Isabel Sörling of Soil Collectors, playing at Match and Fuse Festival this month
15–16 October,Hackney Wonderland@ Oval Space, The Laundry, London Fields Brewery, Sebright Arms, The Pickle Factory
Five venues play host to a line-up of established bands such as Mystery Jets and We Are Scientists as well as up-and-coming acts like singer Sonia Stein and NGod.
21–23 October –Stoke Newington Music Festival @ various venues including Mascara Bar, St Pauls Church West Hackney, The Waiting Room, Haunt, Stereo92, The Lion, The Lacy Nook, Green Room Café, The Haberdashery
Three-day multi-venue event across Stoke Newington will see DJ sets and live music from the likes of Thurston Moore, Sterling Roswell, Pink Cigar and The Pacers
One of the nation’s best loved comic creations Super Hans from Peepshow (aka Australian comic Matt King) takes to the decks for his debut London DJ set.
Organisers boast this will be a “knees up like no other”, bringing together musicians from 14 European countries. Highlights include Portuguese trumpeter Susana Santos Silva and the Native American/Scandinavian pop improvisers the Soil Collectors.
29 October – Mirrors festival @ St John at Hackney, Moth Club, Oslo, Round Chapel
Eyes will be on the Mercury Prize-nominated Bat for Lashes, who is set to headline this one-day indoor festival. Also on the line-up are Allah-Las, Bill Ryder Jones and the curiously-named garage punk six-piece Diarrhea Planet.
As the last tune rang out and sweat hung in the air of the room where the final Cave Club of 2014 had run its course, Rhys Webb felt it was the end of an era.
For the last seven years his aptly named night had been a monthly feature at Highbury and Islington’s Buffalo Bar, which was set to close to make way for flats at the end of that year.
The night showcased some of the finest psychedelia ever made from around the globe, all of which was from the extensive record collection of Webb, otherwise known as the Horrors’ bass player.
Soon the same psychedelic sound reared its kaleidoscopic head at Oxford Street’s 100 Club. But although Cave Club still drew big crowds, the more ample space of the legendary venue absorbed the atmosphere of one of London’s key underground gatherings.
Seeing an opportunity at the newly opened Moth Club off Mare Street, Webb seized the chance to find a new home for his “party.”
“The party at the Moth, the first one there [in September 2015] was just electric and fantastic and so reminiscent of the feeling and atmosphere of the original night,” Webb recalls.
The word psychedelia tends to evoke whimsical images, Lewis Carroll poems and the heavy use of a harpsichord, and it’s no secret that many of the discs spun have been produced in the late Sixties. But Cave Club takes account of how the genre has developed since then.
“The inspiration for the night is mind expanding psychedelia, and has a heavy focus on the lost and obscure groups of the late Sixties.
“There are no rules. If it’s weird and wonderful we’ll play it. I want the club to be an experience and an adventure,” he says.
Webb, along with The Voyeurs’ Sam Davies, is on a mission to harvest the world for the rarest, trippiest 45s, along with some more familiar sounds and others that have become “Cave Club classics”.
To his memory, Webb’s vinyl-only policy has only been broken once (“probably to play a demo from The Horrors or one of our friend’s bands like TOY,” he says).
The night attracts the cream of the East London music scene as well as music lovers of all ages, many of whom dressed in technicolour cast-offs, and all gathered to hear psychedelic rarities from a collection which Webb jokes, has cost him “about a decade in pocket money”.
Each month, a band is picked to open the night, which has seen TOY, Telegram, The Wytches, Connan Mockasin and Temples’ drummer Samuel Tom’s shoegaze warriors Secret Fix do the honours.
This month will see Riddles, a lysergic space metal band, take to the stage of the former working men’s club, in which the ceiling has been completely adorned with gold glitter.
Even when Webb is out on the road with his acclaimed band, who are currently in the studio working on new material, he says the night is never far from his thoughts.
“I’ve been as far away as Mexico or Tokyo and sitting on the end of a hotel bed and sending texts to people who are there, just wanting to know what’s going on.”
Cave Club is at Moth Club, Old Trades Hall, Valette Street, E9 6NU mothclub.co.uk
Detail of World War II poster ‘We Can Do it’ by J. Howard Miller, 1943. Credit: Wikimedia Commons
Instead of opting for syrupy sweets, fawning cards or doe-eyed teddies for your darling, go to Moth Club in Hackney Central this Sunday for a Valentine’s Fair with a kick.
The Alternative V-Day fair offers you the chance to purchase tokens of undying affection for your other half, such as one of Babak Ganjei’s passive aggressive Valentine’s cards.
Or if you’re on your lonesome, you can always decorate your very own pair of pants with writer and blogger Rosie Cherrington, as part of an installation exploring sex and feminism, or pick up a copy of Instant Hit zine to learn about a new breed of girl bands.
The fair will be a celebration of women, feminism and girl power, raising money and awareness for Girls Against, a campaign led by a group of young women whose goal it is to end sexual assault and harassment at gigs.
From 8pm a Girl Power Pub Quiz, hosted by Sister Magazine, will put you in with a chance of winning tickets to Lovebox or Citadel festival, followed by a screening of Heathers, the film that gave a voice to female teen-angst bullshit with or without a body count.
There will also be DJ sets from Cosmic Strip and Middle Fingers, a flash sale from Into You Tattoo’s Emily Johnston (with all proceeds going towards Girls Against), and artworks from Please Kill Terry and Soft Taboo.
The event runs from 5pm to midnight on 14 February – entry is free but donations are very welcome.
