New project! New music! 🎶

Operation ‘Alexander’s Festival Hall’ has been on a quiet hiatus the last few months, while an exciting new LP project comes together. The new-new-thing is a single called ‘I am a businessman‘ by Astrid & Alexander – a project with my wonderful singer pal, Astrid.

Our debut release is a torrid tale of power, robbery and the tribulations of the mindbogglingly wealthy. It’s also the first single of a new album that ‘drops’ towards the end of summer. We hope you like it!

You can follow all things ‘Astrid & Alexander’ right here:
🎶 https://www.astrid-and-alexander.band

📸 https://www.instagram.com/astrid_and_alexander/

The Hackney Kansas Radio Hour podcast: ep 4 is now live

Yes indeedy audio-ear-content-fans! We present The Hackney Kansas Radio Hour:
The “Bloody awful! Sorry Barb, but it was atrocious” Edition

Featuring excellent musics from:
Tennis
Alvvays
Van Dyke Parks
Perfume
Barbra Streisand
Momus
… and many more…

Also including exciting feature items from our artisanal contributors:

Mike Monaghan’s View from the Drum Stool
George Terry’s History of Britpop: feat. Dodgy
Piney Gir’s Drunk Cookery: Three
“Our voyage begins at last” a nearly-sci-fi story from Alexander’s Festival Hall
Katrin Geilhausen the Hackney Kansas Weather Girl

Hackney, Kansas Radio Hour podcast – second episode now online!

Somewhat tardily, mine and Piney Gir’s podcast enters its critical second-episode all-grown-up phase!

The Hackney, Kansas Radio Hour 31.December.2015 by Radionowhere.Org on Mixcloud

Yes, it’s episode 2 of RadioNowhere’s “The Hackney, Kansas Radio Hour” – an eclectic mix of light entertainment from the imaginary borough of London that’s stuck in the middle of the American mid-West. Your hosts Piney Gir and Alex (of Alexander’s Festival Hall) take you on a spin through exotica, pop, lounge and country, intermingled with sport, cookery, and documentary shenanigans. In fact, let’s just file the whole thing under “shenanigans”…

Quand vas tu rentrer – Melody’s Echo Chamber
Prussian Blue – The Lilac Time
Supersonic – Oasis
Jacqueline Taieb – La coeur au bout des doigts
Shades of Winter – Streetplayer
Dreaming – Knower
Donut Taco Palace – Shiny Ribs
Palast Orchester mit Max Raab – Super Trouper
The Love You Save – Jackson 5
Home – Jane Birkin

AFH DJ set at FrightNight At the Proms (Scala) 29th Sept.

Something evil’s lurking in the air… could it be a selection of devilishly-disposed danceable divertissements? I’ll say! AFH will be spinning some genuinely disquieting *hits* from beyond the grave at Fright Night at the Proms this Sept 29th – an all-nighter at the Scala put together by the nice programming genii from MidnightMovies, featuring some great movies (Prom Night 1 and 2?! come on!) and a decidedly dead-teenagers-at-a-prom atmosfear…

Get your tix here!
Fright Night at the Proms (Midnite Movies)

Album finished!

Insert sound of clapping/dancing/falling-over but the debut AFH album, so very long in the brewing to our secret recipe, has now been finished and mastered! Titled “Not a dry eye in London“, and being some 13 delectable tracks in length, the AFH record features twinkling sounds from birds in the trees, to cellos in the basement, synths in the club to sweet words on the breeze.

Update: released by State51/MelodicalTrax in March 2013. Listen here…

AFH spinning intergalactical tunes at next Curzon Midnite Movies

[singlepic id=48 w=200 float=left] A week’s notice to my space-headz 😉 But self aka AFH will be spinning some intergalactically spacey tunes next Friday at the Curzon’s Barbarella Midnight Cinema in Soho! Grab a ticket, don your pervotronique outfit and see you there… I can promise an otherworldly set of chansons indeed… xx

Date: 30th April 2010
Grab a ticket here: here
Click here for groovy poster!

Escaping the labyrinth!

Well, what a well dressed peacocking and friendly bunch were the assembled throng at the Curzon Midnight Movie showing of Labyrinth last night… Afh judged the mood as requiring a blend of scritti politti, Ryan Paris, human league and by the end the 14th consecutive 80s revival was definitely in full swing 😉 thanks to Nadia and all you pretty things… X

Get lost in the Labyrinth! AFH DJ-set vs Curzon Soho!

[singlepic id=45 w=320 h=240 float=left]Aloha team, time to put on your mask, fluff your mullet (!?) and get yourselves tickets to the midnight Masquerade at the Curzon Soho! AFH will be playing a DJ set of classical-madness-and-80s-Bowie-baiting hitz to follow the screeny goodness. Friday 27th November is the date. Click the image for more details! Or go here to find out more and book tickets…

AFH’s Springsteen cover: now available on Amazon/iTunes

Late last year AFH was approached to contribute to an album of Bruce (“Broooce”) Springsteen cover versions by the nice people at the WIAIWYA label. A chancey gambit you might think, as AFH knew next to nothing of the Boss’s back catalogue and had spent little time in checkered shirts or contemplating the ups and downs of life in New Jersey.

However, there’s nothing like a short-ferry ride away from the old music komfort zone so AFH readily agreed and went into deep Brucemmersion. The result is “Empty Sky”, a song chosen for its dark 9/11 subject and forceful simplicity. Piney Gir lends her lovely voice to the choruses. Dedicated to the memory of Suria Clarke. Hope you like it. x

AFH is on Disk 2: Track 16 but there are lots of other treats on this mega expansive 38 track overview!
Amazon: “Empty Sky”
iTunes: Empty Sky