Hello everyone, I am back behind the desk at Toad HQ once more and, frankly, feeling a little ambivalent about the fact.  What do you mean I have work to do, fetch me another fucking Margarita!

This weekend we have the next Ides of Toad night at Henry’s.  We may be short a big-name headliner, but it’s an absolutely excellent lineup, with (coincidentally) two Leeds bands. Post War Glamour Girls and Slowcoaches. and Toad favourites Dolfinz from Stonehaven.  And as an added bonus, Papi Falso is right afterwards.

All our current tickets can either be bought online here or at Avalanche Records on the Grassmarket.

Post War Glamour Girls – Suburban Barbarian

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Dolfinz – Teenage Bloom

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Slowcoaches – 54

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Now, in terms of the last couple of weeks, I have of course been out at SXSW with Mrs. Toad as you probably know.  Last year I did daily video diaries, and this year I did take video footage, but nothing like as much of it because, frankly, I couldn’t be fucked.

In all honesty, it’s hard to do when you are more familiar with the whole thing yourself and aren’t spending the whole time wandering about with your mouth open going ‘ooh, look at this… and look at that!’ all the time.

So this time, instead of a daily video what you’ll get is a couple of relatively short ones – one for Interactive and one for Music – and I’ll get those up over the next day or so.

And finally, as you almost certainly noticed, Ian kept the site ticking over rather nicely in my absence, and apart from rather controversially showing the NME some respect, I think he did an amazing job, so I would like to extend a big, gin-fuelled Song, by Toad thank you to him for all his work in our absence, which meant I was able to enjoy SXSW without really fretting about the site at all.

It may be getting dark now, but this morning was one of those days where I began to question my decision to put the office in a North-facing room.  Really, when it’s this sunny I just want to be able to enjoy the sunshine.  Mind you, I wouldn’t be able to read my computer screen, but that strikes me as a very small price to pay.

I am getting ready to go to Austin this week, leaving the house, the cats, the label and this weekend’s Ides of Toad gig in the hands of young Ian.  What, I hear you wondering, could possibly go wrong?

Actually, just getting ready to be out of the country for a couple of weeks is a major headache.  A lot of label and blog stuff can be done from foreign parts easily enough – they do have the internet in America after all – but there are a lot of practical things which I need to wrap up before I leave, so the next couple of days are going to be bloody mental, I fear.

And also, I miss all these fine gigs, which is annoying:

Thursday 8th March: Born to Be Wide Music Journalist Seminar at the Electric Circus.

If you’re in a band and you don’t want to know more about how music journalists think, what they like and don’t like, and stuff like that then frankly you’re an idiot.  At this month’s seminar will be: Claire Sawers (Music Editor, The List), Gary Flockhart (Evening News), David Pollock (Everyone) and Sue Wilson (Sunday Herald, Songlines, The Scotsman).

Friday 9th March: The Ides of Toad, with Adam Stafford, So Many Wizards & LeThug at Henry’s Cellar Bar.

I am really looking forward to this one.  Or at least, I would be if I weren’t going to be in Austin instead.  Instead, I leave this rather excellent lineup in the hands of Ian and yourselves, and I trust none of you will let me down.  So Many Wizards are touring from the States, Adam Stafford was one of my favourite performers I saw all of last year and LeThug are a highly, highly promising new droney, electronic pop band from Glasgow.

Lose Your Mind by so many wizards

Saturday 10th March: Loch Lomond & Frances McKee from The Vaselines at Sneaky Pete’s.

It’s highly frustrating that, given I was responsible for getting Loch Lomond over here in the first place, I have found it impossible to get to any of their gigs ever since they signed with Chemikal Underground.  After a stripped back tour earlier in the year, this is apparently a full band show, and their lush, orchestral pop is bloody gorgeous, so get down to it.

Loch Lomond – Wax & Wire

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Sunday 11th March: Lach at the Third Door.

Lach is finally legal and can finally legally work in the UK, and to celebrate he has booked a UK tour for April, and to warm up his musical muscles after a couple of spoken word sets, he’ll be playing at the Third Door this weekend.

Lach – Blue Overcoat by Song, by Toad

Well after a weekend of total mayhem in Scotland’s capital city, what the fuck are we in for this time around?  Well there’s a few things actually, although one of my personal choices is pretty much sold out, I do believe: that being Withered Hand & the Pictish Trail at the Caves on Thursday. If there are a few tickets left I suggest you turn up at the door pretty promptly in order to score one.

The other stuff, as usual, is listed below:

[Meanwhile, in the now traditional 'Matthew is an idiot and has left something out' slot we have the following: on Thursday 1st March Thomas Truax is playing in a rather surprising choice of venue - Opium nightclub on the Cowgate.]

Tuesday 28th Feb: The Cast of Cheers & Theme Park at the Electric Circus.

I think ‘sprightly guitar pop’ best sums this up.  It’s cheerful, upbeat and bouncy – perhaps not entirely my kind of thing at the moment, but I reckon those of you who like your music a little less growly might enjoy this.

The Cast of Cheers – Goose

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Friday 2nd March: Wet Nuns, Fat Goth & Hagana at the Electric Circus.

If you fancy a bit of pantomime villian blues rock (to coin the stupidest genre designation I’ve heard in a while) then you might well like this.  Despite being tipped by the NME, Wet Nuns sound pretty good, and there’s a sort of over-the-top camp to this bill which looks like great fun.  The names alone are worth going for.

Saturday 3rd March: The Machine Room, Blank Canvas & Zed Penguin at the Wee Red Bar.

This gig is the launch night for the Machine Room’s new EP, which you can preview on the Bandcamp embed below. I am reserving judgment on the band for the time being, but it’s certainly very promising and contains lots of individual moments I do like.  The support bands are pretty varied too, with bluesy screech from Zed Penguin and rollicking piano pop from Blank Canvas.

Sunday 4th March: Adam Stafford, Radio Trees & Loch Awe at the Third Door.

I am such a latecomer to the Adam Stafford Appreciation Party that I am probably really annoying everyone who’s been banging on about him for ages. Nevertheless, the way he builds his songs out of looped vocals and guitar is nevertheless something to behold.  I confess I know nothing about Radio Trees, but Loch Awe have been recording in Chem19 recently and the one song I’ve heard from those sessions sounds bloody great.

Sunday 4th March: A Hawk and a Hacksaw at the Filmhouse.

A Hawk and a Hacksaw’s last visit to Edinburgh brought them to the Caves, if I remember, but this occasion will be rather different: they are here, I think, to play a live soundtrack to the Russian film Shadows of Forgotten Ancestors.  I am a bit sketchy on the details I have to confess, but this looks rather fascinating.

 Assuming you are all boycotting Valentine’s Day which, let’s face it, you really should, we finally enter a week in Edinburgh where there are plenty of options for Superior Fun, after a longer than usual hangover from the Christmas period this year.

Limbo is back on Friday too, which is good news.  It’s not really my kind of lineup I must confess, but Limbo gigs are always good ones, so check it out here.

It’s also quite a Toady week as well, which is nice.  We have our first house gig of the year on Wednesday, which I am hugely looking forward to.  And then on Saturday the Ides of Toad return to Henry’s Cellar Bar, and Song, by Toad Records hero Rob St. John is also playing at the Banshee Labyrinth.

It’s an unfortunate clash, but both promises were made a long time ago, so there was nothing to be done about it, you’re just going to have to gird your loins and pick a favourite.

Tuesday 14th Feb: Akke Phallus Duo, Cat Hawed & Scrim at the Canon’s Gait.

The consistently excellent Powan Presents have a night of noise, found sounds and collage at the Canon’s Gait on Tuesday (forgive me if I get my genres wrong, I am not exactly an expert on this kind of music) and I guarantee you it will be better than awkwardly sitting in an ironed shirt at some restaurant which you don’t really like but is expensive enough to look like you made an effort while your other half wishes you could skip all the tedious small talk and just get to the shagging already.

Bacchus Frolicking In The Snow excerpt by Akke Phallus Duo

Wednesday 15th Feb: Randolph’s Leap & Molly Nilsson Song, by Toad House Gig.

Doubling as the album launch for Randolph’s Leap’s new release Randolph’s Leap and the Curse of the Haunted Headphones, this gig also sees Swedish Molly Nilsson popping up to play, after I was introduced to her music by some friends in Manchester. Please try and buy tickets in advance if you can (from here) because our house isn’t all that big and a bit of advance planning is a big help.

Randolph’s Leap – I Can’t Dance to This Music Anymore

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Friday 17th Feb: Ian Nagoski and The Family Elan at the The Pleasance Cabaret Bar.

This looks like being a very Eastern European/Levante flavoured psyche-folk event, with strong links archiving and field recording work.  Nagoski will be discussing as well as playing stuff from his new release To What Strange Place.

Saturday 18th Feb: The Ides of Toad present Chris Devotion and the Expectations, My Tiny Robots & Morris Major at Henry’s Cellar Bar.

Chris Devotion and the Expectations are launching their new album at Henry’s at the first Ides of Toad show for 2012.  They will be supported by Edinburgh’s My Tiny Robots and Edinburgh-via-Manchester band Morris Major. It’s all very indie, this lineup, with plenty of catchy guitars and eminently hummable choruses and should be great fun.

Chris Devotion & the Expectations – Tell the Girl

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Saturday 18th Feb: Rob St. John, Hiva Oa & Cheer at the Banshee Labyrinth.

Song, by Toad Records’ own Rob St. John returns to town to play what I believe is going to be a rather heavy, droney set at the excellent Banshee Labyrinth, accompanied by visuals, I think. Support comes from promising local band Hiva Oa, and Cheer, about whom I have to confess to knowing almost nothing.

Rob St. John – Sargasso Sea

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 Yoofff, wake up, my dozing brain!  I think I am going to blame Mrs. Toad, but we have recently taken to having weekends of such epic sloth that even by seven in the evening on Monday my brain is still very much stalled.

Of course, back when I had a day job this still used to happen of, except I had to sit at my desk looking fucking useless all day.  It’s just that now when I spend a day being just a little bit vacant and useless – or glaikit as the Scots rather excellently refer to it – I just end up feeling like I am robbing myself.  Which I am, because it means I have to do this shit in the evening instead, which is just silly.

Anyhow, in terms of waking up and getting out of the house for some fun and games, things still don’t really seem to be picking up in Edinburgh, after a woefully slow start to the year.  Still, never mind, there will be plenty of Ides of Toad action in the next couple of weeks, and the Tidal Wave of Indifference will be back too, so things will start creaking into action again, hopefully.

Mind you, with the official retirement of Cabaret Voltaire from the gig circuit – not that they’d been really actively booking for a couple of years anyway – and the potential closure of the Bongo Club by Edinburgh University, I’d be surprised if any self-respecting band wanted to play this blighted fucking city ever again.  Fucking hell, we’re going to be having gigs on the forecourts of Tesco’s if this keeps on much longer.

Tuesday 7th Feb: Vieux Farka Touré and Samba Sene (solo) at the Voodoo Rooms.

The venue may make you feel, as a pal of mine so neatly put it on Twitter, like you’re at a wedding reception, but it is a venue, it is in Edinburgh, and it shows no imminent signs of being closed, so for this we must be really rather grateful.  Well, that and the fact that they are bringing someone I suppose you could legitimately describe as one of the most respected African musicians of his generation to play in Edinburgh tomorrow night.

Vieux Farka Tour̩ РAigna

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Thursday 9th Feb: North Atlantic Oscillation at the Voodoo Rooms.

This event is actually called Moodjam and is being held to raise funds for the charity Action on Depression.  Playing will be Edinburgh’s North Atlantic Oscillation, who create indie which touches on everything from shoegaze to electronic to epic bigness.  Yes, epic bigness, it’s a term.

North Atlantic Oscillation – Marrow

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Friday 10th Feb: Indie Funday Friday, with Spook School, The Seven Deadly Sins, November Orchid and Little Love and the Friendly Vibes at Henry’s Cellar Bar.

This night is designed to raise money for charity, and in order to do so they have invited a very promising collection of local bands whose music can loosely be described as variations on the term ‘indie-pop’, with the Spook School and The Seven Deadly Sins looking very good indeed.

Saturday 11th Feb: Video Loves the Radio Star with Her Royal Highness at the Third Door.

I’ve mentioned this night before because I really like the concept: Videolab apparently do a live VJ set whilst the band is playing, and in terms of making a step up from the plain old ‘get some bands in a room’ gig approach, this definitely strikes me as something very much worth investigating.

Alright, I know that by the end of January you are supposed to stop using terms like ‘new year’ but I reckoned it was about time for an update on these matters, and that seemed the most appropriate way of phrasing it.

So, with a flurry of album launches coming up in the late Spring/early Summer, we have a small but exciting fistful of gigs to tide us over until then, which I will list below.  Apart from the aforementioned launches, which we’ll generally try and do somewhere a bit strange, I am looking at putting on as many of my events as possible at Henry’s this year.

This is for numerous reasons, but chief amongst them Nora and Claire have been there at every gig and have been a real pleasure to deal with.  When you’re a relatively rookie promoter, having sound engineers and venue managers who just take care of shit in the calmest possible way makes a huge difference, leaving you to panic about attendance at your leisure.  Also, I just kinda like the place.  It’s scruffy, sure, but in many ways it’s a classic dive bar – it’s where gigs should be taking place.

Anyhow, our first gig is in a few weeks and it will be Armellodie Records’ Chris Devotion and the Expectations but umm… well, I’ll write down a handy list for you because, maybe even more than it loves kittens, the internet just loves lists doesn’t it. And as per usual, all tickets will be available from Brown Paper Tickets, and from Avalanche Records down on the Grassmarket.

Saturday 18th Feb: Chris Devotion and the Expectations, My Tiny Robots & Morris Major.

Chris Devotion and the Expectations have a new album out on the brilliant Armellodie Records, and will be playing some dates to support the release.  Their smart, slight stylised indie pop should work well with My Tiny Robots, who are also rather stylish indie poppers, albeit in a rather different way.

Friday 24th Feb: The Pineapple Chunks, Brown Brogues & Zed Penguin.

Er, ramshackle and idiosyncratic – is that the best way to describe this lineup?  I think it might be.  Zed Penguin have a new EP and a new full band lineup, and Brown Brogues a new single on the way, so this should be perfect timing.  All these bands make a bit of a racket, and none of them seem entirely right in the head, which er, well, should probably make for a brilliant night I reckon.

Saturday 25th Feb: Louis Barabbas and the Bedlam Six, Skeleton Bob (I think) and Lee Patterson at the Third Door.

Louis Barabbas were absolutely mental and absolutely brilliant when they last played Edinburgh, in the middle of last year.  They’ll be joined on the bill by Lee Patterson, who I first happened across at this year’s Antihoot in the Summer, and hopefully Skeleton Bob.  Actually, for all they said ‘yeah, awesome’ when I asked them to play, I have yet to get proper confirmation from Skeleton Bob actually, so I’d better get on top of that, now that I think about.  Also, please note that this gig is at the Third Door, not Henry’s.

Friday 9th March: So Many Wizards and LeThug.

This will be a pop night, sort of.  All the bands take their pop and make it weird, be it by fuzz or by skewed eccentricity.  So Many Wizards are over touring from the States, and LeThug are a really promising new Glasgow band I wrote about on Song, by Toad recently, and if you haven’t already checked out their stuff then you should.

Saturday 24th March: Post War Glamour Girls, Dolfinz and Slowcoaches.

Two Leeds bands accidentally ended up on the same bill here, so I hope they get on. Dolfinz are favourites of ours already, as you know, and they are touring with Slowcoaches, so you can expect some fine, garagey racket from those two.  Post War Glamour Girls are just a tad more restrained and stylish I think

The Muppets win at everything.  That’s all I have to say on the matter.

In other news, Mrs. Toad and I went out into the garden this weekend, to try and tackle the small jungle which has slowly been developing since the Summer.  The weather has been so spectacularly shit since July and August that we just haven’t been out there, so our window boxes have all died and every bed was overrun with weeds.

Still, due to our particularly indelicate methods of gardening – a little closer to slash and burn than anything you might see on Gardeners’ World – we managed to get through an awful lot and also to shove some rather late bulbs into the ground, albeit more in hope than expectation.  It was nice though, especially because we haven’t been out there for months now.  Although fuck knows what we’re going to with all the piles of cuttings and various other crap we generated.

Anyway, after the extreme rock ‘n’ roll of a spot of gardening, I’m not sure that booze and drugs and gigs will impress me all that much.  But let’s give it a go, eh…

Thursday 2nd Feb: Born to Be Wide Festival Seminar at the Electric Circus.

The guests for this one include Dave Corbet (T In The Park/The Edge Festival), Katch Holmes (Knockengorroch Festival), Gordon Reilly (Insider Festival), Shaun Arnold (Go North). So if you want to know how best to get on festival bills and to hear some chat about what it can actually do for you, then I strongly recommend you come to this one.

Thursday 2nd Feb: Lady North play Sick Note at Cabaret Voltaire.

This is a late night club show, and I actually think this might be one of the best ways to experience Lady North’s thumping rhythms and hypnotic guitars.  And for those of you getting soused at Born to Be Wide ealier, then this would be an ideal place to stagger onto next.

Saturday 4th Feb: Love Your Library Day at Penicuik Library, with The Last Battle and Matt Norris and the Moon.

Ed from 17 Seconds has organised a couple of great events for National Libraries Day.  The first is a comedy night involving Frankie Boyle and Miles Jupp, but that’s sold out now, and the second is a musical event out in Penicuik, with a couple of 17 Seconds Records bands.  The 37, 47 or X47 will take you there really easily from the centre of Edinburgh, so I don’t want any whinging excuses about the enormity of the journey, it’s just not that hard.

Sunday 5th Feb: Dam Mantle plays Superclub at Sneaky Pete’s.

Dam Mantle is probably on the fringes of my taste for electronic music, truth be told, but for those of you with better knowledge of this kind of stuff I reckon this should be a very good bet.

 Is it just me or is the gig calendar around these parts taking ages to shudder back into life after Christmas?  I know there have been good shows here and there, but most weeks I find myself looking at a list of one, rather than the more plentiful goodness we can usually count upon in Edinburgh.

Ah well, Mrs. Toad’s two new cats are capering about the house like loons, so I suppose they’ll keep me entertained in the absence of significant musicfun.

What’s fucking happening in Edinburgh anyway? Neither the Liquid Room nor Cabaret Voltaire seem to be doing any significant booking anymore, are we just not considered to be worth visiting for a band who can attract a crowd above about two hundred people?  I mean, the smaller venues do a good job of bringing really under the radar bands here, but is no-one interested in booking anyone that people have actually heard of?

I love the Ides of Toad gigs, but we’re operating in venues with a capacity of a hundred or so – who the fuck is bringing the bands to the city who can pull a few hundred people to a venue?  No-one, it seems, although please do correct me if I’m wrong. Even DF and PCL seem to have decided there ain’t much point in bringing bands that they’ll happily put on in Glasgow through to Edinburgh.

Presumably we just don’t go, so as far as the bigger promoters are concerned there’s just no financial point in putting on bands here, and so to a degree we get what we deserve.  It’s a shame though.  Even when I first turned up here I’d regularly go to 200-500 attendance shows at the Liquid Room or Cab Vol.

Thursday 26th Jan: United Fruit, PAWS & Vasquez at the Electric Circus.

This is going to be good and loud isn’t it. PAWS are just back from recording their debut album down in shiny, shiny London so I reckon they’ll be in a fair mood to blow off some steam.  United Fruit are a band I tried to get through to Edinburgh in August actually, until it turned out they couldn’t make it, so I’ll be looking forward to seeing them too, as well as a local band Vasquez, about whom I know shamefully little.

PAWS – Bloodline (Toad Session)

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Friday 27th Jan: Live Lounge, with Mike MacFarlane, HP Neilson, Jay Bharaj & Mike Kearney at the Electric Circus.

In the absence of more than a single relatively big ticket show in town this week, why not swing by the Circus on Friday for a bit of an Antihoot reunion, in the form of the humour of Jay Bharaj, the rather biting self-mockery of Mike MacFarlane and the smooth MCing and popsmithery of HP Neilson.

 Man, as a blogger who works from home is there such thing as ‘taking a day off sick’?  I don’t think there is, but if there’s one thing I miss from the days of having a grown up job it’s being able to take a day off sick knowing that someone else would have to take care of the shit you were supposed to do, and it wouldn’t all just pile up and sit in wait for you until you got back.

So here I sit, secretly wanting to curl up in bed, but knowing full well that, well, all the shit I have to do now isn’t going anywhere, I am just going to have less time in which to do it once I do get my shit together.

Gig going, at this point, is the very last thing on my mind.  However, I do of course recognise that there are hardier souls than myself out there and that with an Edinburgh gig calendar still only spluttering into life after the Christmas break there will be a fair few people champing at the bit for musicfuns by now.

So what are your options, if that’s what you’re after?  Not an awful lot, to be honest, but there are definitely a couple of goodies to be found this week.

Thursday 19th Jan: Frightened Rabbit at Cabaret Voltaire.

Tickets for this are apparently available only on a first come, first served basis, so I expect a rather enthusiastic queue to be forming on Blair Street on Thursday.  Given the size of venue they are used to playing and the way Frightened Rabbit put their back into things live, this should be a rammed, sweaty corker.  If you can get in.

Thursday 19th Jan: Seafieldroad at the Traverse Theatre.

This is part of the Traverse New Sessions, apparently, which looks interesting, if a little grown up for boorish oafs such as myself.  Nevertheless, I can’t think of anywhere more suited to the rich, rolling piano balladry of Seafieldroad, so this should be a treat.

If there’s other shit that I’m missing, well you’re just going to have to forgive me I’m afraid. I am off back to my bed.

 So, what’s happening with you lot this week?  I myself am getting ready to do a spot of recording with Waiters and Sex Hands, who are up from Manchester to put together a split 12″ which we’ll be releasing in, er… April, I think, assuming all goes well.

So, once more to offend the neighbours with the battering of drums and the sound of loud guitars.  The good news is that Mrs. Toad is off to the States on grown-up business this week, so that’s at least one less person to annoy with the racket and the mess.

Once again, there’s not all that much on this week, but what there is looks really interesting. Sneaky Pete’s website is down at this particular moment, so I can’t check what they have going on at the moment, but you can check yourself here when you get the chance, and hopefully it will be back up and running.

Thursday 12th Jan: FOUND launch Atmosphere|Memento at the InSpace Gallery.

I’ll be honest with you, I know next to nothing about this. FOUND are involved though, and pretty much everything they touch turns to genius, so I’d recommend it whatever it is.  According to the blurb on the site they are presenting two different chronologies of the same story to two different audiences, one being linear, and the other more fragmented, to represent the story of a man who can no longer form new memories.  Sounds a bit weird, but fascinating, but then that’s FOUND for you.

Saturday 14th Jan: My Tiny Robots single launch at The Third Door.

As well as being the launch night for My Tiny Robots’ new single will be the first night of a new concept at the Third Door called Video Loves the Radio Star, a collaboration between Ten Tracks, who book for the Third Door, and video LaB. My Tiny Robots will be looking to follow up a couple of excellent singles last year with Zut Alors (preview below), and I can only assume they are building towards a debut album – one I will be most interested to hear.