The Lost Cavalry's Diary

20/3/10 : White Heat and The Windmill

This week we played our first gig at White Heat - the club where Oliver and I used to visit every Tuesday back when it was at Infinity and our mate Jon used to DJ downstairs. Half the people I know in London I met through White Heat, including our new band member Toby. It was good to be back at White Heat - I'd played there before as the drummer in Wolfie and guitarist in Fanfarlo, but this time I got to be the singer and stand at the front, which is of course the best place to stand. I'd forgotten how high up the stage is at Madame Jo Jo's.

We had to rush round the corner after sound check to meet a PR company so we missed the first band, but the headliners were a brilliant band called Foreign Office, who's song 'think about leaving the house' is still stuck in my head now. It was a fun gig, we played our new song 'The Flood' and it seemed to go down pretty well. I get to play my new concertina on it, which hopefully everyone could hear ok - I need to get a built-in mic for it maybe but I bet they're expensive.

Thursday night we played at The Windmill in Brixton. If you've ever been to The Windmill you'll know that from the outside it looks a bit dubious - someone described it to me as looking like a hippy scout hut - but I have never been to a night at The Windmill that hasn't been brilliant. There's something about the place that just has an amazing, friendly vibe, and despite the slightly strange stage layout the sound is always really good. Thursday night showed that to be true - Tim had put together a great lineup that really worked together - Twin Falls were beautiful, and Heliopause had a lovely rich sound. And they were all great guys too. We played one of the most fun gigs we have played so far, despite a few entaglements with ukulele leads and the especially hot lights! Mike from Urban75 (he's the unofficial King of Brixton) kindly took some photos which can be seen here: www.urban75.org.

Our next gig is for Wonderland and will be a bit different - playing at around midnight in a club inside some of the arches near London Bridge. Then we have a good acoustic gig coming up at The Lock Tavern supporting Dave from The Wave Pictures. Apart from that, we're going back into the studio over Easter Weekend to record two new tracks, more on that later...

Mark.x

1/3/10 : Sea Monster

On Friday we had our first gig as a five-piece - Toby is now officially inaugurated as our melodica, glockenspiel, guitar and ukulele playing fifth member. And he sings some mean backing vocals too. The gig went well, thanks in no small part to Mike from Offline Club who organised the PA and mixed the sound for us and was generally brilliant (thanks again Mike!) and we played a new song called 'The Flood' as our final tune - where I get to play my new concertina.

We've got some good gigs coming up in March including White Heat and The Windmill, Brixton. White Heat kind of feels like the place that it all started. Half of the friends I know in London are via some kind of White Heat connection, including Toby in fact, and it was because of White Heat that I played drums in Wolfie and guitar in Fanfarlo. Oliver is the same I think - it's going to be good to play at White Heat with The Lost Cavalry!

And here's a drawing I did last night of a sea monster attacking a ship... no reason, just thought it would look cool...

Mark.x

12/1/10 : The Lost Cavalry Video Diary - Lonely on a cold balcony

We spent most of this evening feeling lonely on a cold balcony in Camden, fortunately we're the kind of people who like to make the most of things. It was cold though...

Don't worry Greg, we forgive you! :-)

03/01/2010 : Happy New Year

Well, it was a year ago now that I walked down the road in Dalston to pop to the shop for a can of coke after Boxing Day dinner, and first hummed the melody to 'Oh Sally' to myself. I'd just left Fanfarlo and already knew my plan for 2009 was to start a new band, and I knew who I wanted to ask to be in the band with me. Dave who I'd been in a band with years ago at school, Oliver who was playing in Xup along with me, and Nick who I had written songs with before as 'Meissner' and also in a band we had at university.

We practiced for a few months and things came together well. Since our first gig in May we've played some great shows and had a great year. I think our show at the Buffalo Bar for 'Basement Scam' was the highlight so far, loads of people, great sound and a nice venue. Our weirdest gig was an acoustic show in Beyond Retro, the same night as the Basement Scam gig. We played among the hats and fur coats to a load of guys dressed in Halloween costume and a bunch of confused shoppers.

So, it was a good first year - we have some good recordings, some cool live videos and everyone seemed to like our Christmas 'Stop The Cavalry' cover - I think we'll do more recording like that in future, it was a lot of fun to make. Happy 2010! Mark.x