Unlit House Party! 23/10/10
with Jont, Little Fish, Ben Walker, Tony Kaye & Daniel Hernandez
Unlit is a concept born in the mind of a man who goes by the name 'Jont', and started out by Jont using his home as a gig venue organising a series of bands to play short sets followed by a rocking party. Jont did this for awhile before his neighbours became annoyed by it, it could have been the end of the dream, but something magic happened. Some of his friends told Jont that they would let him turn their homes into venues for the night, and thus Unlit thrived. At it's core, Unlit Records relies on the kindness and graciousness of the hosts and trust in the attendees to behave themselves and respect the enormous leap of faith in letting complete strangers enter their homes. This is a true testament to some of the greatest qualities in people, and Jont has brought this magical event to the States, Italy, (I think France, and maybe more) and of course the UK.
I had gotten an invite to this party via Twitter, from one of the acts playing there that evening 'Little Fish' a trio (although tonight a duo) from Oxford who I had seen previously supporting Placebo for both nights at Brixton Academy (see my blog entry on this here). I had tried to convince some of my friends to come with me, but they were all too busy, too skint, or otherwise inaccessible to join me. I was teetering on the edge of 'coming' or 'not coming' and it wasn't until a five minutes before I left that I decided that I would go, and I would make friends there (this was something I would later find out, I would NOT regret). So I made my way to London, and headed to the brick lane area where the party was. I drew myself a little map as my phone lacks the internet capabilities that most have at their fingertips on their mobile phones, and it was a relatively simple journey. When I arrived at the front door, the buzzed me up and I was greeted with this sign.
I had arrived as suggested with a bottle of wine (white wine from ASDA) and I was greeted as soon as I had arrived by many friendly faces and got talking to quite a few different people almost instantly. I was nervous at first, it has been some time since I last attended a house party, and even longer to a house party that I did not know the host, and well never had I come to one alone before. My nerves were quickly subsided, with good conversation and alcohol, the great social lubricant that it is.
While standing outside on the Balcony, admiring the view of London from this very lovely Flat, I got talking to the man who gave birth to Unlit (metaphorically speaking of course), the great Jont. He was very appreciative of the fact that I had taken the leap of faith to come, and we got talking about how Unlit began, which is a subject I believe I have already covered in the first paragraph of this blog, so I shall save myself in repeating this.
The stunning view of London from the balcony.
So the evenings entertainment began sometime around 10:30pm. Jont began the evening by introducing a man dressed as a clown, by the name of Daniel Hernandez, who took to his position and the crowd around him watched as took out some plastic bags and watched them fall to the floor. He did this a few more times before throwing around a huge number of blue plastic bags all over the place and then he took out a large blue plastic sheet, which he assembled into a backdrop resembling the sky, with a little sun in the corner and an umbrella he had cleverly turned into a palm tree. Hernandez continued by miming along to a song, with some classic clowning gesturing and expressions. It was a nice gentle opening to the night, and was entertaining although it did remind me at times of Norman Lovett, of Red Dwarf fame as Holly (his show in Edinburgh Festival Fringe this year, was very much a plastic bag floating event).
Daniel Hernandez albeit not the best picture, but it was dark and I didn't want to use Flash.
After Hernandez, a man called Tony Kaye entered the middle of the crowd with his acoustic guitar. If you don't know who Tony Kaye is he directed one of my favourite films American History X, and I had no idea he would be here when I came. I did briefly meet him, but I felt a bit to fanboyish I got his autograph (well actually he did a little doodle for me, see it here). Tony Kaye played just two songs (I think) but they were brilliant, I found a youtube clip of one of the songs he played The Hell Of Compromise enjoy! I only wish I could have managed something more intelligent to say to him, rather than "I really loved American History X, it's one of my favourite films". Oh well, at least I got the doodle.
Tony Kaye with his guitar in middle, and next to him is Jont, in the bottom corner incidentally is Daniel Hernandez, and to the left of Kaye, is Hernandez creation (the umbrella tree, and the blue plastic backdrop, complete with bright yellow sun)
After Kaye, Ben Walker (who plays the Hammond in Little Fish, and has played with Jont for many years) played a series of 12 second songs on his guitar which were all very funny and got a lot of laughs from the audience. Songs ranging from favourite shirts with stains on, to imagining what you could hear if you could un-mute a silent film (see below).
We had a little break to allow Little Fish to set up, and got some more drinks, and when we returned Little Fish was being introduced to us by Jont, and Julia "Juju" Sophie Heslop declared that she doesn't really do many acoustic shows and stating there aren't enough women in rock, and her shows are normally louder. This was a special treat to see them in this environment, having previously seen in Brixton academy, this was a very different experience. They began off by playing 'Darling Dear', a song I was familiar with, followed by a new song called "Hollywood" which required some audience participation, during the chorus one half of the audience sang "Old fashioned morphine", followed by the other half singing "old fashioned love". This kind of sing song environment may be somewhat different to what Little Fish are used to, but they really excelled here.
Little Fish have an album out called Baffled and Beat, which was released in August under Island Records.
Little Fish were loved by all it seemed and when they finished their three songs, the everyone clearly wanted more, so they obliged us very kindly with a few more songs from them as a band, and a few more with Juju solo. When she had finished I got the chance to talk to them and got them to sign a note book I had with me, and they wrote this (Juju's message & Ben's message), I told them how I had first heard them at the Placebo shows (see here) and they seemed very happy that I had come to see them. After that the music went up and we all danced. Well we danced for a little while before the neighbours complained.
Even though the music had stopped, it wasn't quite the end. Jont played us a couple of very beautiful songs of his. I have to say the whole good natured spiritedness of this whole evening is all thanks to this man, who has a new album coming out soon 'Whole Again' through Jont's own lable Unlit Records, which you can get signed by the whole band, and he is having an album launch party, and you can buy tickets to go here on the 12th of November for just £5 (a bargain if I do say so myself).
Jont playing the last couple of songs of the evening, and being lit by the Juju of Little Fish
I didn't leave the party till gone 5am! Where luckily, and very kindly Jont's friend and manager gave me a lift back to Kings Cross St.Pancras so I could get home. Little did I know I wouldn't be getting back into my house until 8:30 in the morning, due to maintenance work on going on between Cricklewood and St.Albans. But a lovely Freezing cold (3 degree's) Coach service shuttled us very slowly to St.Albans. Oh well, it was a perfect night, and it didn't matter how bad the journey home was, I will remember it for the great company and the great music of what is Unlit house party. And what a great way to end a great week of live music for me, 5 gigs in 6 days!
A special thanks goes to the hosts of the evening who were trusting enough to let a whole load of strangers into their house to enjoy the fabulous music, and a big thanks to Jont and Lee for organising it all and everything. Thank you so much.
Little Fish's first song of the evening 'Darling Dear'
Me with Ben Walker & Juju of Little Fish
Note: there was another band scheduled to play, but couldn't make it unfortunately, but you should check them out: http://www.myspace.com/holdenofficial
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