Pitch Black .. On tour

Bass bins everywhere will be visiting Priests and phoning insurance agents!

3 Jul 2003

Electronic maestros Michael Hodgson and Paddy Free are once again doing their annual European tour to catch the Euro summer clubbers.

Since their debut sell-out gig at London's Cargo club in August 2001, have been building a steady stream of dark dub fans in the UK and across the dub-loving countries of Europe.

Building a fan base in such a vast territory, which is saturated by music labels and sub cultures which morph and shift faster than you can lay a finger on, makes for a very tough mission.

"It's critical that we make every live show a killer show because that's how we win people over. Our approach has been to target venues and festivals, which have a reputation for having discerning crowds and wicked sound systems" says Michael Hodgson.

"You know you've made an impact when you get emails from around the world asking when you're playing next and it's important to us to keep building on that energy."

"We work closely with English music promoter Jasper Edwards who has been organising gigs in Europe for us since he saw us play in New Zealand in 2000."

Jasper is responsible for staging festival in London this year showcasing numerous NZ bands. "It's really important to have an advocate to help push you in such a large place like London."

EP Release

The Pitch Black boys are currently putting the final touches on a small CD release to sell exclusively at gigs in NZ and take to Europe with them. It will have two new tracks and two remixes by Automatic and Son Sine. "The tracks are down beat, a quiet outing from us" says Mike.

In anticipation of another European summer, Mike and Paddy reflect on their last two tours:

Favourite festival to play at - The Big Chill, UK

The Big Chill was our first real performance to a completely UK crowd. 2001 was a three day camping festival at a castle near Devon and last year was in an enchanted garden with roaming peacocks near Salisbury. Beautiful locations, fantastic crowds, great gigs.

Most exotic venue:

Playing on a moored tugboat transformed into a club called the Batofar on the River Seine in Paris. The Batofar is a known venue for underground electronic artists and is a rockin' good venue!

Most loved crowd - The Dub Club, Vienna

Amazing being at a club that has specialised in dub for years and a delight to play to an audience who respond and groove to the first dub beat you drop. The crowd goes off to our sets there. We've got a new track coming out on a Dub Club compilation this year, which is great.

Most memorable UK moment to date

... has to be the queue outside the Cargo gig in London in 2001. The queue lasted from 6pm until around midnight. We met New Zealanders in the queue who had heard we were playing in London and had flown from as far away as Germany to check us out. It was a total buzz!

2003 NEW ZEALAND TOUR

18th July - Wellington at Indigo Bar, supported by Automatic, , Agent Alvin

23rd July , Queenstown at , supported by Automatic & Downtown Brown

24th July , Dunedin at Refuel, supported by Automatic and Alpharythm

25th July , Christchurch at The Civic, supported by Automatic, Salmonella Sound System, Future Zen, Confucius, Mysterous D

26th July , Nelson at , supported by Automatic, Olab, Funknslocuts

2003 UK / EUROPE TOUR

31st July , Brighton, UK

1st August , Big Chill Festival, Eastnor Castle

11th August , Dub Club, Vienna, Austria

14th August , Popkom Music conference, Cologne, Germany

18th August , Nottinghill Arts Club, London, UK

21st August , Spacific, Fabric, London, UK

END

For more information please contact:
Michael Hodgson
021 863 500
mike@dub.co.nz
www.pitchblack.co.nz