For the past couple of weeks, I’ve been working on a Music As Culture project with the band UB40.
They’re going to be playing a gig at the Rainbow pub in Digbeth on Tuesday to raise money to help the venue pay for a new soundproof roof over the courtyard, so that they don’t get shut down due to the noise complaints.
They’re in Switzerland at the moment, performing their last festival gig of the season, but they’re back in Birmingham tomorrow. Meanwhile, they’ve been taking short videos of the band rehearsing, soundchecking, performing and hanging out, and I’ve been uploading that to the site.
There’s a lot of work to do over the next few days, and we’ll be doing lots of interviews, video, blogging and photography to try and capture everything around the event, as well as some of the music too. You don’t work on a project like this and not capture the music…
It’s been brilliant so far working with the band, who’ve been incredibly generous with their time (in particular, saxophonist Brian Travers, who is the driving force of this project).
For an act that’s sold over 100 million records worldwide and play to tens of thousands of people, hanging with a couple of guys from the local University and providing us with unlimited access and lots of band-created footage has been just amazing.
We’re interested in things like: how a major act like UB40 connects with their hometown; how local venues are important to cities and scenes; and the ways in which city regeneration affects local music culture.
All this is happening in a backdrop of threatened venue closures, noise complaints and tensions between city council and inner-city music venues and pubs – so it’s quite topical and relevant to stuff going on in our local community.
Check out the website: http://ub40.musicasculture.org.
It’s just one of a bunch of projects we at the Interactive Cultures Research Unit are doing under the umbrella of Music As Culture, and we’re working with an organisation called Amplified to help us capture and document all of the conversations and ideas as they happen.
Right now:
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Tagged: Birmingham, culture, Music, research, UB40
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One Comment
Looking after your listening has to be one of the most critical matters you can do. Take it from me, somebody who sufferred listening damager early on. As a result, I in reality like taking care hearing and whilst I do agree with the above poster and I really hope I do not get shot down for stating this, but I guess it is essential to take all things in moderation.