Commercially Inviable Records

hello chaps!

a whole heap of news for you this time round.

indietracks: first up, i’m delighted to be playing indietracks festival this coming weekend. i’ll be on the church stage at2.20pm on saturday 30th july. if you come and see me play, one of my glamorous assistants will give you a free cd! you can have a free copy of the basic cd version of respect on the door. all my stuff will be on sale at the merch stall, but if you want to get a freebie, you have to come to the show.

new single: my next single will be out very soon on where it’s at is where you are records. this download single closes the loop on my respect project, which had me covering a whole heap of songs from the 1980s and already incorporated 12 monthly downloads in 2010, an album and single released at midnight 1st january 2011. there was a competition to choose two 1980s songs for me to cover for the second single. luckily, the winners, dunc vernon and tim chamberlain, showed excellent taste and you’ll be able to download my versions of “flowers” by galaxie 500 and “pristine christine” by the sea urchins. nice!

	you know, for kids!: i’ve just recorded a new song for the pop! for kids project. it’s a great idea, getting artists to make music for kids that doesn’t suck - a must for culturally aware parents everywhere. you can download for free my version ofpure imagination, originally sung by the great gene wilder in my all-time favourite film, willy wonka & the chocolate factory.
	website update: i’ve finally got round to adding a shopping cart to the music page. this makes it much easier for you to order multiple items. when you click on “add to cart” a shopping cart is automatically generated. you can review and amend your purchases before you buy. p.s. you don’t need a paypal account to buy anything.
	i’ve uploaded the complete works of krafla to soundcloud. you can download all the tracks for free! for those of you who don’t know… “lovely electronica.” huw stephens, bbc radio 1. krafla was steve hough (einstellung / cable regime / godflesh / grover) and simon fox. extending the experimental tendencies of grover, krafla developed into a long-term project, mixing live instruments and electronica. a debut 7″ single on static caravan records was followed by an e.p. release on bearos records. krafla add layers of depth and instrumentation to fragile song structures and delicate melodies.

gigs
29th-31st july 2011
indietracks festival butterley station, butterley hill, ripley de5 3qz
with jeffrey lewis, edwyn collins, jonny and loads more…
stop press: i’m on in the church on saturday afternoon, 2.20pm - free cd for everyone who attends my show!

13th august 2011
a grand day in
the windmill 22 blenheim garden, london wc1n 3lz
(all-dayer)

10th november 2011
folk for free
birmingham symphony hall* centenary square, birmingham
(*foyer!)

cheerio!
FOX

–
www.worldoffox.com
www.ruthgreendesign.com

News message from World of Fox…

hello chums!

i’ve got some exciting news for this summer!

all aboard!
i’ll be playing this year’s indietracks festival! it’s great boutique festival in derbyshire. it features loads of indie bands and you get there by steam train! headliners this year are jeffrey lewis and edwyn collins, so i’m in pretty good company. details on which day and stage i’m playing as soon as they’re released. there’ll be an indietracks compilation coming out too, so look out for that. there’s even an interview with me here, if you’re interested.

as if that’s not enough, i’ll also be playing a lovely intimate little get together in varberg, sweden: blazfest. those lovely chaps the winter olympics asked me to play their annual indoor barbecue and all-dayer a grand day in at the brixton windmill.

respect is due
don’t forget that my respect competition closes on 1st june 2011. if you buy the deluxe version of my latest album, respect, and email me the limited edition number, you’ll go into the hat for a free prize draw. two winners get to choose a song from the 1980s which i will record as my next single! there’s only a handful left, so don’t leave it too late! if you’ve already bought it, email me with your edition number to enter.

on me shed, son
videos from the shed sessions we recorded last summer are finally online! i’ve posted them up on my blog so you can have a look.

so, here are the gig details:

29th may 2011
the free love club the yardbird, paradise place, birmingham b3 3hj

16th july 2011
blazfest varberg, sweden

29th-31st july 2011
indietracks festival, butterley station, butterley hill, ripley de5 3qz
with jeffrey lewis, edwyn collins and loads more…

13th august 2011
a grand day in, the windmill 22 blenheim garden, london wc1n 3lz
(all-dayer)

cheers
FOX

–
www.worldoffox.com
www.ruthgreendesign.com

Some months ago we sent a crack squad of Commercially Inviable artists to Somerset to play some songs in a garden shed. All of the bands had a great day and one of them, World of Fox, wrote about it on his blog and we re-published it here. (LINKY)

The reason for the journey was for the bands to record sessions for Songs From The Shed, a brilliantly quirky folk music website that does exactly what it says on the tin - Bands arrive, they are filmed playing in a shed and then the videos go online.

It seemed like a perfect fit for the bands on the label and so when got in touch with Jon, the owner of the shed, we were delighted when he invited us down.

Jon has been plodding along at his own pace for a while now and has quietly gone about recording almost 60 separate sessions. However, and for reasons apparently unknown to Jon himself, it seems that this week the rest of the world has started to cotton on to the great things happening in his shed.

Earlier this week Jon mentioned on his Twitter feed that The Daily Express had written about Songs From The Shed.

This was swiftly followed by an article in The Times, which no-one can link to because of Rupert’s paywall and so therefore may or may not exist, and then there was a mention and an interview on Tony Livesey’s BBC Radio 5Live show. You can listen to Jon on the wireless by clicking on this BBC iPlayer link. The interview kicks in at 54 minutes.

With all of the press attention heading Jon’s way it’s rather lucky that we’d previously agreed this week to make the first of our four Commercially Inviable sessions available online.  We chose the marvellous folk collective Gurdan Thomas to appear first in order for their session to coincide with the release of their album, “The Fat Lady Sings”. Here’s on off the 4 videos in the session:

You can view all 4 videos over on the Songs From The Shed site.

We hope you enjoy the session. We’ll keep you posted on when each of the other 3 from World of Fox, James Summerfield and Richard Burke appear online.  We also hope to send Friends of the Starsdown to Somerset at some point in the near future to complete the Commercially Inviable set.

From World of Fox…

dear chums,

a couple of bits of news for you this month:

primitive painters: if you’d have asked me what my favourite song was at any point from the mid 80’s to mid 90’s. i’d have probably said this one. ‘primitive painters’ was by birmingham legends felt, in collaboration with cocteau twins’ robin guthrie and elizabeth fraser. truly a match made in heaven.

you can download my version here for free during october.

respect due: more exciting news on the respect front! we’ve agreed a release for the whole project with those lovely, lovely folks at where it’s at is where you are records. early in 2011, all the songs featured during the year - plus a few extra tracks - will be released as a cd. the plan is to have two versions: a basic cd release, featuring the tracks in a nice, simple sleeve, which will be available at a special reduced price; plus a limited edition deluxe version which will come in bespoke extra-special packaging, including hand-printed artwork by ruth green, plus the chance to win a very special prize! more news as it’s confirmed.

cheers
fox

gigs coming up:

17th october
world unlimited present a commercially inviable showcase
hare & hounds, birmingham
(i’ll be playing solo, and as one of the james summerfield  band)

7th november
the sunflower sessions
the sunflower lounge, birmingham
there’ll be plenty more gigs in the new year to promote the album…

A few weeks ago the internet went crackers for a strange remix. A musician going by the name of Shamantis took a track by teen-sensation Justin Bieber and decided to slow it down 800 times. The result was a thing of great beauty. A bubblegum-sweet, pointlessly throwaway tune by perhaps the least credible artist on the entire planet was transformed into a 30 minute symphony of pure harmonics and gorgeous tones. Ain’t the internet marvellous?

We were curious as to what our own output would sound like given a similar treatment, so here’s the first in an occasional series of Commercially Inviable acts, for the want of a better word, ‘Bieberized’

This is World of Fox’s “Please Take Your Time”, renamed for the purposes of this exercise as “Pllleeeessse Taaaaakkkke Yoouuur Tiimmmme”

Enjoy!

Plleeeaaassseee Taaakkkeee Yooouuurr Tiimmme by commerciallyinviable

(Readers of the RSS feed will need to click here to listen)

Last weekend the vast majority of the Commercially Inviable stable of acts took a day-trip down to Somerset.  The reason for the trip was for each of them to record a session for the very lovely Songs from the Shed. World of Fox takes up the tale on his blog

“so, last saturday we all went down to north somerset where we ate sarnies, drank beer, snoozed in a hammock and played a few songs in a shed, captured on a camcorder by a lovely chap called jon. it’s quite a big shed, but even so it was quite a squeeze for gurdan thomas, given that there was five of them, and one was playing a tuba

the shed is an old billet hut and is stuffed full of fascinating detritus. one thing that caught my eye was an old magnetic theatre toy that i had when i was about four!

it was a thoroughly nice day out and some of us popped over to nearby clevedon for a glimpse of the seaside (well, the severn estuary, but close enough for a bunch of brummies). it has a nice pier:

i haven’t seen the finished videos, but i’ve a feeling they’ll be pretty good. jon will be posting them up on his website in the next few weeks, and obviously i’ll keep you posted when they’re up.”

Likewise, we can’t wait to see the results. A big thanks from us at the label to Jon from Songs from the Shed for accomodating 4 acts on the same day. Watch this space for links to the videos!

From World of Fox:

Storm The Charts is an ambitious music campaign on Facebook to get 40 independent artists in the UK Singles Chart in June. Voting on the first 40 artists to be picked has started. Vote for World Of Fox here: http://bit.ly/stormvote - listen, vote, and spread the word.

Click ‘All bands’ at the top of the voting page- click ‘World Of Fox’ in the list - look for the where it says ‘…can be found in this poll’.

But please listen to the other artists in …the poll, and try to vote in at least one other.
You can find out all about Storm The Charts here: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=231943888357

Cheers,
FOX

World of Fox news….

tiny children: the respect project got off to a flying start in january, with loads of people downloading “don’t talk to me about love”. next up is “tiny children” which was originally by the teardrop explodes. you can listen to it now, and throughout february 2010 it will be available to download for free from here!

facebook fans: you can now become a fan of world of fox on facebook! click here to get to the page. become a fan and you’ll see the latest updates, offers and news in your facebook live feed. i won’t be twittering though. there has to be a line drawn somewhere…
fox gigs

5th february 2010
feel the folk! presents a commercially inviable showcase at
the grain barge, bristol
with friends of the stars and richard burke

14th february 2010
the free love club - valentines serenade
the yardbird, birmingham
with paul murphy, the j-tones and lots more
show starts 4pm - i’m on 7.30pm

6th april 2010
freedom of expression at
the green dragon, croydon

Commercially Inviable artists Richard Burke, World of Fox and Friends of the Stars will be sharing the bill in Bristol on Friday 5th Febuary at the Grain Barge.

Happy New Year from everyone at Commercially Inviable Records. We hope you had a good one. We’re looking forward to a great 2010 - we have a couple of releases coming up this year, and we’ll be telling you all about them soon.

To kick the year off, Commercially Inviable artist World of Fox has a special, year-long project for 2010. Over to you, Simon….

Dear Chums,

Happy New Year!

FREE download - first in a series of twelve monthly giveaways!r.e.s.p.e.c.t… i’ve got an exciting new project planned for 2010 which will result in you, my lovely friends, getting a whole heap of free music! i often play the odd cover at gigs and, in response to lots of requests, i’ve decided to record some of them and give them away. i noticed that several of the songs i’ve covered over the years have been from the 1980s (something to do with my age, perhaps?), so i decided to turn it into a bit of a concept.

so, throughout 2010, i will be releasing one new song a month. each one will be a cover of a song from the 1980s which has a special significance for me, so it will be quite a personal selection. some of them will be recognisable, some less so, but they’ll all be pure fox…

each song will be available to download for free during that month. after that, you will still be able to listen, but not download it, and the next song will be available to download. at the end of the year, i plan to release them all as a limited edition album, with some extra songs on it as a thank you.

first up is “don’t talk to me about love” by altered images. throughout january 2010 it will be available to download for free from WORLDOFFOX.COM!

Cheers
FOX