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New decade, random gig number 1

Something of a quiet start to the year for us for one reason or another, so I picked a random band off the Clwb Ifor Bach website and came up with Strange News from Another Star, playing last Friday 5th February.

First time at Clwb Ifor Bach for a while, and it was full (too often there's been an audience just in double figures!) - though as all bands (2 supports, Goodtime Boys and Panic Basket) were local that's not too surprising. I won't waste much time on the dire Panic Basket except to say that screaming "12345678" does not constitute a song! Goodtime Boys were better but neither much our thing.

The main guy from SNFAS, Jimmy Watkins, has a good line in banter, starting the gig with a poem about the residents of St Mellons, and with printed flyers satirising David Cameron! Again, the style of music is probably not our thing (more in the line of my earlier student taste) but certainly interesting and worth checking out. They were described as 'dark bluesy' but turned out to be quite heavy, but not without melody. I'm going to say relatively typical current S Wales band sound, but better than a lot of other offerings I've heard.

Coming up? A few broadly 'classical' things, most interestingly a show by a group called Pianocircus at Cardiff University School of Music in April, preceded by a visit to St Davids Hall to see the Philharmonia.


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