Tuesday 29 March 2011

Folie à Deux Presents Mary Hampton, Laura Hocking & Nick Mulvey

We are proud to announce our third Alternative-Folk evening on 30 April 2011 19.00 - 23.00 with performances by Mary Hampton Cotillion, Laura Hocking and the Long Goodbye and Nick Mulvey (of Portico Quartet) at Utrophia Project Space - a 1950's ice-cream factory turned art gallery and events venue in New Cross. Held in a cosy and intimate barn space, it is the perfect environment to experience emerging and established contemporary folk musicians in a uniquely private and rustic setting. It will be a unique, joyous and inspiring evening, laced with mulled wine, cider and beer! There will also be an art exhibition for audiences to view next door. In November 2010 we launched our first visual arts exhibition I have this strange kind of feeling and I just can't place it... (listed in Time Out's Best Galleries in London) at Utrophia Project Space as well as our first Alt-Folk night featuring Dear Winesburg, Mariner's Children front-man Benedict Rubinstein and Amber States. Since then performances have included Tristram, Laish and Kristin McClement (Willkommen Collective). Folie a Deux's next art exhibition will be in a new location this summer 2011, details soon to be announced. BUY TICKETS HERE. Find out more about the bands below.

MARY HAMPTON COTILLION


'mesmerising' - The Guardian
'songs which recline with shimmering sensuality in various cloaks of weirdness... fragility, desolation and humour' - The Telegraph
'spectral and spartan, an exotic gothic drama' - Q Magazine

Mary Hampton is a folk singer and song-writer from Brighton. Her first album 'My Mother's Children' (2008) was named in MOJO'S annual round-up of Top 5 Folk albums and featured in HMV'S Top 20 albums of the year. Over the past couple of years she has toured solo worldwide as well as supported the likes of James Yorkston, Adem and Diane Cluck. Her songs combine the traditions of centuries-old folk with dark contemporary subject matter, simultaneously taking you into timeless, edgy, fantasy worlds. The Fly describes her songs 'as the dreams of children, far more unsettling for an adult... evoking Eliot's Wasteland in it's beautiful bleakness.' On April 30 she will be performing with her band Mary Hampton Cotillion, who adorn her 'unnerving, delicacy, elemental and acoustic simplicity' with cello, double bass, fiddle, horns and percussion and more vocals 'all of which makes the lyrical perversity of 'Ballad of the Talking Dog' and the buffeting intensity of 'Honey' the more potent and enchanting' (uncut ****). This year she is writing her second album and touring with her cotillion.

www.doublesixclub.tv/session/14/mary-hampton

LAURA HOCKING AND THE LONG GOODBYE

'gorgeous' - Johanna Hari
'A singer/ songwriter of piquant gifts' - New Statesman
'Truly addictive and utterlyconsuming' - Drunken Werewolf
' '...Destined for world domination' - God is in the TV

Laura Hocking and the Long Goodbye are a 'vaudeville folk' band formed in early 2010 after Hocking decided to develop her solo material by adding a viola player, violinist and drummer. Together they juxtapose cut-glass vocals and dark story telling against a shifting backdrop of strings, guitar and bass. Her songs tell stories, some true (as in her song 'Strongmen and Acrobats' about taking her autistic brother to the fireworks), some far-fetched ('Talented Tailor') is an immorality tale about the perils of sleeping with a tattooist) but all full of a dry wit which picks at the stitches of anxiety and the female body - 'Like biting into a cream cake, and finding a razor blade' (The Windmill). After three years of refining her craft, Hocking is realising her first double A-side on 7 inch vinyl including a bonus CD with four tracks 'Brilliantly hummable melodies and masterly storytelling with sweet harmonies belying often brutal lyrics. We can't recommend it enough' (For Folks Sake). The EP launch is being held on the 30th March 2011 at the Slaughtered Lamb and is available to order on http://www.laurahocking.bandcamp.com/

www.soundcloud.com/laurahocking


NICK MULVEY

Nick Mulvey is a afro-beat and flamenco-influenced guitarist and song-writer based in East London, also known as the 'hang' player in the Mercury Music Award nominated Portico Quartet (Real World Records). After two acclaimed albums (including Time Out's 'Best Jazz Album' 2007) and worldwide tours, Nick left the band at the end of 2010 to tell his own stories and pursue new musical adventures. Those who know the music of Portico Quartet will hear from similar traits in Nick's solo work - hypnotic, grooved based patterns and richly melodic tunes - but blended this time with a love of song- writing and intricate, driving guitar playing.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=U1F_KMbdVXM

http://www.utrophia.net/

www.twitter.com/FaDgallery

'Folie a Deux is shaping up to becoming an alt:folk barometer of bands that you need to know about in 2011' - Amelia's Magazine