Buffalo Rocks

Not long now until our Dingwalls show on the 7th December with The Heavy and Skinny Machines.

The Buffalo Rocks team are getting excited and we hope to see you all there.

Tickets can be purchased here.

Hey Skinny Machines. We are really looking forward to having you play Buffalo Rocks on the 7^th December at Dingwalls – are you excited about playing alongside The Heavy?

Jay - Yeah, we are really buzzing about it. I think that although we are an alternative band and they are a soul outfit I guess, I think we have a lot of stuff in common, dirty guitars, big riffs etc. Also it’s the last big gig of our tour so we can’t wait to smash it in style.

 So tell us about the recent tour?

Rikki – It was an absolute riot. I’m really enjoying playing both the new tracks we wrote on the tour as well as the stuff on the album. Throughout October we played fifteen dates in Switzerland and then flew straight back to the UK where we have nearly finished our fourteen dates over here…so yeah…knackering but awesome.

If you could drink Buffalo Trace bourbon with any musician dead or alive who would it be and why?

Ed - I guess it would have to be with Billy Corgan of the Smashing Pumpkins, since he’s the reason I ever got into ‘real’ music when I was a young teenager. He comes across as a guy who’d have a lot of interesting things to say and those kinds of mellowed out conversations are usually enhanced by a drop of the good stuff. 

We have been listening to your new album ‘ Wrong Side of The River’ and we really love it – especially ‘Laid Out Cold’. How do you feel about the album?

Jay – I’m really proud of it. All my life I’ve wanted to put a whole album together and its something we finally managed to do.  We recorded and produced the whole thing ourselves with a good friend of the band at our studio in Wandsworth and then took it to be mastered with Jon Astley for mastering. It was great to work some someone who had previously worked with such great musicians as The Who, Clapton, Stereophonics and The Rolling Stones.

What is the best thing about being a musician?

Ed - Quietly smiling to myself when I see people on the London Underground at rush hour. Knowing that you’ve made a conscious choice to live a life that doesn’t conform to the norms of society and being able to surround yourself with like-minded people makes you feel you are part of a very special community. It’s not that I have a problem with people who work 9 - 5: I have many friends who do this, but being a musician allows you to exercise your right to live by your own rules. 

The Heavy headline our December show at Dingwalls!!!

“Incredible.” -  Q Magazine 

 “Imagine if you could be in all your favourite bands at once. The Heavy already are.” BBC

“The band kick out the jams with a terrific, menacing and dirty mix of Funkadelic, James Brown and maxi-fuzzed psychedelic garage” Time Out

“A powerhouse that begs and borrows from a multitude of genre without ever straying into patische… Authentically, dirty, nasty and down right FONKY!” Clash
With support from up and coming indie/rock band Skinny Machines, this will be one of the best nights of the year! Get involved people. Get involved.

www.myspace.com/theheavy
www.myspace.com/skinnymachines

Tickets available HERE

BUFFALO ROCKS will be putting on free shows in association with the legendary Bedford in Balham from the beginning of December. The Bedford has earned a reputation for being one of the most important and critically acclaimed venues in the country with a passion for performance. BUFFALO ROCKS in association with The Bedford promise to bring you some of the best emerging acts and breaking artists of the moment in one of the most beautiful venues in London.

http://www.thebedford.co.uk

Hey Robinson We are really looking forward to having you play Buffalo Rocks November show at The Vibe Bar – are you excited about the night?  

Very much so, I believe it’s a whisky night so I’ve found a place to sleep, should be an interesting one, I’m sure many stories will come out of this gig… It’s very exciting to be part of such a great line-up.

What have you been up to this year?   

My band and I have just been consistently gigging most weeks of the year. We’ve played many festivals including Glastonbury, Hop Farm and the Secret Garden Party and lost many brain cells along the way! In times when we haven’t been gigging, we would spend time rehearsing, re-arranging songs and changing instrumentation. Earlier on in the year close to the general election we hired an open topped double-decker bus and rigged it up with a very powerful P.A system. We played live off the top of the bus a song of mine called “England’s Bleeding” around all parts of central London to try and encourage people to vote as I was worried about the rise of the B.N.P.

Out of all your songs – which is the one you are most proud of and why?

Probably my latest material as I’m becoming more of a narrative writer and I’m moving in a direction that’s more exciting. But with music I’ve recorded it would have to be “Always talk to strangers” because of its humble recording style. It was the first song I recorded and it was at a time when I had no money, record deal and little interest from anyone. Mark Lyons showed a big interest who was a friend of a friend and agreed to record me without wanting any money. He was and is a gardener and he lived in a thatched cottage.  The studio was just a small room in his house that wasn’t much bigger than a cupboard and all he had was a computer and a microphone. I was armed with my instruments, my guitar, my clarinet, my pianorg and we made the best of the situation. That night it was raining really hard and the wind was shaking the house, the chairs in the studio creaked and I remember desperately rubbing my hands together to try and keep warm. We finished the track in about 3 hours and it truly sounded magical, it was and still is my favourite recording. We tried in more advanced studios to re-record it but every version seemed to lack in soul or mystic. There was something about that night that we were never able to re-create again.

What are some of your most memorable gigs and why?

The one we played up in Scotland seems to stick out in my memory. It was at the Mad Hatters in Inverness, very far up north. We spent the day handing out flyers in town, trying to get people to come down. When we got up on stage there was a room with about 10 people in, we played through the entire set and the applause was fairly deflated. As we played through our last song about 50/60 Germans poured through the doors and stood right in front of the stage. They all started dancing and cheering really loudly, we finished the song and then pretty much repeated the entire set again. Afterwards we sold out of all of the albums we’d brought with us, and then spent the rest of the night signing autographs, drinking whisky and talking to pretty German girls. That night I had my first groupie, and with that I shall never forget and will always be grateful.

If you could drink bourbon with any musician (dead or alive) who would you drink it with and why? 

Django Rhinehart, the two-fingered gypsy. He was the finest guitar player to have ever lived and you could guarantee that as the night went on the instruments would come out and everyone would be jamming and dancing. Plus we would both speak different languages so we wouldn’t have to bother with any small talk. Just music.

What emotion are you generally under the influence of when you are writing songs? 

In all serious, I do most of my writing on my hangovers. There is something very desperate about it. A hangover is so good because you are desperately trying to survive, you can feel death’s cold fingertips and you can smell the lilies. A sober brain is always useless for a writer as too much thinking is taking place. For good poems or lyrics you need good summary, powerful metaphors and the ability to say it all in one sentence that would normally take an entire page. A hangover only filters through so many words at a time; visions and imagination are simpler and clearer. Only through real pain can you understand real love.

After an amazing show in October with The Milk our November show with Foy Vance has SOLD OUT. For information on more up and coming shows make sure you ‘like’ us on facebook and twitter!

www.facebook.com/buffalorocks

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Hey Jem. We are really looking forward to having you play Buffalo Rocks October show at The Monarch – are you excited about the night? YES!!! Can’t wait, if it’s anything like the nights I’ve done for Shuga Buddha, Regal Room and Bedford crew et al, I know it’ll be amazing! Who are your main influences? I wouldn’t say I’ve really got any main ones, I’m a bit of a music junkie, so it comes from all over and changes all the time, but at the moment the things I’m listening to most at the moment are a steady rotation of William Bell, Lusine, Beat Connection, Linda Lyndell, Commix Recall to Mind EP, Mumford & Sons, Caribou and Brackles. What are your plans for the next six months? Second album definitely a priority! And on top of that, over the last year, I’ve been working on a few electro projects with some amazing producers, which I’m unbelievably excited about! They’re all in production at the moment and being released in the new year, more to follow on them! But on my acoustic stuff, I’m heading back out to Germany in February next year for a 3 week tour which I can’t wait for – am a big fan of Germany and very excited to get back out there, the crowds there are AMAZING! If you could drink bourbon with any musician (dead or alive) who would you drink it with and why? Can I have 2? Marilyn I think, just because there are things I’d want to ask her! Plus I think she’d have been on my wavelength…not sure if that’s a good thing or a bad thing?! And I reckon I’d have had a pretty good time with Freddie Mercury too, so he’d be my equal second. What is the most rock n roll situation you have ever been involved with (name dropping and rock n roll vocab is a must) To be honest most weekends with my friends would probably fall under the R&R category, but I won’t be naming any names or details on that front! What emotion are you generally under the influence of when you are writing songs? Is alcohol an emotion? I jest (kind of). Can’t say it’s about one single emotion overall, it’ll depend on where I’m at generally and how I feel at that time. ‘I Am Jem Cooke’ was basically written about the journey of a relationship, from conception to the break up, and I guess that takes you through a bit of a rainbow of emotions and I hope that’s reflected in the album. The next one will no doubt be a big old rollercoaster if my past relationships are anything to go by! Or failing that, then about the unadulterated bliss of being single! haha! What is the best thing about being a musician? Getting to say what you really feel without feeling embarrassed. If I was to get up on stage and speak about how I was feeling about certain things, I’d cringe and never dare do it, but for some reason, writing and singing gives you a freedom to say things that you might not feel able to in a normal conversation. Well I’m sure some people can but I’m not built that way and find it a hell of a lot easier to say what I’ve got to say with my eyes shut on stage singing my socks off. Plus if people are there because they like the sound of your voice you can get away with murder, and I like that!

Hey Marcus. We are really looking forward to having you play Buffalo Rocks October show at The Monarch – are you excited about the night?  

Yeh course I am, I used to drink in this pub when I was growing up in Camden, it was called the Man in The Moon back then and the Monarch was what the Barfly is now. We used to play in there all the time. I got a lot of good memories of this part of London, be great to play here again… 

Who are your main influences? 

I listen to a lot of music, first thing in the morning till I fall asleep to it at night so I’m influenced by a lot of people, right now I’m listening to a lot of Tom Waits, Grady, Muddy Waters & a lot of old time & Bluegrass music. I grew up listening to Joan Baez, Cat Stevens, Joe Cocker, The Beatles, Chuck Berry and have kind of got into everything in between along the way. I always come back to the blues though. 

What are your plans for the next six months? 

I just come off the road  with my band, we’ve been doing a bunch of shows around the country so I got a solo tour starting in November opening for a guitarist called. Philip Sayce, he’s pretty serious. I’m also opening for Walter Trout and John Mayall, which will be great. Then I got the Carlisle Blues Festival happening as well as another trip out to Norway to play there and also a few more shows with the band. I gotta find some time to write this new record too and then it’s off to Texas in March for SXSW festival and then back to record the album. Gonna be a good fun six months. 

If you could drink bourbon with any musician (dead or alive) who would you drink it with and why? 

I think it would have to be Muddy Waters, I’d love to sit and talk bout the blues with him. I’ve read books on him and he sounds like a real interesting guy, I’d like to know bout how it was growing up in America at that time, playing the blues, breaking through and being part of a whole new way of thinking and being that helped change America.  Also I’d like a Jam with him of course, try and learn some slide tricks… 

What is the most rock n roll situation you have ever been involved with (name dropping and rock n roll vocab is a must) 

Haha, I’ve had a few good times on the road, a lot of times The Whiskey has been flowing so I can’t remember all the details. I suppose the most rock and roll would be when we were out on tour in Los Angeles and me and my drummer went to the Viper Room dressed in kilts (he was Scottish, I was just drunk), found a whole bunch of Scottish people in there, got em back for a party at our posh hotel cos it had a pool. There must have been bout 30 people there, it was pretty messy. We got kicked out the pool so moved it to my room, got kicked out of there so went to another room, same happened so back to mine. Finally the hotel staff had had enough of us so called the police. Everyone split pretty quickly and three police cars turned up to kick me out the hotel, I got restrained in proper LAPD style, it was pretty full on. Anyway, had to sleep on Sunset Blvd. that night and wait for the rest of the band to get up in the morning. It was pretty funny but I had a killin hangover and nowhere to go!  

What emotion are you generally under the influence of when you are writing songs? 

A lot of the time I’m not sure, I just let it happen and see what I come out with. Looking back on some of my songs I seem to have been pretty angry at some points and quite self reflective in a lot of them. I find it difficult to write love songs but I think I got a lot of love in all the songs I write, its just really well hidden! 

What is the best thing about being a musician? 

The fact you get to play music everyday, with your friends and every now and then you get paid. There is honestly nothing better. Oh and that drinking on the job, is encouraged, that’s pretty cool too. 

The Milk are four spirited young men from Essex (and proud of it): best friends since the age of 5 and in bands together since their early teens, growing up in Southend but dreaming of being cool kids in Camden.

The boys occupied their teenage years thrashing away in a punk band, cramming their equipment, Mohawks and tent into a Ford Escort, and camping at the side of the road. Having spent far too much time slogging up and down the M1 on self-booked tours that took them to Hull via Exeter and Edinburgh (“we had no concept of geography”, notes singer Ricky Nunn), the band realised that punk was dead, and split.

Remaining a true gang of friends (“we still get pissed off if one of us sees a film on their own that the rest of us want to see”, says Ricky), the band took a break and re-evaluated what they wanted to do. Soon after, narrowly avoiding naming themselves Nigel Winterburn & The Flat Back Four, they re-emerged as The Milk, embracing the classic Motown, Stax and Trojan records that had soundtracked their early lives.  Yet the band’s plans for their album are anything but retro, instead incorporating elements of dance, hip-hop and dub into their sound (they idolise the Beastie Boys’ seminal album, ‘Paul’s Boutique’).

The last 12 months has seen The Milk refining their sound together with producer Brad Baloo (The Nextmen), and laying down the foundations for a debut album which, like their live shows, will flow without a break from one track into the next. The band’s riotous gigs – augmented by a brass section and keyboard player - are modelled on the DJ sets they used to watch in Ibiza, keeping feet moving by segueing seamlessly between tracks via quick snatches of Kelis, Dr Dre and Kanye West.

It sounds like a manifesto, and to a great extent it is: “dance kicks, soul snares”, as they put it. Now, the challenge is to drag White Boy Soul (hence, ‘The Milk’) into the twenty first century. Their demos are stomping, but with multiple major labels scrapping over them, and an ever-developing idea of who and what they want to be…well, you sense they’re only going to get better and better.

TICKETS FOR THIS GIG WILL SELL OUT - MAKE SURE YOU GET YOURS BY CLICKING HERE