it's CHRISTMAS!

here's a short but sweet look at the STA christmas show on Sunday 14th December. held at KCLSU, the event was headlined by The Thermals. unfortunately i was only able to stay for a short while but it seemd to be going very well when i left. if you were there, i hope you enjoyed it and if you weren't then you probably missed out on another corker!



hope you all have a great christmas - see you in the new year! ac

taking (another) break

i've been moving flat so it's left little time for thinking about the film. i did mmanage to get a rough edit of the Calories performance from TANP. the next event from STA will be the Christmas show headlined by The THermals. it should be a great show too. in between, i hope to catch up with mr pocock to chat about his podcasts and of course i need to organise a trip to derry to see how the new office is doing and chat to andrew, brian and some other folks back there. now the next problem will be making room around a new job which i will be starting in a couple of weeks - its been a while since i've had constant steady work but it'll pay the bills and pay for the edit suite...

priorities

ah priorities... basically, the biggest obstacle to following through on this documentary has finally reared its head. real life. and real life loves to munch through time and money.

i have been putting off building or buying an edit system for about six months now and i have reached the point where it will be financial issues putting it off for me. i'm lucky enough to be buying a flat. unfortunately, its going to eat a huge hole in my bank balance, which when you're self employed as i am, requires keeping enough in reserve for those times when you're not working much. this leaves little change for an edit suite.

but biding my time, i have been practising away on a free edit suite - Avid Free DV (sadly no longer available). i have mainly been cutting live performances, as you can see in the This Ain't No Picnic special video diaries.

so in my spare time, waiting for the moment to take the documentary into post production, i'll be cutting more performances and diary entries.

ac

This Ain't No Picnic Part Two

As promised, here is part two, featuring a live performance by Alan MX, more of me rambling and some sights from the festival. including plenty of STA general manager Daniel - because I know how much he loves being on camera...

This Ain't No Picnic

As part of the documentary, I dragged Ciaran along to "This Ain't No Picnic", Smalltown America's festival held to raise money for charity by getting some of the best bands around to perform. This is part one of two, featuring a full live track from The Young Playthings.




Part Two will follow very soon.

notting hill arts club

not sure where to go next - loads of exciting things coming up for sta and their artists (including a couple of new ones!) but above, you can watch a little about the occasional showcases organised by sta in assosciation with ROTa at the NHAC. theres somehing going on pretty much every saturday afternoon, so if you're around london with nothing to do, drop in (its free, the music is great and there seems to be different beer every time you visit...

Revenge Of The Video Diary

yes, i know it's been a long time. and yes, quite a lot has happened. and yes, i was there to film some of it. so here's a sneaky peek for you from the sta sessions at maida vale for bbc radio one.



more to come from the sta notting hill arts club gigs as well as me talking crap again (probably) - don't worry, i'm not in this one!

get on with it!

as ever, the need to pay rent etc. has curtailed activity on the doc. however, i should be getting back to it in a couple of weeks time as well as finally sorting out an edit system. next stop will likely be another showcase gig at notting arts club with another great line-up. also there will be a chance to get a sneak peak behind a new sta project and some members of the sta family we haven't met yet. oh, and the web diaries will soon re-appear!

rock (and indie electronic...) legends

last week i was lucky to be able to head along to the bbc's amazing and legendary maida vale studios to shoot a special sta session for the doc. alanMX and fighting with wire each performed sets in front of a small invited audience. the sessions will be broadcast on Huw Stevens' show in the coming weeks when sta will also be his label of the week.

andrew and daniel did their label business thing, supporting alan and fww whilst charming the radio 1 folk with their eloquence and enthusiasm whilst i busied around with the camera, trying not to get in the way. alan and fww rocked the place (fww's cahir narrowly avoiding choking to death on a sweet during a song - bet that wasn't in the beeb's risk assessment...)

so big thanks to andrew and daniel, fww and alanMX, the audience, the engineers at the studio and of course Huw and his peeps, all for letting me film and being dead nice.

keep her lit!

After a frustratingly long time since we went to see Alan MX, I convinced Ciaran to help me out with the second shoot for the doc. last saturday, we went along to notting hill arts club for an STA showcase event. 4 acts, some STA family and friends to chat to. i wish i wasn;t making this doc so i could've supped a few beers and enjoyed the music without having to think what shots would look good or would it be too loud and distort! so a huge thanks to all the bands as well as Daniel from STA for finally commiting some thoughts to tape - more to come from him methinks. and a certain other STA luminary has promised to let me come and film him in a few weeks time.

well, its off to the legendary Maida Vale studio tomorrow to see fighting with wire and alanMX recording a session for Radio 1. can't wait!

Diary Episode 04

I've posted a new diary on youtube. boringly, i've tried it in a wmv format to stop it being distorted like all my other cips which originated from mp4. yawn.

aside from that, progress is slow at the minute as i've been busy with real world work. yawn. gots to pay those bills and finance this thing though...

more exciting things next time! i promise!

xac

finally!!!

AH, finally, tomorrow I'll be picking up my shiny new shooting kit. its been a long wait to get it sorted out but tomorrow i shall be trundling over to the supplier and getting the camera and bits and pieces that i'll be using throughout the documentary production before pensioning it and myself into filming weddings and bahmitzvahs (apologies for the spelling on that one - despite "appearances", i am not jewish!). so expect a video diary very soon from a happy and excited me playing with my new toys!

We've started!

The first day of shooting went well - AlanMX mixing his album at Southern Studio. I brought along a friend, Ciaran to take on Camera duties - he is afterall a real-life professional camera operator and he provided the imagination and expertise to make the pictures look pretty. I was lucky enough to get the loan of a shotgun mic (cheers Paul!). Here's episode 3 of the video diary of production: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y84AHgs4lpE

First Shoot

Well, it's all about to happen. The first shoot for the Smalltown America documentary takes place tomorrow. We'll be going to visit STA artist AlanMX in the glorious surroundings of the prestigious Southern Studio in London where Alan will be mixing his debut album for Smalltown America. So that's it - it's real and it is all going to happen. I look forward to bringing you these reports to mark the progress of production. I will also be posting video diaries for the production which I'll link to from here.

To get to this point, I need to thank Andrew and Daniel at STA, AlanMX, Harvey at Southern and Ciaran. so, thanks!

cheers,
aaron