SINGING ALL THE RIGHT NOTES.
Faced with a load of boring questions, most bands would probably scream: ‘Let the music do the talking.’ So this month we thought we’d try just that.

Instead of a tired journo reeling off the same stale pap, we’ve taken the six notes that make up many a great guitar riff and used them to give some of the hottest up-and-coming bands a voice. Each note – E, A, D, G, B, E – represents a question and allows each act to have their views and opinions heard by the people that matter most, the fans.

What did this month’s groups think of our new material? Find out below:

3RD DEC

Whisky Works

Ethos of your music?
Currently unsigned and do everything ourselves. A lot of our collective influences share a similar ethos such as: Fugazi, Husker Du and more currently the Big Scary Monsters record label.
I think with the current state of the music industry, it's getting more and more important for bands to be self sufficient and self aware. Although the record industry may be in decline, there are better opportunities for bands at our level to do things by ourselves and the way we want to.

That's not to say we are immune to help! If the right people came along and cared about our sound, we are all ears! We pride ourselves on our live performance, if we don't come off completely shattered and covered in sweat then we haven't done it right.
    
Ambitions for 2010?
Too tour…Lot's. To let as many people as possible hear our Mini Album which is released officially next year. We are also planning a single/video launch early next year. Around summertime we will be starting to think about our first full length record too, really busy!

Do’s and don’ts of touring?
Do bring multiple changes of clothes! Tour with lovely, honest people! Plan everything way in advance! Keep clean and resist the temptation to have fast food every day! Be careful in Dundee.

Don't tour in a Ford Focus. Have four guitars across everyone's lap in the backseat. Play with promoters you don't trust. Join a random band line up.

Greatest band playing today? & why?
Most of our favourite bands have split up. Couldn't possibly name the greatest as that's an impossible question. My personal favourite at the moment has to be The Fall Of Troy but collectively we all adore At The Drive In!

Biggest tune? & why?
'Pattern Against User' is vintage At The Drive In. Its so full of energy! Alternatively, our own biggest tune has to be 'Electric' as huge is the only word you could use to describe the chorus!
Songs of the last 20 years you just can't ignore though, include 'Just Like Heaven' by The Cure, one of the greatest love songs ever written. Our drummer would have you believe it is 'Time After Time' by Cyndi Lauper but he is wrong….

Eurythmics or Human league or neither – if neither, why?
Eurythmics every time. I don't feel guilty about having 'Thorn In My Side' on my I Tunes playlist!
 

3RD DEC
Trapped in Kansas

Ethos of your music?
We try to write songs that will engage the listener, challenge their perception of music by offering jazzy time-signatures and tempo changes, as well as interesting guitar work, whilst making sure they can still sing along! We really just try to challenge ourselves most of the time though, just to try and keep things interesting!

Ambitions for 2010?
Do as well as we did in '09! Try and get round the festivals we missed like Wickerman, Belladrum etc. We definitely aim to get a proper physical release out sometime early next year too!

Do’s and don’ts of touring?
From experience…
DO:      sort out accommodation (car boots aren't  comfy)  Overestimate how much money you'll spend, you'll still exceed expectations through the blissful medium of fast food.

DON'T:   Steal things from your drummer Stay in university halls and expect to leave with everything intact. i.e eyebrows, limbs etc.

Greatest band playing today? & why?
For me it has to be either Frightened Rabbit or Biffy Clyro! I really feel, in both cases, that everything they do is incredible, they both gig frequently and are both constantly releasing, which keeps me happy! Thye music is easy to relate to for me too, as being a fellow Scot makes it easy to identify both bands' authenticity, which is really important. If a Scottish band sing in American accents it isn't authentic and vice versa, it's just good that the accent is coming through more and more these days and both Frabbit and Biffy seem to be leading the way!

Biggest tune? & why?
I would say our biggest tune is Tower Block. It hasn't been recorded as of yet but it has such a catchy chorus that everytime we play it, people are always singing it hours later. When it does finally get recorded, I really think it will be huge for us!

Eurythmics or Human league or neither – if neither, why?
I am going to say neither, for the sole reason that they're both pretty dated now and innovation is key to good new music! 
The Mill Edinburgh

10TH DEC

Homework

Ethos of your music?
To make something memorable, inventive and original and to carry on the making albums. Not just releasing MP3s. If people leave your gig and have at least one of your tunes stuck in their head you know that tunes a keeper.

Ambitions for 2010?
We have just finished writing the album so the first half of the year will be spent getting it all recorded and the second half promoting its release. A manager and a label interested in releasing the album would also be high on the list.

Do’s and don’ts of touring?
Do play outside of the normal circuit; Do get everyone’s email address; Do try and get paid for your gigs; Do it with another band; Do take photos

Don’t share certain photos

Greatest band playing today? & why?
The Flaming Lips – Because they do what they want. Amazing live show. Inventive production.
Daft Punk – Peerless, well maybe apart from Chemical Brothers.
Wilco – Have you heard A Ghost is Born?
Radiohead – Everybody says Radiohead and In Rainbows just blew everything else out of the water when it came out.

Biggest tune? & why?
Changes from week to week, month to month, year to year.

Eurythmics or Human league or neither – if neither, why?
Take Depeche Mode, Gary Numan and Kraftwerk before either of them.  They were always on the darker side of the synth.

10TH DEC

Kid Canaveral

Ethos of your music?
We want people to have fun and dance like idiots. We're anti the Mayor in Footloose. Go Kevin Bacon.
    
Ambitions for 2010?
Release our album. Tour our album. Let as many people as possible hear our album. Choose Life.
   
Do’s and don’ts of touring?
Do eat plenty of fruit and vegetables when the opportunity presents itself. Service station's breakfasts will shorten your life expectancy. Shower whenever possible.

Greatest band playing today? & why?
Spinal Tap. There is no why.
 
Biggest tune? & why?
At the moment we are all loving Brow Beaten by the "mysterious and elusive" Silver Columns. It's a real floor filler.    

Eurythmics or Human league or neither – if neither, why?
Surely the answer is both. Love Action, Thorn In My Side, Fascination, Don't You Want Me, Who's That Girl, There Must Be An Angel…. we could go on…

17TH DEC

Sparrow & The Workshop

Ethos of your music?
3 people can make a big sound

Ambitions for 2010?
Well, 2009 was a busy year for us; 2 releases, 3 tours, 90+ gigs and a whole round at the festivals – glastonbury, end of the road, belladrum, kendal calling… So hopefully 2010 will be that plus more -  we'll be releasing our full-length Album, so hopefully that will be a good incentive to tour our hearts out around the land – and fingers crossed further a field!

Do’s and don’ts of touring?
Get Directions! – We've turned up to a Gypsy camp at 1am, looking for our hotel. And bumped into Timmy Mallet down a backstreet in Newcastle when lost!

Eat! – it's the one thing we forget to do, or we end up eating right before we go on stage, and spend the entire gig avoiding burping into the mics!

Chin-Up and take a punch-bag! – when you rock up to a town and despite driving 7 hours to get there, the promoter's an ass, you're broke and there's only 2 people in the audience.. you'll want to hit something.

Greatest band playing today? & why?
Flaming Lips certainly put on the best show on earth, saw them at the O2 and it was mind blowing!

Biggest tune? & why? 
Right now I've got the Flaming Lips 'She don't use jelly' in my head – we were lucky enough to get taken to the  stage wings for that song at their gig at the O2.. seeing the guys backstage loading the confetti canons and blowing up balloons!!

Eurythmics or Human league or neither – if neither, why?
I'd be inclined to say neither, but you got to give it to Dave Stewart, purely on the grounds of sticking with that beard 20 years on. 
The Mill Glasgow

17TH DEC
Invisible Republic

Ethos of your music?
To create music which is both classic and contemporary, which gives a nod to the past but with an eye on the future.

Ambitions for 2010?
In 2010 our ambitions are to get signed to a record label, record our album and to do a tour of Britain and beyond.

Do’s and don’ts of touring?
Having not yet toured to any degree, we have yet to be exposed to the highs, lows, opportunities and pitfalls of life on the open road.

Greatest band playing today? & why?
Wilco – They are both traditional and experimental and are not afraid to take risks. A fact borne out by them being dropped by their record label on delivery of their ‘Yankee Hotel Foxtrot’ album. They combine great songwriting with experimental production values.

Biggest tune? & why?
Either Way’ from their ‘Sky Blue Sky’ album for it’s arrangement and sound. A fantastic song with a sparse, ambient arrangement and some virtuoso guitar work.

Eurythmics or Human league or neither – if neither, why?
The Eurythmics. ‘Cause sweet dreams are made of this. Keep your head up. Movin’on.'

Interview with Keren McKean – manager of The Mill and head of our influential, sharp-eyed A&R team.

Ok, let’s start with a big question. What’s your proudest moment to date?
My first platinum disc. I have 3 now. All quite special, but the first was the best. And that my name is the very first credit on Final Straw by Snow Patrol.

Yep, that’s pretty impressive. So what was the first record you bought?
I’m fortunate enough to have had quite a cool dad who liked his music, so both my first record and first gig are not too embarrassing. Thanks to him my first record was Blondie and my first gig was Adam & The Ants.

And right now, what song’s in your head?
I have got Untitled by The Ads absolutely stuck in my head!

Great track. So who’s your favourite band?
My constant few are Love, Television, Patti Smith, This Mortal Coil, dEUS, and obviously Snow Patrol and Aerials Up (formerly known as The Ads). I can get really into one song by an artist – my ringtones change fairly frequently. Alec Downie, a friend and part of the Scottish music industry, regularly posts brilliant YouTube videos on Facebook of old songs that always remind me of something I love. I currently have  “Since Yesterday” by Strawberry Switchblade on. Sometimes I don’t want to answer the phone as I like listening to the song too much.

So, when did you realise that the music industry was for you?
I was about 16. I was friendly with Teenage Fanclub and the BMX Bandits. Duglas Stewart used to make up the most amazing compilation tapes for me. While I was at Uni, I managed my first band, State of Flux, who were signed to T&B (Twitch from Optimo’s first label).

And how did you get in to A&R?
First as a promoter. My dad died from leukaemia when I was 17. Teenage Fanclub helped me put on a charity gig in aid of leukaemia when I was 18. We did 2 nights at King Tut’s that were totally sold out. Geoff Ellis was the booker. He ended up offering me a job at DF where I worked in a variety of roles.

Then where did you go?
I applied for a job with Big Life in 2000. Jazz Summers (responsible for the success The Verve, The Orb, Badly Drawn Boy, Killing Joke and more) found my passion for Scotland and Scottish bands a worthwhile investment. I am still there. I co manage with Jazz and Tim Parry and do A&R for the publishing arm, where I signed Snow Patrol. I have actually offered two publishing deals to The Mill artists recently.

Got any advice for anyone wanting to get on in the music industry?
Most people that ask me about the music industry want to get into management – it’s a good place to start. It generally gives people an idea of all the different roles needed to break a band. With things the way they are in the music industry, a good manager is someone who is creative, has loads of ideas about how to market their band and is very pro active. No one is sure what business models are working and which ones will fail, so you need to have confidence to experiment with your ideas. Just because no one else has done it before, it could work brilliantly so it’s important to have that belief in your band and yourself.

So, how has your time with The Mill been so far?
Busy! It always has been, from day one, but I like that. There is such a big team on The Mill, so many people behind the scenes making everything happen.

What do you think about what Miller Genuine Draft are doing?
What I loved about The Mill most at the beginning was the way Miller Genuine Draft listened to my ideas, understood what the bands needed and acted on it. Looking at the number of bands asking for a slot at The Mill, I know we are getting it right. It’s a fantastic opportunity for any emerging band to be associated with our line-ups and also to receive all the assets for free. Loads of bands don’t realise that they get to keep the rights, even though Miller Genuine Draft pays for the recordings. Many bands can’t afford to work with Tony Doogan, so that is always a huge selling point. Production Co Pilot that make all the videos have also developed loads since working on The Mill – everyone comments on how good the quality of the videos is when they see them.

Any of The Mill bands you can see going the distance?
The obvious ones are Frightened Rabbit, Broken Records, We Were Promised Jetpacks and Twin Atlantic but I also see huge potential in Found, Aerials Up (formerly known as The Ads), OK Social Club, Pearl & The Puppets, Sparrow & The Workshop, and a few others coming through that you will see confirmed shortly.

At the moment, what’s your favourite downloadable The Mill track?
Other than The Ads, I like all of OK Social Club’s tracks.

Finally, predictions for 2010?
It will be interesting to see how the music industry goes. I hope to see Found and Aerials Up breaking through.

We received an email on Saturday afternoon informing us that The Red Well will not be playing The Mill Edinburgh this Thursday. It would seem that they have split up……

Fortunately there were a number of bands ready to fill their slot and to receive all the assets The Mill offers. We decided to try to stick to a similar genre and as we had a few options, we went with The Stantons.They describe themselves as country but with an edge, but not quite alt country – make of that what you will. It's an interesting line up! They should be an fascinating match for Meursault. We'll have their info up on the website as soon as we can but in the meantime you can check out their myspace. You can still get tickets under the date – 15th Oct, or you can text in for tickets. The code is MILL14K  - text it to 82500.

While looking for a band to replace The Red Well, I came across loads more ideas for Edinburgh which resulted in a bit of  a booking frenzy again, so it ended up working out well. At least The Stantons will be able to make use of the video and audio recordings we give them to promote themselves –  not much use to a band splitting up. We are now confirmed up until the end of the year and most of January, but we do have some slots left in February and March just now. Our database is fairly massive now so we'll be looking through that, but if you are particularly looking to play in that period, flag it up to us now. Leave comments on here.

As usual, you can download all the assets a few weeks after the gig. Loads more audio and video assets have just gone live so make sure you keep coming back to see what new music we have added.  

n

Finally got home to write the blog after a very long, but great day. We celebrated a Year At The Mill at The Mill Glasgow tonight, and it was a brilliant celebration!

The Mill crew worked so hard to pull off such a good night, and it helped that the bands were amazing too. Tony Doogan brought his whole studio set up into the venue and we recorded the whole gig. Tony and his colleague, Gregor, then hid in a wee back room, mixing a few tracks by each band and by the end of the night we had them all duplicated to give away to the audience by the end of the night. It was an impressive task, but we managed it.

Sparrow & The Workshop had to pull out at the last minute which was unfortunate – their singer lost her voice, which made performing pretty hard but although they were sadly missed, the other 3 bands were excellent. A big thanks to Some Young Pedro, We Were Promised Jetpacks and Broken Records!

If you have tickets for next week's celebrations at The Mill Edinbrugh, you're in for a treat when Found, The Ads, OK Social Club and Come In Tokyo all play and Tony will be working his magic once again.

Make sure you get a drinks token too – you'll understand why when you see them. They're excellent!

see you there! 

It's been a year!! Really, it has. The time just seems to have flown by but we have loved every minute of it. Over the last year The Mill has played host to a veritable array of emerging bands. A couple of months ago, a few of the A&R team and I did an interview for the Sunday Herald about how Scotland's music industry thrives in a recession. It was fascinating to hear the journalist's research which demonstrated that Scots tend to pick up a guitar when they don't have a job, rather than get depressed. Ok, so they may express their depression sometimes in their music, but the amount of creativity in Scotland cannot be argued with. It has meant that we have had an amazing choice of bands to be able to book this last year, and we are looking forward to booking just as many creative people in the coming months. We're already booked up til December and demand is high for places, but we still want to look back at the bands that have progressed to the next level of their career since they played. That's what The Mill is all about.

It was hard to choose our headliners, and it is hard to decide which bands we should book weekly. We could only book everyone that wants to play if we were open every night of the week now, so you can imagine how hard it gets. We did manage to decide eventually though, and it seems we got it right as all tickets for both events were gone in 12 hours.

If you haven't managed to get your paws on any tickets,  you can still enjoy some of the music. All four of our headliners were asked what emerging bands they would like to bring with them to play at our gigs celebrating a Year At The Mill. We figured nobody knows best than the musicians themselves. A great example of how this works for bands is with our headliners We Were Promised Jetpacks – they were signed to Fat Cat Records after fans of the band, Frightened Rabbit, suggested them to their label, Fat Cat. Jetpacks and the Rabbits also played a stunning sell out show together at The Mill last year – you can check out the audio recordings produced by Tony Doogan and the videos online on our website. Unfortunately you won't be able to get your ears around Jetpacks latest recordings unless you have tickets for this Thursday's gig. We are recording all the bands live, as usual, Tony is producing and mixing them as usual, but the difference is that we are doing it all as it happens, and making it available only to all the guests on the night – as they leave they will be given a free exclusive CD of the gig they have just seen.

Our emerging bands audio and video recordings will all be available on our website so you can check out Some Young Pedro, chosen by We Were Promised Jetpacks, and Sparrow & The Workshop, chosen by Broken Records, this Thursday. I highly recommend checking them out if you haven't managed to grab a ticket because they may be our headliners next time.

For those of you that have managed to obtain tickets, you are in for a treat. A plethora of great bands, playing great songs with Jim Gellatly on DJ duties, it's going to be an aural pleasure for everyone. Not only that, you will get an exclusive memento of the evening in the form of the live CD and posters were have for you. 

Doors are at 7pm, and as we need to squeeze 4 bands into the night, bands will be starting fairly early on so make sure you get down in time to catch everyone. Be aware that the emerging bands will play directly before the headliner that brought them, so the running order for Thursday is Some Young Pedro, followed by their headliner We Were Promised Jetpacks, then Sparrow & The Workshop, followed by our other headliner Broken Records. Don't be late!! You'll regret it!  

We've had a manic couple of weeks, so apologies for not posting on here earlier, but we had to get all the acts confirmed for our annual event before I could announce them to you.

It's all been worthwhile though. – we are now happy to announce that we have invited back 4 great headliners who have previously played at The Mill in the last year, but we have also given them the chance to bring some of the bands that they think deserve a chance to play at The Mill too. Demand has been huge for slots at The Mill -we have now had requests from over 600 bands who are asking for a gig. Unfortunately we only have 100 slots available in  a year, so obviously not everyone is going to get the chance to play but we thought these bands would know who deserves it. Our headliners are We Were Promised Jetpacks who are bringing Some Young Pedro, Broken Records who are bringing Sparrow & The Workshop, Found who are bringing Come On Tokyo and The Ads who are bringing OK Social Club.

Tickets are available now and are already flying out the door so make sure you get your texts or emails in for your free tickets now.

This Thursday at The Mill Glasgow is also looking like a busy one – and we are really looking forward to it too. Ming Ming & The Ching Chings are launching their single and sharing the stage with Big Ned to celebrate it. Ming Ming's single "Show Off" has already had thousands of plays on myspace, but you really need to see it live to get the real energy about it.  Big Ned are fast becoming one of our favourites at The Mill too. See you there!

Today I had the pleasure of hearing some of the best audio equipment on the market. My old school friend runs Linn Records and invited me up to see what they do – I love that place!! You should hear all their different systems and how amazing the quality is. I have been planning to replace my turntable soon and now I can't wait. I felt like a kid in a toy shop, and it doesn't hurt that the setting is beautiful and that the building is amazing. I have been buzzing so much about music in the last few weeks, there's loads of great bands and brilliant songwriters in Scotland just now, but it's even better to hear it all through those systems. 

looking forward to even more good music at The Mill Glasgow tomorrow. Bronto Skylift and Gap Year Riot promise to put on an amazing show, well worth catching. Tickets have been flying out the door so make sure you nab your freebies quickly. It's going to be interesting to hear what Tony Doogan does with both bands – I have no doubt it will be up to his normal fantastic standard though, so make sure you come and get your free downloads in a week or two. 

It seems loads of you are discovering new bands on here and downloading all the new tracks – feel free to keep building your library! Let us know which ones you like and who has impressed you or surprised you. I'm always finding something new I really like. ID Parade has been in my head quite a bit, but I also revisited Endor and Be A Familiar this week – both brilliant bands!  

Today is one of those days that I am just loving searching through all my music and playing random things that I keep meaning to get round to listening to. I always find some wee gems. Listening to quite a few Mill bands – and I am particularly impressed with Found's new invention, Cybraphon. It's absolutely brilliant. It's a robot band that reacts to praise and criticism online. www.cybraphon.com  Loads of other Mill bands have been busy too. Manda Rin is off to Tokyo where she has a great fanbase, Juno happily DON'T have swine flu and are working on a few interesting projects. The Gillyflowers are getting ready to play at The Rowchester Music festival next month, The Ads are playing a crazy gig in the planetarium at the Science Centre, Colin Train launched his new material at Buchanan Underground Station. The Mill took over Buchanan Street Underground too, prompting a texting frenzy when loads of bands found images of themselves plastered all over it. The Mill cinema ad has had exactly the same response. Hope you've all had a chance to see it now! Bronto Skylift took on proper management, Donnie Little from Paolo Nutini's band and Endrick Brothers has been writing new material with Yorick McCormack from Endrick Brothers. Little Buddha are touring America – still! Suspire have just finished some dates in France and have just confirmed for a Mill show in November, as did Washington Irving. The scottish music industry is definitely buzzing right now!

We had a busy but very hot and sweaty night at The Mill Glasgow last week. Good to see so many of you there and bearing the heat – but then when the bands are good, it's all worth it! No one made more effort than the singer from Franco Neon though. His girlfriend was in hospital being induced as he took to the stage – we held the show for him to race over from the hospital in a taxi. that's dedication for you!! the Apple Scruffs also put on a great show – check back here in the next week or two to download the audio tracks and check out the videos.

You can also check out The Debuts and Yuill Scott & The Haight in a few weeks as we have them coming to play at The Mill Edinburgh this Thursday. That's a great bill that should get you warmed up for any of the number of festivals that are on next weekend!  It also means you can save your pennies for the expensive festivals and come enjoy some free gigs courtesy of The Mill! 

 The Mill has an A&R team who are responsible for helping to choose all the bands – made up of Scottish music industry folks who all know their music inside out. They are mainly based in Glasgow but as Edinburgh seems to be providing a greta number of good bands recently, we are bringing The Mill A&R crew through to Edinburgh on Aug 6th. We will be having our regular meeting but after that , they will all be down at The Mill for Ray Summers and The King Hats. If you want to chat to any of us please feel free to get tickets for that night and come and find us and ask us as many questions as you need to. We are now up to 600 bands asking if they can have a gig, so if you feel you need some advice as to how to secure one of the few slots that we do have left, Aug 6th is the time to ask those questions! 

It's been a crazy week in music this week. The sad news about Michael Jackson has shocked everyone, but on a high note, the Glastonbury coverage has been great. Festival season has very much kicked in so I'm sure loads of you will be finding new bands that you love. We had a brilliant gig at The Mill Edinburgh last Thursday, so if you want to look fro some more new bands, I suggest you check out The Gillyflowers as soon as we get it uploaded. I am just listening to the audio tracks – Kirsten Adamson's voice is brilliant! I really like Hold Me Down just now.

Next week at The Mill Glasgow Franco Neon and The Apple Scruffs are taking over. It's looking like another busy one so get your tickets soon. We have done a deal with both Glasgow Met radio and TMS Radio who are both featuring Mill bands so if you want to check out what anyone coming up sounds like, go check those stations out.

The Debuts, who are playing next at The Mill Edinburgh, already have material on the site if you fancy getting an idea of what they are like in advance.  

It's been a wee while since I managed to update this – we've been running around putting loads of new stuff together for The Mill such as the cinema ad. many of you probably know we filmed it at The Mill at the beginning of May. The final edit looks brilliant and all the bands involved are happy with it. If you want to check it out and see if you can catch a glimpse of any of Found, The Ads, Palace Ballet or Saint Deluxe, the ad will be aired this week. I just got a huge list of everywhere it's showing so if you are heading to the cinema this week, look out for it. Think I'll go check out Angels & Demons, tho The Last House on The Left and Terminator are all options as it is on before all of them. Let us know what you think.

Other than the cinema ad, we have been planning the coming months at The Mill. We now have over 600 bands wanting to play at The MIll so it takes us a long time to get through everyone, please be patient with us. We have our co curators night coming up on Aug 6th – News of The World's A Listed have teamed up with us to bring you Ray Summers and King Hats. We have more plans for the end of August or September that we can let you know about soon too.

Tonight we have Acrylic Iqon and Rosco – both great bands and looking like it's going to be a busy night. Come join us! 

We had a great night at The Mill Glasgow on Wednesday – Eoghan Colgan and Emma Curran complemented each other well. The highlight of the night for myself and the crew was Emma's Song by Eoghan Colgan. as soon as he finished playing it, we all checked the set list to see if it was one of the ones we were recording for him. You'll be happy to know it is, so we'll see what Tony does with it and get that uploaded soon.

In the meantime, Eoghan is setting off on a Scottish tour so if you missed him at The Mill, you can check him out at the following dates…..

Sun April 19th – QMU, Glasgow

Tue April 21st – Saucy Mary's, Skye

Wed April 22nd – Cafe Drummond, Aberdeen

Thurs April 23rd – Hootananny, Inverness

Fri April 24th – East Grange Loft, Kinloss

Sat April 25th – Twa Tams, Perth

Sun April 26th – The Voodoo Rooms, Edinburgh 

I'm really looking forward to The Mill tonight because I haven't seen Eoghan Colgan live but he sounds brilliant. He has written some really beautiful songs and is just about to go off on a UK tour to promote them, but we managed to persuade him to come take part in The Mill first, so if you are looking for a cheap night out and some great music, we'll see you tonight.

For anyone in Glasgow tomorrow night, there's an interesting talk taking place at The Apple Store on Buchanan St. John McLaughlin, another of Scotland's well known producers, will be giving a talk on how to make a hit record and the future of the music industry at 6pm – 7pm. It's free entry and anyone is welcome.

Unfortunately I won't be able to make it along as I will be heading through to Edinburgh for our very last night at The Caves. We relocate to our new home at Cabaret Voltaire, the following week, on April 2nd, when our first performers in our new venue are Bo Deadly and Electrolite. Both bands have been doing chatting to us and telling us all about what they are up to, and it's all sounding great, so we are looking forward to a great first gig at Cab Vol. You're welcome to come and join us and see how we have transformed Cab Vol into The Mill! We know you love Cab Vol, as do we, but we are sure you are going to love The Mill there too.

played a brilliant gig at The Mill Edinburgh last week. It was poptatsic and really high energy – great to watch! That should be a cool video. If you are in London though, you obviously won't get too many chances to catch some of the great bands live at The Mill, but you can see Futuristic Retro Champions supporting The Vaselines at The Kentish Town Forum on March 27th. That's a well deserved support slot and a great bill if you are looking for some good Scottish bands in London! If you aren't in London or Scotland, then at least you can check out all the videos on here anyway.

Wehave a few changes happening at The Mill from April, when we move The MillEdinburgh from The Caves to Cabaret Voltaire. This means that to see the bestin emerging music you now just have to come round the corner to Blair Street.We are all looking forward to working with the team there – it's a great venue.

Changeis also afoot in Glasgow, as The Mill Glasgow opens on Thursday, not Wednesday,nights. But though the day has changed, the doors we open are still at Oran Mor- who we’d like to thank for their support over the last 6 months.

Eachvenue will take it in turns to entertain, with gigs alternating between TheMill Glasgow and The Mill Edinburgh every Thursday. This kicks off on April 2^nd at The Mill Edinburgh with Bo Deadly and Electrolite,followed by The Mill Glasgow on April 9^th with Canary Warfare and El Dog. April 16^thsees us back at The Mill Edinburgh with Thieves in Suits and State ofAffairs, then it's the turn of The Mill Glasgow with Nacional and Diamond Seaon April 23^rd.

We'vegot loads more good bands in the pipeline and lots more free music to be givingto you all. So make sure you keep checking the website for info. We’ll be sureto outline more plans as the year goes on.

Letus know what you think using the “ADD COMMENT” link.

I have just been listening to some of the downloads we have on The Mill website. I love being The Mill Manager but I can't take any credit for the quality of the recordings and the songs, which really are truly brilliant! I hope you have all taken the opportunity to check them out. I love the fact that there is a whole website dedicated to giving away such great music for free. Tony Doogan is brilliant, but fair play to the bands too, because there has been some great material for Tony to work with. There really is far too many to mention, but I started off with Endrick Brothers and The Ads, a few ofmy favourites as everyone knows, but I also loved Gdansk, Endor, Be A Familiar (both on the same bill, that was a great night!!)ID Parade, Lions.Chase.Tigers and FOUND. The list goes on , so I am sure I will go listen to a few more after writing this.

So you asked who our A&R Team are? it's no secret, you are welcome to come meet any of us at The Mill. There are 9 of us. We are from both Glasgow and Edinburgh. Some of us are in management, some of us are at record labels, some do publishing, some are in bands, some like rock, some like indie, some like hip hop, some like electro. We're a varied bunch but we all have a passion for good music in common.  We are myself, Malky B, Sharon Stephen, Derick MacKinnon, Yvonne Mclellan, Ali Davidson, Matthew Quest,  David Murray and David O'Hagan. every single band that contacts us is forwarded to the full A&R Team and then every 6 weeks or so we all get together and discuss everyone we have been approached by. We all also add our own suggestions and then we try to decide who the most deserving bands are. We choose you because we think you have a great chance of making it in the music industry. That might be because of a particular song, or it might be because of your approach to how to manage your career. It's always worthwhile to tell us as much as you can so we know where you are at in your career. One of the best things about our meetings now is that the demand for gigs is so high, we have some brilliant bands to choose from! It's great to be a promoter that doesn't need to worry about selling tickets to fill the venue and therefore only booking bands that pull a crowd – at The Mill we genuinely get to book the bands that are great!

if you want to get anything to any of us, you can contact us all on our own email addresses or though the website. Our email addresses are as below…

keren@themill-ar.co.uk

sharon@themill-ar.co.uk

malkyb@themill-ar.co.uk

derick@themill-ar.co.uk

davidm@themill-ar.co.uk

ali@themill-ar.co.uk

matt@themill-ar.co.uk

davidoh@themill-ar.co.uk

yvonne@themill-ar.co.uk

We have now been inundated with bands wanting to play The Mill and our waiting list is getting big. We have a great A&R team and every single email from you guys is forwarded to the whole team who listen to all the bands. We are struggling replying to everyone, but rest assured, if you have sent us your info, we will or have already listened to it.

The team is made up of the following…. myself (Keren), Sharon Stephen, Ali Davidson, Malky B, Yvonne McLellan, David O Hagan, David Murray, Quest and Derick MacKinnon. All of us work in the music industry in a variety of areas and we all have opinions on loads of emerging bands in Scotland, so just by emailing us you have guaranteed to be heard by a number of useful Scottish music industry contacts. We tend to book the most pro active bands as The Mill is all about helping bands that help themselves, so if you want to actually come and have a chat with any of us at The Mill and tell us what you are up to, we are more likely to book you than bands that just send us an email.

Look forward to seeing you at The Mill! 

Tomorrow night at The Mill Edinburgh should be another great night – and with the last 3 weeks in a row at The Mill Edinburgh all being a sell out, it's a good idea to get your free tickets from the website as soon as you can!

Broken Records and The Endrick Brothers were the first to sell out The Mill Edinburgh this year and the demand for tickets was impressive.  The following week we had OK Social Club and the 10:04's and yet another impressive sell out crowd. With the gig being 10:04's fifth ever gig, they had a fantastic support from their fans and everyone loved the set. You can check the video out on the website to see what you missed. OK Social Club played a great set too, reminding us all why they are one of The Mill favourites. Our list of Mill favourites is getting big now – it's great!!!!

Last week Epic 26 pushed the bar even higher and set an amazing precedent for their sell out gig with Tokyoblu. Their audience are obviously real music lovers and the crowd went wild throughout their whole set. We are looking forward to booking them at The Mill Glasgow to see how they get on so make sure you pay attention to when we announce that show – we are just arranging dates just now, so we will announce it soon.

 This week it's the turn of Profisee and Big Toes Hi Fi which is promising to be yet another great night at THe MIll Edinburgh. If hip hop is your thing, you'll love this show and if you aren't sure, then this is a great opportunity to check it out for free. Hip hop shows generally are appreciated by new audiences so you won't be disappointed.

We have had another great few nights at The Mill with both Broken Records and The Endrick Brothers the last two nights.  Both nights were sold out, which wasn't great for those of you were hoping to get tickets but didn't manage, but it was brilliant for everyone at the gigs – the atmosphere was great. Fortunately, those of you that missed out can download the free tracks from the website and come and check out the videos in a few days.

We coaxed The Endrick Brothers out to play a rare live show which was appreciated by loads of you. Not only did Niall and Yorick play to their usual high standard but they were joined by Paulo Nutini's guitarist, Donny Little, which was a huge bonus for some of the girls at The Mill Edinburgh. Donny previously played with The Endrick Brothers so was able to really complement Niall and Yorick. It was brilliant to hear their music live again and as they got offered a few more shows from other promoters at The Mill Glasgow, we are hoping to see them again soon. Great guitarists with beautiful vocals, what more can you ask for? 

Broken Records  also hadn't played a live gig for a while as they have been locked in the studio in Wales recording their debut album. We were pleased to have them perform at The Mill as their first show since escaping the confines of the studio. The band were itching to play live and it showed in their performance. The capacity audience at both venues were just as excited to be seeing them play too, so it was an amazing atmosphere. I think this week there will definitely be even more downloads on the website!

It was also good to chat to all the bands that came down to say hello. There are loads of regular faces at The Mill, so you never have to worry if you will know anyone – more if you will remember what band everyone is in! Our DJ, the lovely Malky B, helped us out by chatting to a few of the bands, providing all the tunes and also interviewing Broken Records. A big thanks to him.

 We'd also like to say thanks to Belle & Sebastian and their manager, John Williamson, for their technical assistance the last few weeks.  Their help has made all the recordings possible for the last few weeks. So thanks to them we can look forward to this week's offerings – I'm looking forward to these ones loads!