Last night I took Emily on a bit of a magical mystery tour over to Coventry. It was a surprise - she didn’t know what we were doing or where we were going.
The reason? Sam Amidon, the artists behind our favourite album of this year “All is Well” was doing a show over at The Tin Angel in Coventry.
Because I co-run Type with John we often get pre-release MP3s from people we’re in contact with. I’ve had this in my iPod/iPhone for months now, and I can wholeheartedly say it’s one of my favourite releases in a long time.
So it felt good to actually go and buy a physical CD from him to say thanks.
Have a listen on the iTunes store.
The venue
‘Why is Birmingham so short of venues like this?’ was my first thought when we got there. It was a converted shop that sells sandwiches during the day and turns into an intimate gig space by night.
We sat on the front row.
The front row of one, consisting of eight chairs.
I think there may have been 30 people tops in the room, and we were joined by Steve Gerrard and his wife Evelyn who are both fans too. Steve seems to get around all sorts of interesting places. The last gig he shot was Mayhem at the Sanctuary, complete with severed pigs head and blood on stage - this was a stark contrast.
Wouldn’t it be nice if a few of these micro-venues would pop up around Birmingham - what’s stopping that happening? Rents? Availability?
I’d certainly recommend the Tin Angel - lovely people, nice location, good list of shows they’re running. I’ll be back.
The Photos
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Tags: samamidon, gig, coventry, tin angel
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5 Comments
over on birmingham alive! (yeah, ok, i know the xhtml / accessibility leaves something to be desired - i’m still working on a complete recode !) when reviewing gigs i frequently muse upon this.
i think it’s a vicious circle - so often i go to the small pub-based gigs to see the only people who’ve bothered to turn out are the friends of the band playing; what’s worse is when there are several bands on in a line-up, the friends turn up for that band, & then bog off (along with the band) straight after, leaving the next band on to play to only their friends. few people seem to be prepared to just go out to the flapper or wherever just to see whoever happens to be playing.
so with that kind of lack of support from The People, what incentive is there for a prospective venue owner to set up?
Thanks for a lovely surprise Stef! A super treat
Ooh! And Valgeir from Bedroom Community got in touch and asked very nicely if they could use these shots for press releases and such. Creative Commons in action again…
I bet the Kitchen Garden café in King’s Heath could pull off gigs like this (not really competing with the Hare & Hounds opposite as their smallest room is hardly tiny). In fact I’m annoyed I didn’t think of that in time for the Red Deer tour’s Midlands-shaped gap!
Could we get some promoters chinwagging?
John and I from Type are looking for people to connect with and make a few shows happen… drop him a line and say hi?