LISTEN: Mosa Wild - 'Night'

Apologies if the posts are coming a little slowly at the moment - today marks eight weeks since our HMV store closed and I'm currently spending most of my days trawling the internet for job listings. One constant that has been helping to keep me sane for the past few weeks is certainly the amount of brilliant new music I've been discovering, and I really wanted to share a March release from Mosa Wild.

A new name to me, the four-piece released their debut single in 2016 - the success of this one track lead to a global deal with Glassnote Records, slots at Reading and Leeds and a support tour across Europe with my current fave, Maggie Rogers. New single Night is taken from their forthcoming debut EP Talking In Circles, due for release via Glassnote this Summer.

Building on the sound they established with debut single Smoke, this track builds until it is almost anthemic, with the cry "help me be strong" which I can easily imagine being repeated back by a large crowd in the live setting. The new track is produced by both Jim Abbiss (Arctic Monkeys, Bombay Bicycle Club) and James Kenosha (Pulled Apart By Horses, Dry The River) - they're certainly in safe hands! The EP is the result of an intense eight month period where the band retreated to guitarist Alex Stevens' aunt's house in a village "miles from civilisation", working on the tracks which have come together to form the forthcoming EP.

With new tracks under their belts, the band are itching to get out and play live - they play their first ever London headline show at The Waiting Room on 10th April, followed by slots at two of my favourite festivals, The Great Escape (9th May) and Bushstock (15th June.)

Follow Mosa Wild - Facebook | Twitter | Instagram.

FESTIVAL NEWS: Bushstock line-up additions!

I'm really excited to be heading back to my favourite festival Bushstock this June (15th) for a second year of volunteering! It'll be my fifth consecutive year at the festival - it's always a highlight of the year and consistently delivers an incredible line-up. Whether you're catching artists you're already familiar with and love, or taking a chance on somebody new, you're sure to be in for a treat. For those who don't know, Bushstock is a one-day multi-stage festival held in Shepherd's Bush. With Communion Presents organising, you're in pretty safe hands musically. Across the last few years I've seen the likes of Nick Mulvey, Bear's Den, The Staves, Matthew & The Atlas, Ten Tonnes, Banfi, Rukhsana Merrise and MarthaGunn play at the festival.

For me, this year was already sounding incredible at the announcement of Novo Amor as the first headliner - so it can only get better from there, right? Correct. Novo is joined by recently announced fellow headliners Gang Of Youths. The Aussie rockers play the festival following four consecutive sold out shows at Islington Assembly Hall in April. In addition, the likes of Ferris and Sylvester, Jordan Mackampa, Laurel, Marsicans, Mosa Wild, Rhys Lewis, Roman Lewis and more have all been added to the line-up, which you can check out in full here. There are more announcements to come too! 

With Super Early Bird tickets selling out in record time, and Early Bird tickets now also sold out, general tickets are on sale and selling fast - you can grab yours here for what is guaranteed to be a wonderful day of live music on June 15th!

FESTIVAL NEWS: Bushstock line-up announcement!

This genuinely is some of the best music related news I've heard in a long time. My favourite festival Bushstock have announced the first few acts for the 2019 festival, including my favourite musical discovery of the year Novo Amor, who is the first headliner. Can. Not. Wait.

Bushstock is a one day multi-venue festival held in Shepherd's Bush and organised by the folks at Communion Music. Across my four years of attending I've caught the likes of Nick Mulvey, Matthew & The Atlas, Seramic, Amber Run, Ady Suleiman, The Staves, Tamino and Frances. They're my favourite label, working with some of my favourite artists, and it's always a wonderful day of music discovery - the worst part is deciding which artists to miss! Alongside Novo, they've also announced the equally brilliant MarthaGunn, as well as Apre, Olivia and Winnie Raeder with a lot more to be announced. Grab bargain early bird tickets for the festival, which takes place on June 15th 2019, here.

Follow Novo Amor - Facebook | Twitter | Instagram.

WATCH: Seramic perform 'Trying' at Bushstock 2017

As I'm heading to Shepherd's Bush this evening for the Music for Grenfell show with the likes of The Hoosiers and Sam Swallow performing, I'm reminiscing over the wonderful day of live music that was this year's Bushstock Festival back in June. A huge highlight for me was a secret set from one of my favourite new acts Seramic, with Marcus and Layla bringing their beautiful voices and stunning harmonies to a tiny Shepherd's Bush wine bar with simply a keyboard to accompany them. The set left me grinning from ear to ear, telling friends at the festival what they'd just missed, and I remember writing on Twitter that it was no exaggeration to say that the set was one of the best things I'd ever seen. They had released the I Got You EP not long before the festival and closed their set with its final track, which also happens to be my favourite from the EP, the wonderfully emotional Trying. Thankfully the performance was caught on camera and a video of them performing the track has been uploaded recently - get watching below to have your socks blown off by their voices.

LIVE: Bushstock Festival 2017

At the weekend I caught my third Bushstock Festival, a day of superb music curated by the lovely folks at Communion Music in venues around Shepherd's Bush. Highlights of 2015 included seeing this year's headliners Nick Mulvey and The Staves play secret acoustic sets in a tiny wine bar, and last year's festival gave me the chance to see Bear's Den for the first time alongside the likes of Matthew & The Atlas, MarthaGunn, Dan Croll and Charlie Cunningham. A glance back at the past line-ups shows the likes of George Ezra, Bastille, Michael Kiwanuka and Hozier playing before they were well known, so as you'd imagine the atmosphere is great and the festival has a loyal following, there to try and discover the next big thing (and like I've said many times, a line-up curated by Communion is bound to be wonderful!) As with any festival there are clashes galore and the strength of the line-up doesn't help in this respect, however despite missing the likes of The Staves, Rhys Lewis, Isaac Gracie, The Big Moon, Spring King and loads more I had a great day, here's a little round-up of who I managed to catch!

Kicking off my day was Rukhsana Merrise, who I caught on a Communion New Faces tour a year or so ago and really enjoyed. Yesterday was her first live show for a while and a chance to debut tracks from her forthcoming record, and despite playing pretty early in the day she drew quite a crowd at the Courtyard stage. The venue was a trek from the others (I thought) but worth it once you got there with food, drink and a little pop-up record store surrounding the stage which was underneath a sea of rainbow umbrellas - luckily none of them needed as the sun came out and made the day even better! Check out the absolute tune Money below...

Rukhsana Merrise at the Courtyard stage

Next up I was headed towards Defector's Weld, where two friends I'd met up with were keen to see John Joseph Brill. He seems a lovely chap and I enjoyed his EP so was up for checking his set out when my phone buzzed with a twitter notification - Seramic were the second secret set of the day. Sad to miss JJB but I'm sure another chance to see him play will come up soon, so I headed to the wine bar, met up with another friend and waited... they ran behind schedule while they waited for a keyboard stand but it was completely worth the wait. I've seen Seramic play as a full band a few times over the past months and in this stripped back set-up for a couple of tracks at the Bear's Den Christmas show in December, so knew that I was in for a treat but even my high expectations were blown out of the water. I couldn't stop smiling, the tunes made me so happy and as I watched Marcus and Layla grin to one another it struck me how important it is to see that the band are enjoying playing for you to really take something from a set. Taking us through some tracks from their two EPs, they finished off the set with Trying, my favourite track from the recent I Got You EP, wowing the crowd with some seriously crazy notes. With two really strong EPs under their belts and some seriously impressive live performances I can't wait to see what Seramic do next!

Seramic secret set at the Albertine Wine Bar

We headed back to the Courtyard stage after they had finished to catch some of Ten Tonnes' set - I've heard good things about him but hadn't listened to his music before, all I really had to go on was that he's George Ezra's brother, which seems like a pretty good sign of musical quality. I was impressed by his voice and the crowd seemed to be having as much fun as he was up on stage. He released his second EP, Born To Lose, on Friday, and I'm digging the title track (listen below) which went down pretty well on Saturday afternoon - stream the whole EP on Spotify here!

Ten Tonnes at the Courtyard stage

After a quick stop off for some food came a tough decision between Isaac Gracie and Tender Central... I've been wanting to catch Isaac for a while and after missing his set at The Great Escape had assumed I'd definitely watch him at Bushstock, and was particularly keen as he was performing in the beautiful surroundings of St Stephen's Church, but I was also curious about Tender Central, and it meant less walking as I was sticking around for Banfi in the same venue afterwards. TC is the project of India Bourne, who plays in Ben Howard's band, and for the show she was joined on stage by Banfi's own Aaron and Joe, and while I heard great things about Isaac's set from friends that were there, I was glad I'd stuck around and really enjoyed the set! Check out the beautiful Wake Me Up below...

Tender Central at Traid

Next up and also playing in Traid, one of my absolute favourite bands of the moment, the lovely Banfi chaps. It was my seventh time seeing them and they're getting better every time, the busy touring schedule is working wonders for their live performance, with slots at Dot to Dot festival a couple of weeks ago and Citadel coming up in July, as well as heir first headline tour (dates) in September which I can't wait for! Having seen them lots in such as short space of time even the unreleased tracks feel incredibly familiar, so it'll be great to hear more of them recorded as studio versions (check this exciting tweet about album mastering!) and I'm chuffed to hear that they're releasing She Comes Home at the end of this month! Get listening to the tracks they've put out to date, including Rosedale House which is below and fall in love with them in time for the September tour!

Banfi at Traid

After some quick chats and hugs with the band it was a rush back to the Courtyard, where it was far easier than I'd expected to get in for Nick Mulvey's albeit quite early headline set. He's been away working on new music and with his beautiful baby boy for a while now and it was so great to have him back playing his first live performance for some time, with a stripped back version of his new live band. I was a little unsure as the crowd chattered away over the first chords of the first track, the recently released single Unconditional, but they soon fell under Nick's spell and spent fifty minutes totally entranced by his beautiful music, as did I! Sneaking only Fever To The Form and Meet Me There into the set from his first record we were treated to an array of entirely new tracks and it really felt like we were all part of something special, singing along to tracks as we heard them for the first time, and it feels amazing to have Nick back - and the joy at the crowd's response was so clear across his face too!

Nick Mulvey at the Courtyard stage

The second Nick had finished the crowd all rushed out of the venue, with most headed towards the church to try and get in for The Staves. I knew there would be no chance of getting in for their set so headed back towards Traid where I'd left my friend, whose favourite band Seafret were headlining, so of course I had to see what all the fuss was about. The venue is a charity clothes shop, raising money through donated clothes to target child and sweatshop labour in fashion, a really interesting and worthwhile concept, and as I stood at the back of the crowd a friend from Oxford tapped me from behind the clothes rails, isn't it lovely to bump into friends unexpectedly?! Stood quite far back it seemed as if the stage was a little dark but the sound was great in the venue and I definitely hope that they use it as a venue for the festival again next year. The singer Jack has great hair and a great voice and they were a really fun way to finish off my festival - I already can't wait for the next year of Bushstock!

Seafret at Traid

If you like the sound of Bushstock, be sure to sign up to the Communion mailing list for a weekly mailout about their upcoming releases and tracks. After ten years in the business they are continually killing it, working with some of my favourite artists on some really special concerts in London and further afield. Long live Communion!! 

LIVE: Bushstock Festival 2016

Yesterday I went to my last gig/festival as a teenager and my first for a month, the sixth Bushstock Festival (my second) and experienced some wonderful live music amongst passionate music fans. Organised by Communion Music, the festival was almost guaranteed to be a winner in terms of the line-up, with the label championing so many superb up and coming artists in London and beyond (Ben Howard, Nick Mulvey and James Bay to name a few!) Being the cheapskate (and student!) I am, I didn't buy a ticket, but entered all the competitions I could find, and won a pair of tickets for the festival through TOMS (thanks TOMS!) A part of the prize was also access to an acoustic garden set by Dan Croll, the headliner of the biggest venue on the night.

Until that set, I didn't have anything I was desperate to see, but knew that if the festival was like last year, there would be a secret line-up (last year I saw Alex Vargas, Nick Mulvey and The Staves in the secret stage). There was, but this year they'd split it into two venues, meaning more people would get a shot as last year most people seemed to stick around for all three sets. I checked Twitter and they'd announced Luke Sital-Singh as the first secret act - I'd heard a lot about him but couldn't remember listening to him, so figured it was the perfect opportunity and headed to the venue.

I loved his set and his humour, particularly when he forgot one of the verses to Nothing Stays The Same (below) and the guy sat next to me helped with lyrics. While it was all new to me, he played tracks from his new record which is ready, and they sounded pretty good!

When Luke's finished, they tweeted that the second secret set was going to be The Beach. As I caught his set on the recent New Faces tour I decided to give it a miss and headed over the road to see MarthaGunn. I'd listened to a couple of the tracks in the run up to the festival as I have seen their name recently as supporting Toothless and Bear's Den, so I figured that they must be worth checking out. It was pretty full for them and they really impressed me and I look forward to seeing where the rest of the year takes them. Loving their recent release Heaven which they finished the set off with, the studio version is below but this acoustic session is worth a watch if you enjoy!

I wandered off to find something to eat, and as I walked across the road from the venue where the third secret set would be at 5, it was 4 so I expected an announcement at any minute, before I noticed three of the guys from Amber Run coming outside. I was there pretty early but luckily so as the venue filled up by 4.25, and the guys played a beautiful stripped back set. I had actually been tempted to go to the London Contemporary Voices show yesterday, where the band were performing, so this was a great surprise! 

The set started with Joe playing the band's track I Found by himself, not too unlike this session... it was great to see them again after catching them at one of my first shows in Oxford back in 2014 on the Communion New Faces tour.

Next up I headed to St Stephen's Church and caught some of Charlie Cunningham's set. I saw him back in November supporting Stornoway, a show which was also in a church. While I haven't got anything else to compare it to, I feel his sound probably works best in this kind of environment where his beautiful voice can fill the whole room. Even his Facebook cover photo is taken in a church... One song that I'd really remembered from the set in November is Telling It Wrong, which went down really well last night - the church was pretty full for Charlie's set! 

Once my friend arrived, we dashed to the Dan Croll set at the TOMS Secret Garden Stage, which it turned out was in fact exactly that, somebody's garden! While I couldn't see much to begin with (I took the pic below to see where Dan was even stood...) I could hear, and it sounded superb! Very lucky to catch Dan in such a small crowd before he headlined Bush Hall in the evening!

When I won the tickets, I hadn't actually listened to Dan that much (a bit of a recurring theme!) but after checking out his videos online, found that I had heard From Nowhere before. I listened to and loved his track Home, and found it pretty funny hearing the track last night. The lyrics "so if you ever come round to my house take your shoes off at the door, cos it's impolite not to, you'll be damaging my floor, cos it's my home" made me chuckle, considering we'd all just walked through someone's house with our shoes on! Rubbish house manners aside, a lovely little stage and a great set!

After Dan's set, we rushed back over to St Stephen's, where Bear's Den were headlining in just over an hour. Matthew & The Atlas were up first and it was already pretty much at capacity but we managed to squeeze in. The title track of his latest record, Temple, is on the record which Communion released for Record Store Day, so I'd listened to this and the session below, but the music was mostly pretty new to me but I was just as impressed as the rest of the church. As Davie of Bear's Den said during their set, he sounds like he's "a million years old, but still sexy.... we can all only hope to be sexy when we're a million years old."

Finally, the main event - Bear's Den took to the stage (a little late) and instantly wowed the crowd, opening their set with the title track of their new record Red Earth & Pouring Rain. They played a few more tracks from the new record (including the beautiful Auld Wives which they released recently), and all are sounding great - can't wait to hear the record in full! The hits from the debut record were great too, and it was a massive shame to leave just as they started playing Agape in their encore to make sure I could catch my train (which I only just did!)

The set was superb and I'd really recommend taking a listen, buying the record next month (July 22nd) and going to their tour in November (they're also playing some in-stores around the album release date.) It seems fitting to finish off with a video of them performing Agape for a session in the church back in 2013 - it was completely packed last night and deservingly so!

Overall I had such a great day and it's testament to the brilliant organisation both in the run up over the last months and on the day - I say it a lot but I have a lot of faith in the music that Communion get behind, making a day like yesterday pretty difficult to plan out. I caught seven brilliant acts but there was still so much more going on and I only wish I could've split myself in half and seen more (Shura, Flyte, Tempesst etc!) As well as that, every act I saw throughout the day seemed genuinely humbled that people had turned up to watch them, which is always so lovely to see as a fan. Long may Bushstock continue!!

WATCH: Bear's Den 'Auld Wives' at Pinkpop 2016

At the risk of becoming a little repetitive as I only shared the studio version of this new track from Bear's Den a few days ago, the guys have shared an acoustic performance of the single which they did for 3FM while at Pinkpop. I couldn't stop listening to the studio version over and over and I'm having much the same effect from this acoustic video... take a listen for yourself below!

I am lucky to have just won tickets to Bushstock Festival next weekend where Bear's Den are headlining, can't wait to see them and looking forward to Dan Croll's acoustic set for TOMS which was part of the prize. Here's the line-up... last few tickets online here. Who should I go and see? I might be holding out for a secret stage as that's how I saw Alex Vargas, Nick Mulvey and The Staves at last year's festival.

WATCH: Ady Suleiman 'Serious' for Mahogany

The Mahogany Sessions never fail to disappoint, and the calibre of their artists leaves a lot to be desired of other session channels. This new session features Nottingham musician Ady Suleiman performing his track Serious. I saw Ady live opening up Bushstock last year as the friend I went with was a big fan and recommended we check his set out. Very glad we did! Check his session out below and then if you're looking for more, his session for them a couple of years ago is a good place to start, with over 150,000 views!

As a side note: the line-up for this year's Bushstock is, as is to be expected from Communion, looking pretty fantastic. Last year was superb, and I'd certainly recommend checking it out and grabbing a ticket here.

LIVE: my day at Bushstock 2015...

I've been to a couple of local free festivals, and had half a day at Cambridge Folk Festival a couple of years back, but on Saturday I took a trip to London (again) and had my first proper festival experience at Bushstock. After being offered the tickets by a wonderful friend who won them but had already bought some, I made the last minute choice, the day before the festival, to go along. In retrospect - brilliant  choice. Organised and run by Communion, you know you're in safe hands in terms of the line-up, as  the label has ties with the likes of George Ezra, Ben Howard and Half Moon Run. Though I left early and didn't check them out, this years festival was headlined by Lucy Rose, Michael Kiwanuka, and Villagers, with various other fantastic acts throughout the day.

As the festival started up, we checked out Ady Suleiman at The Courtyard, a new and intimate stage area in an outside part of The University of the Arts. Being a particular favourite of my friend's, his set was a no-brainer, but I went into it blind, having not heard any of Ady's tracks beforehand. What might be described as R&B with soulful vocals and harmonies, I found his set impressive, performing tracks from his recent release This Is My EP with his talented band.

Ady Suleiman

After Ady's set we grabbed some food and dashed around to the beautiful St. Stephen's Church, where Frances was playing. Having recently played on the Communion New Faces tour, I came to this set more prepared, but my expectations were exceeded. I'm not one to constantly compare artists, but she could be seen as a Rae Morris and Adele hybrid of sorts. Basically, Frances isn't short of talent. Her style suited the church venue perfectly, and her set was topped off by a beautiul performance of her recent new track 'Grow' (below), which is the title track from her upcoming EP, released July 10th. A brilliant, chilling live artist, you can catch her live at Servant Jazz Quarters in London on Wednesday 14th October.

After this set we decided to head to the Albertine Wine Bar, where the first of three secret special guests, Alex Vargas, had just been announced. Having heard good things of his music but not having listened to him, this was another great musical discovery of the day, alongside a wonderful stage presence and great stage banter, his haunting style filling out the intimate, packed wine bar in a stunning way. He must be doing something right as he's just sold out four dates in London this month, so I guess I should also be grateful to have seen him fairly early in what will probably be a fruitful and long career in music. Certain that the special guests could only get better, we decided to stick around and wait for the next announcement - particularly as there was apparently a huge queue to get into the venue for the second set. Shortly, this was announced to be the incredibly talented Nick Mulvey, a particular favourite of mine. As expected, his set in this jam-packed bar was incredible, and I felt genuinely lucky to have witnessed it. Time ticked on and the speculation was confirmed, the third act were The Staves. I was aware of their music and how well loved they are in the folk community, but again I hadn't really listened to them (it was a day of brilliant discoveries!) The harmonious, quiet, unplugged set from the gifted sisters was a pleasure to listen to. In short: Communion weren't lying when they said they were 'special' guests, it was a superb mini line-up.

Alex Vargas

Nick Mulvey

The Staves

The final act of the day that I checked out before choosing to leave early as I was tired and needed to catch a train home, was Port Isla at Bush Hall. I'd heart about them for supporting James Bay on his recent UK tour, and my friend was keen to check out their set. The set was energetic and fun regardless of the band being down a regular member, and I'm interested to take a listen to the band's EPs to see how their recorded music sounds.

Port Isla

It's my opinion that once you scratch the surface, the music industry is far smaller than it first seems, and this is obvious nowhere more than at this sort of day. Throughout the day I saw various artists, music industry people, and friends around, and everyone that I met was incredibly friendly - even the security! Overall I had a great experience at the festival which is fairly new, in only its fifth year, and I'd definitely consider going along to the festival next year!