ZODIAC 8 Welcome to this week’s instalment of the Zodiac Lounge, making their long awaited this weeks headliners will be Pony Club, support will come from The Jive Principle, Alice Jago & Peco. Doors are open @ 9:30pm, Admission is €8, €6 with student ID & as usual €5 to members of our mailing list. Drinks promos for the evening include €3.50 cocktails & €3 Corona Beer all night. This week we are offering you a chance to get on our guest list by texting the word “Zodiac” to 087 790 8542. The night’s proceedings will be followed by Andy Colbert playing all of your Indie & rock favourites until 3am. The Zodiac Lounge; Dublin’s Number One Midweek Acoustic Venue – Every Wednesday @ Tomato Night Club, Harcourt St, Dublin 2. Band Biography: PONY CLUB “PONY CLUB” is Mark Cullen, a former get away driver from Dublin. Born and dragged up in Finglas, Dublin’s answer to South Central in LA. “HomeTruths” is his debut album which he describes as an album that will make first time buyers think twice before stepping onto the property ladder. “Home truths” owes a lot to Tiny computers, in fact Mark still owes them the money. “How fucking easy is it to get a computer, fuck abbey road, Tiny will deliver it to your door in a big brown box and you don’t have to pay for it for a year, even if you have a bad credit rating. “ I was always worried that I’d end up living in council flat in Leytonstone with Charlie Dimmock in a rainy edition of ground-force as my only release, but then I had a visit from the Virgin Mary who convinced me to listen to Mariah Carey and have a few vocal aerobic lessons, which I promptly did, and realised that if she could ship triple platinum with such honest, gut wrenching, heart-felt epiphanies that maybe I could as well, and this time next year Dre would be producing the sequel underwater in a swimming pool in LA, modelled in the shape of Heidi Klum’s buttocks.” “I’ve been involved with bands since I was 14, had two major record deals, 6 years of encouragement and sincere apologies from coked-up marketing departments and nervous radio pluggers. With this album, I recorded it in my childhood bedroom, it’s only 10ft by 8ft but I shared it with my two brothers. My Ma has kept it the same way as the day I left. I just took out the bunks and put the “free” computer in and stayed in the room for 5 months, no saunas, no swimming pool, and more importantly no bleedin’ A&R men coming down for a listen.” Mark reckons the album is best listened to in a 3 bedroom Barratt Home, preferably in Enfield with 3 kids and a packet of travel sickness tablets (preferably Boots own) so you can recreate the mood of the original recordings. Straight out of the stalls with “Fuck with my heart”, a glorious Brian Wilson in Ayia Napa soundtrack, as a husband tries to justify his faults to himself and his wife, to the Redbull soaked blues of “CCTV” with the unforgettable line “ I want to run until the houses get ugly where everybody calls their first born Britney”. The gentle soul pleading of “Stop” and the delicate intimacy of “Single” with its spectral rolling piano is perfectly interrupted by “The thing about men”, a song which Mark wrote for Snoop Dogg. Other stand out tracks on the album include “Home is so sad” a song about the disappearance of Marks younger brother when he was 7, to the awesome “What did you expect” probably the most honest lyric ever written. Its only a matter of time before Pony Club’s urban bedroom soul will have them sipping yak and having nightclub shootouts with the Wu tang clan over which Mark Almond track they want to cover. So then, Pony Club, showing the Americans where their white trash came from The Jive Principle The Jive Principle first came into full existence back in May of 1997. Before that point, there was nothing but a cheeky guitarist/songwriter and a stubborn bass guitar player. The guitarist was a young man called Thomas Brady (Tom), and the bass player's name was Alan O' Flynn (Al). Tom and Al had been jamming together for several years playing everything and anything from Guns 'n' Rose's to James Brown to Jimi Hendrix to Neil Young. After a lot of playing and learning, Tom became very bored with all these cover tunes they'd been trashing about and decided it would be much more fun and a much greater test if they started playing original tunes... with that, Tom started trying to figure out how to write a proper meaningful tune which would have a maturity about it that might disguise his age! After some really awful attempts, which left him feeling like he would never write a proper tune, Tom pulled out his first decent song which was called "Inside". Tom was 15 at the time, and the tune is still played today. This was a major turning point which encouraged Al and Tom to start recruiting. They went through many, many people. Practically everyone who they thought might be any good was tried out. This went on for around another two years, leaving the boys feeling like they could never get the right guy's who could play on a par with them. Drummers were always a problem. They were very rare amongst Tom and Al's generation. The only real kick ass Drummer Known to Al and Tom was a friend of Al's big brother named "Fink" (David Dixon). Fink at that time was tied up with another band called "The Blue Iyra Connection". Although Finks' band were pretty dormant at that time, Finks' fellow band members were close friends of his and he didn't want to screw them over, so his loyalty remained firmly with them. Many nights would go past where Fink would return late at night to Al's house with Al's brother and sit in Al's kitchen talking with him for hours about music and bands and other stuff. Eventually, after a few months of Al's convincing, Fink agreed to Jam with them. There was still one problem though, Tom didn't like Fink or people like Fink. Tom didn't like people who wore clothes that represented the music they listened to. Fink had long hair, a parker jacket, hung out with smelly thrashers and hardly spoke a word! After one jam with all three present however, each member thought that what was going down might not have been brilliant, but it was funky as hell, so they decided to record a few tunes. With that, "The flow", "Studio five" and a cover of Neil Youngs, "Rockin in the free world" were recorded in Electra studios in Dublin City a couple of weeks later. Finally... things looked great for them. All they lacked was a front man, and that final piece of the puzzle was about to be discovered. Credit for the meeting of Tom and Damian Channels (Damo), goes out to an extremely close friend of the bands named David Lonergan (Lonzo). Lonzo had his own Reggae/Rock band set up, and with Lonzo only living two doors down from Tom, Tom would often just pop in and jam along with his band. One of that bands members was Damo. Lonzo's band played a lot of songs but Damo only sang one of them. This was "All along the watch tower" (Bob Dylan). The day Tom seen Damo singing that song was the day Tom realised what was to be, rather than what could be! All that had to be done was convince Damo to Jam with them. That was only a matter of time, a jam was arranged in Tom's house for Al, Tom and Damo a few days later. Luckily, Al had roped Fink into coming along. That was the first time that Al, Fink, Tom and Damo had been in the same room together playing tunes. That day they played "All along the watch tower" and a song Damo had written himself called "Belief". Damo's songwritting ability was also another major benefit to the bands future, as Tom and Damo would go on to learn to write together. That was the first time the band had played together but it was not the founding of the band. Tom, Al and Damo were still jamming and played one gig with another drummer - Noel Barrett. Tom and Al felt extremely bad about having to kick Noel out but it was necessary, as Finks skill definitely appeared to be gelling in very well with Al's and his ideas were excellent. Noel is the only person to have been in the band and still remain great friends after being asked to leave... Noel has helped us out with Drum Kits, guitars and has been a roadie with the band all the way, and they owe a lot to him. Once this change was complete and Fink was brought in, The Jive principle was born. Well, almost born! The members were there but no name had been stuck with yet, this was May 1997. The band then went from strength to strength, playing a lot of gigs in both their locality and in Dublin City. They nailed a lot of big gigs around the city, including gigs in the Mean Fiddler & The Temple Bar Music centre. They also played twice a month or so in smaller places like Eamon Dorans, Slattery's and The Da Club. It seemed like they were on a roll when places like Slattery's which were only meant to hold about 200 people, were getting ticket money for 250 people, and the band had allowed around twenty people in free on those nights!! Things were going great when Tom, Al and Damo's final year of school kicked in. This gave the bands future a bad outlook, because time was so limited. Fink took this opportunity to spend some time out of the country in London. These were troubled times for the band as they no longer had a drummer, they couldn't write songs because they had very little time and they couldn't play anywhere. When Fink returned he found three different guy's there than the ones he'd known before and he himself had changed also. Tom, Al and Damo had also spent too much time apart during this time, and when it was time to get it going again the band felt like strangers playing old material, which didn't really get them going. Luckily, a chance came the bands way through a popular English band called "Ocean Colour Scene". Damo and Tom had previously met the band, given them a demo, and asked if they could support them in the future. Some months later, the band received word that they were to support OCS in both Dublin and Belfast! This was exactly what the band needed, a little boost to get them away from school and exams. The two gigs went well, and the reaction was good, but these gigs were low key and poorly advertised, so record company attention was low but it gave the band a taster... A couple of months later the band was finished school and ready to get it going, but they still hadn't recovered from their time apart. It took a good few gigs and a few studio sessions to get them back in gear. Which takes us up to the present. Right now the band is writing, playing, recording and giving out as many CD's as possible. Whats for them, won't go past them. ALICE JAGO No Biography Available, what follows is an expert from an interview in www.songschool.ie Alice Jago talks about song writing Song writing starts for me with an idea that’s in my head that just won’t go away. And if it won’t go way, I’ll just have to write about it. It’s something I have to tell someone. Sometimes I have a word, or a sentence floating round in my head. I would be saying to myself ‘What does that mean? But it doesn’t mean anything to me until I put it to a melody. I write songs in my head, melodies, then I have to go off and look for the chords to express it with a guitar. I’m not the best guitar player, I haven’t been playing that so long so chasing the chords for a melody that’s already written in your head is probably the complete opposite to what amazing guitar players I know would do. I started in music late, when I was well into my twenties. I always knew I’d do something with music because I’ve always loved it. I fell into songwriting from that. And the need to just write somethings down.. I don’t sleep much, I’m kept awake by melodies in my head and I have to get them out someway. That’s when I pick up my guitar. I don’t have my guitar at the moment so I’m going demented. A lot of sleepless nights Peco McLaughlin Formally lead singer & guitarist of Dublin band Pedestrian, Pecos’ solo career is in its infancy and this will be one of his first gigs. A great chance to catch some of his new material as he opens proceeding this week.