, soul, jazz and the chunky psychedelic funk of Can and other Krautrockers.
These new sonic developments, the band are quick to point out, are in no small part down to producer and sometime collaborator Pete Roe, who they first hooked up with after he saw them performing at Glastonbury. Best known as longtime guitarist with Laura Marling as well as a solo performer in his own right, Pete has produced both their EPs to date.
In support tonight .. you’ll recognise him from the wonderful Willowen, it’sJP Music – Jonny Phillips himself! (See the video at the start of this email!)
We guarantee whatever it is you come to see, you will love it, but here’s a little taster video to get you in the mood, featuring Coffee Or Not and Hot Feet.
I am a founding director of a Community Interest Company called The Art House Southampton CIC in the UK. I am a community artist / promoter / facilitator / technologist / general tinkerer! I believe that through the arts, people can rediscover themselves (and thereby reclaim their power.)
