On This Day 24/06/2010 Foals

On this day, 24 June 2010, rock band Foals played Cardiff’s Clwb Ifor Bach. The band had just released their second album Total Life Forever

Formed in Oxford in 2005, the band's current line-up consists of Greek-born lead vocalist and guitarist Yannis Philippakis, drummer and percussionist Jack Bevan, rhythm guitarist Jimmy Smith and bassist Walter Gervers. They are currently signed to Warner Records, and have released seven studio albums to date.

Total Life Forever was very well received; many commented how the band's music has matured from their debut album. Review aggregator Metacritic gave the album a normalised rating of 78 out of 100, indicating "generally favourable reviews".

Q magazine's Rupert Howe was more reserved in his praise. Calling it "the schizophrenic second album", Howe opined that "while this album carries more instrumental and emotional heft than its predecessor, something remains off-balance".

Besides being shortlisted for the 2010 Mercury Prize, Total Life Forever brought the band several nominations for the 2011 NME awards, including best album, best track ("Spanish Sahara") and best album artwork

Setlist

Total Life Forever

Cassius

Olympic Airways

Miami

Blue Blood

Balloons

Black Gold

Spanish Sahara

Red Socks Pugie

Electric Bloom

Encore:

The French Open

Two Steps, Twice

On This Day 14/06/2001 The Strokes

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On this day, 14 June 2001, American rock band The Strokes played Cardiff’s Clwb Ifor Bach.

Formed in New York City in 1998, the band is composed of lead singer and primary songwriter Julian Casablancas, guitarists Nick Valensi and Albert Hammond Jr., bassist Nikolai Fraiture, and drummer Fabrizio Moretti. They were a leading group of the early-2000s post-punk revival and garage rock revival movements.

The release of their debut EP The Modern Age in early 2001 sparked a bidding war among major labels, with the band eventually signing to RCA Records. That summer, they released their debut album, Is This It, to widespread critical acclaim and strong sales. It has since appeared on numerous "best album" lists.

Building on their 2001 EP The Modern Age, the band members molded compositions largely through live takes during recording sessions, while lead singer and songwriter Julian Casablancas continued to detail the lives and relationships of urban youth.

After completing the album Is This It, the Strokes embarked on a promotional world tour before its release. The album was released progressively to coincide with their tour dates, with it being released in Japan on August 22 and the United Kingdom on August 27. The album's cover photograph was deemed too sexually explicit for the US market, and was replaced there.

On This Day 29/05/2004 Jesse Malin

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On this day, 29 May 2004, American rock musician, guitarist, and songwriter Jesse Malin played Cardiff’s Clwb Ifor Bach.

He began his performing career in the New York hardcore band Heart Attack, and rose to prominence as vocalist of D Generation. Since 2015, he is a solo recording artist, having recorded numerous albums including the Lucinda Williams-produced Sunset Kids. Over the course of his career, Malin has collaborated with Bruce Springsteen, Billie Joe Armstrong of Green Day, Ryan Adams and numerous other musicians.

Born January 26, 1967, Malin began his music career at the age of 12, as the frontman for the seminal New York City hardcore band Heart Attack. The band auditioned at CBGBs but were denied because they couldn't bring in a drinking crowd to the bar.

Following the demise of Heart Attack in 1984, Malin worked on several other projects, including the band Hope, before joining the band D Generation for which he was the lead singer. As one of New York City's most noted bands of the 1990s [citation needed], D Generation released three albums, including the critically acclaimed [citation needed] No Lunch, before eventually disbanding in April 1999. The band reunited and released its fourth album, Nothing Is Anywhere, in 2016.

Malin didn't stop writing music and went on to form two other projects, PCP Highway (with former D Generation bandmates Howie Pyro and Joe Rizzo) and Bellvue (also named Tsing-Tsing for a brief time); the latter band released one album, To Be Somebody, on Goldenseal Records. The album included versions of songs that would later be reworked for Malin's first two solo albums, including "Solitaire", "Basement Home", "Brooklyn" and "Downliner"

On This Day 28/05/2015 Georgia Ruth

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On this day, 28 May 2015, Welsh singer/songwriter and harpist Georgia Ruth played Cardiff’s Clwb Ifor Bach.

Born in Llantwit Major in South Wales. At the age of four she moved with her family to Aberystwyth, where she was educated bilingually in English and Welsh, though her parents were not Welsh speakers.

She began to learn the harp at the age of seven, and began to perform her own music whilst studying English Literature at the University of Cambridge. Her early recordings were sent to BBC Radio Wales's Adam Walton, and acclaim led to an early BBC Introducing appearance at the 2008 Glastonbury Festival.

Her first EP, In Luna, was released on limited edition 10" vinyl in 2011. It was engineered and produced by David Wrench at the Bryn Derwen Recording Studio in Snowdonia and featured Pete Richardson from Y Niwl on drums and Pete Walton on double bass.

The EP drew critical acclaim and gained radio airplay from Huw Stephens and Steve Lamacq, leading to an appearance at the 2012 Green Man Festival. She also performed at the festival in 2014 and 2015.

Her first album, Week of Pines (2013) was once again produced by David Wrench and featured Dafydd Hughes, Iwan Hughes and Aled Hughes from Cowbois Rhos Botwnnog.

Music from the album gained significant radio airplay from Adam Walton and Bethan Elfyn on BBC Radio Wales, Huw Stephens on BBC Radio 1, Steve Lamacq[4] and Tom Robinson on BBC Radio 6 Music and Simon Raymonde on Amazing Radio. Additional live sessions were recorded on 6 Music with Lauren Laverne with interviews on BBC Radio Cymru.

The album was further promoted by live appearances at Festival N°6, BBC Introducing on BBC Radio 2 in Hyde Park, Latitude Festival and WOMEX.[8] In 2014 she appeared in session for Bob Harris on BBC Radio 2 and a collaboration with Newport-based Ballet Cymru at the Riverfront Arts Centre, in which a live performance of tracks from the album was interpreted by the company's dancers.

She made a guest appearance on "Divine Youth", from Manic Street Preachers 2014 album Futurology. She was also involved in the Ghazalaw project with Gwyneth Glyn and Tauseef Akhtar. She features on several tracks on English folk artist Jinnwoo's 2016 debut record Strangers Bring Me No Light.

Her second album Fossil Scale was released in October 2016.

On This Day 14/05/1998 Arab Strap

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On this day, 14 May 1998, Scottish indie rock band Arab Strap played Cardiff’s Clwb Ifor Bach. The band had just released their second studio album Philophobia which peaked at #37 in the UK album charts. NME named Philophobia the 17th best album of 1998. In 2012, Fact placed the album at number 91 on its "100 Best Albums of the 1990s" list.

Vocalist and drummer Aidan Moffat and multi-instrumentalist Malcolm Middleton grew up in Falkirk, Scotland, and bonded over their mutual love for Drag City recording artists such as Will Oldham (who at the time recorded under the name Palace Brothers) and Smog. They began collaborating in 1995, and their debut album, The Week Never Starts Round Here, was released the following year. At this point Gary Miller and David Gow joined the band and became the rhythm section, creating a more dynamic live experience when the band started touring.

Over the course of their ten-year existence, Arab Strap worked with numerous musicians, including Jenny Reeve and Stacey Sievewright, as well as Adele Bethel, who went on to form Sons and Daughters. Stuart Murdoch of Belle & Sebastian featured on the album Philophobia, but the Belle & Sebastian album/song "The Boy with the Arab Strap" would later create something of a feud between Moffat and Murdoch.

Arab Strap's marked characteristics include sordid, personal, yet honest, lyrics – described by the NME as "fly on the duvet vignettes". Like fellow Scottish band The Proclaimers, their lyrics are sung in their native Scots tongue. At first essentially an electro-acoustic band with a brooding, spare sound, later albums and gigs saw them develop a fuller sound that drew deeply on both indie and dance music.

On. This Day 31/01/2002 Stereolab

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On this day, 31 January 2002, Anglo-French avant-pop band Stereolab played Cardiff’s Clwb Ifor Bach.

Formed in London in 1990 and led by the songwriting team of Tim Gane and Lætitia Sadier, the group's sound features influences from krautrock and 1960s pop music, often incorporating a repetitive motorik beat with the use of vintage electronic keyboards and female vocals sung in English and French.

Their lyrics have political and philosophical themes influenced by the Surrealist and Situationist movements. On stage, they play in a more feedback-driven and guitar-oriented style. The band also draw from funk, jazz and Brazilian music, and were one of the first bands to be dubbed "post-rock".

Stereolab were formed by Gane (guitar and keyboards) and Sadier (vocals, keyboards and guitar) after the break-up of McCarthy. The two were romantically involved for fourteen years and are the group's only consistent members. Other longtime members included 1992 addition Mary Hansen (backing vocals, keyboards and guitar), who died in 2002, and 1993 addition Andy Ramsay (drums). The High Llamas' leader Sean O'Hagan (guitar and keyboards) was a member from 1993 to 1994 and continued appearing on later records for occasional guest appearances.

Throughout their career, Stereolab has achieved moderate commercial success. The band were released from their recording contract with Elektra Records, and their self-owned label Duophonic signed a distribution deal with Too Pure and later Warp Records. After a ten-year hiatus, the band reunited for live performances in 2019.

On This Day 27/09/2001 Echobelly

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On this day, 27 September 2001, rock band Echobelly played Cardiff’s Clwb Ifor Bach. The band had just released their Greatest Hits album I Can't Imagine the World Without Me. The album is heavily biased on the bands' first album Everyone's Got One, with 9 of the 18 songs coming from that album.

They were often compared to Blondie and The Smiths; Morrissey becoming a fan of the group.

The most prominent part of Echobelly's success formula was vocalist Sonya Madan, who was also the group's lyricist. Born in Delhi, India, before moving to England at the age of two, Madan had an atypical background for a pop star. Her upbringing made rock music an unusual choice for her as a youngster and she did not attend her first rock concert until she was in college.

In 1990 she met Glenn Johansson, a guitarist from Sweden. In a radio interview with Janice Long, on BBC Radio Wales, in December 2017, she admitted that her parents had initially found it hard to accept her choice of career.

On this day 13/08/1998 The Supernaturals

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On this day, 13 August 1998, Glaswegian Indie rock band The Supernaturals, played Cardiff’s Clwb Ifor Bach.

Fronted by singer-songwriter James McColl, they signed to Parlophone in 1996, and had a string of singles which were taken from their three albums and four EPs. Other members included Mark Guthrie, Derek McManus, Gavin Crawford and Ken McAlpine.

The band's best known songs ("Smile" and "I Wasn't Built To Get Up") were featured prominently in a series of television advertisements. In total they scored five Top 40 entries in the UK Singles Chart.

After spending early 1998 recording with Pete Smith, they released their second album "A Tune a Day" (named after the music instruction books) in August 1998 and three singles were released from the album, "I wasn't Built to Get Up", "Sheffield Song" and "Everest" .

This was supported by festival appearances and several headlining tours and a 30 date UK Arena and European tour with Robbie Williams and the Divine Comedy in early 1999.

The band were nominated for an Ivor Novello Award in 1998 for best contemporary song for "Smile" along with The Verve's "The Drugs Don't Work" and Radiohead's "No Surprises". The band won a Tartan Clef award in 1997 as the best new Scottish band.