R.I.P Ken Russel. Another star moves on.

AMUSING OURSELVES TO DEATH

Still think your not controlled...?

MANATUMBLR

So...with a new year comes a new central hub for all manatees activities.
Thats right, we've gone fucking digital and opened a tumblr page.
We'll be updating this often with tours, merch, news and general crap we've been up to. So go check it out h e r e and "follow" us, so that we dont feel like complete losers wasting our time.
http://sunclimber.tumblr.com

While I'm speaking manatees, we are making progress slowly on the release of our next record "Helvellyn" (read about the recording and Rocksound magazine feature from last year h e r e ) and are Touring with Leeds duo Khuda this month.

You can find the dates on our new Tumblr page, or on my previous "blackmanaflag" shirt post.
be there or be a dick.

BLACK MANAFLAG T SHIRT

New T shirt design for upcoming short UK tour.
Rip/Homage to Classic Black Flag Bars logo origionaly by Raymond Pettibon.
These will be available for sale, along with gold and silver reprints of the "ghostship" shirt by leeds illustrator Drew Millward at following UK dates:

18.02.2011 - Edinburgh @ Bannermans
19.02.2011 - Glasgow @ Bloc
20.02.2011 - Sunderland @ The Borough
21.02.2011 - Leeds @ The Well
22.02.2011 - Liverpool @ Don't Drop The Dumbells
23.02.2011 - Nottingham @ tbc
24.02.2011 - TBA
25.02.2011 - London - The Unicorn
26.02.2011 - TBA

O)))' MALLEY vs MACARTE.

Still raking through old pics. Totally forgot about these snaps and never uploaded them to my own blog at the time, But Artist/musician Stephen O'Malley of Sunn O))), Khanate, Burning Witch, et al, was kind enough to put them up on his own Blog/website Ideologic.org, along with the slightly hazey fanboy email I sent him way back in December 2009...yep they are blurry, yep they are hazy,yep they are abstract, but they really do visually represtent my experience of those shows.
Taken from Ideologic.org Dec 09:
SUNN O))) vs most excellent fanmail 30 12 2009
Hello There Stephen.
Here are some shots taken on 35mm film with an Old russain Lomo LCA of firstly the Sunn O))) monoliths performance at Islington Mill Manchester Dec 09 and the Monoliths show at ATP 10 Years. They are by no means professional and the results are pretty wierd, but thats why I like using that camera... I hope they are of some interest.
I must say as if the Islington Mill wasnt transcendial enough, the ATP performances litterly blew my mind. The reason there are few pics of the ATP show...well as many folk battled to get to the front to fully aurally and visually experience the performance, myself and some freinds found the option of sitting at the back of the room against a wooden barrier much more appealing, mostly due to our intake of recreational smoke which made us oh so weary. Well i found this was the optimum position to FULLY exprience Sunn O))) as the wooden barrier acted as another amplifier to the vibrations. It was like having a massage chair ALL OVER my body. The sound litterally resonated through my body, bones vibrating, teeth rattling, and im sure my brain it's self was being vibrated. this sent me into a complete trance like state and soon I could no longer move, my arms and legs numb from the power of the vibrations. My mind wondered through plains deep in my subconcious, shapes, colours, clouds all racing through my mind, neither awake nor asleep. Truly amazing physical state. And the most deafening point of all was the point where the amplifiers were turned off and my ears were hit with the equivilent of throwing my body in an ice water plunge pool after time stewing in a hot steamy sauna...
Mind=blown.

Awesome.

Alex Macarte.
------------------------------
That sounds amazing, Im posting this letter and your great photos on my website now.
I wish I could be in the audience sometime!


S

BAD FOR LAZARUS 2009

Again another old film.
This time Bad For Lazurus, playing newcastle sometime in November or December 2009.
Must confess, I don't actually have any of this bands music and come to think of it, don't think I've heard any recordings. However I have seen them a few times live and they are a real hoo haa to watch. real raucous, garage punk filth. Members are either in or have been in The James Cleaver Quintet, 80's Matchbox B-line Disaster and bizarrely Nine Inch Nails. Also another bizarrity, Craig Charles cites them as one of his favourite bands. Yeah, Lister from Red Dwarf loves them?!
I do know they've just finished up their debut album which should be out in the next few months. Get on it.
http://www.blogger.com/www.badforlazarus.wordpress.com

SCANS OF SOLITUDE

Realised I must have gone through about thirty or so rolls of film since I last uploaded any photography up here, so with that in mind was looking through various scans last night when I came across this roll taken in the early months of last year. From what I remember I had passed my driving test after years of on and off attempts so was in the habit of taking the car out on my own to various places in Cumbria armed with my camera. I have to say was not overly happy with life at that time, a place I thankfully do not feel I am anymore, but strikingly on reflection I think these photos capture the solitude I was feeling on those drives. Not a conscious effort by any means, I was literally walking around, listening to music, snapping whatever caught my eye and enjoying the fresh air.
I will endeavour to upload more photography, more often as I have physical piles and piles of exposures, a lot yet to be scanned.
The locations of these photos, from memory, seem to be Silloth, Calbeck, The chuch down my street and I think one of Talkin, and they seem to have been taken over the course of a few months. My memory isn't what it used to be.