Official Website of The Vanity Clause
 
Hi friends!
As a first little branch from the tree of  The Vanity Clause, myself  Russell Harris of said electropopsters has put together a little 7 track electronic instrumental mini album under the guise of ‘Bang Ce Soir!’, it’d be great if you could give some support by taking a free download of debut single ‘Nuclear’ and liking my page on Facebook if you..um..like!

The rest of the album will be officially released on 12th Sept through all channels itunes, spotify & blah, it’s a bit of a departure from our usual music and quite experimental away from the tidy pop song format. I promise that it wont be full-on 20 minute self indulgent noodling either because that’s never much fun to listen to someone going off on one unless you are incredibly lonely, it’s more of a short collection of moods and tones drawing from many of my electronic influences such as, Nine Inch Nails, John Carpenter, Neu! And Kraftwerk.

…..’You’ll find a whole lot more here than what you’d get from those pan pipe albums or ‘whales in the rain forest moods’!….  myownquotes

…..’it’s like falling asleep on the autobahn only to wake up suddenly in the path of an out of control juggernaut’….beingsillyweekly

….’this must be how it sounds to be born!’….dailynonsense

….’I highly recommend this to anyone on a spaceship’…..somefriends

A few of my songs have recently been acquired for forthcoming film projects so if you are also looking for using audio for any film productions or games etc then please get in touch here or through my media composition company http://www.neonmonkeystudios.com


Here’s the free track - http://snd.sc/nYF8MP 

Like Bang Ce Soir on facebook here - http://www.facebook.com/pages/Bang-Ce-Soir/130882313668752

Rest of the tunes -http://soundcloud.com/bang-ce-soir

Twitter - http://twitter.com/BangCesoir

Web - http://bangcesoir.tumblr.com/

Zimbalam widget & mailing list - http://bangcesoir.zimbalam.com 

Cheers for your support!

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While we've got our heads down writing new material we thought it only fair to share some of it with you all, here's our brand new song "The Scream" free for you all to download from our Soundcloud page, we hope you enjoy it and feel free to let us know what you think! In between our little studio sessions we're finding time to pop out and do a few little gigs through the Summer starting with one next Monday 18th July at Proud in Camden London, It's totally free so if you haven't seen us play live yet it's a good chance to get down and check us out, if you've got short arms and long pockets this is the one for you and you can let those moths hang out in your wallet a bit longer.

We played a little show last week at CAMP in London too, we've got a video of us playing our cover of "Killer" here on youtube so come and have a gander.

Also as a brief little round up of our summer so far, we played the Glade festival and it rocked. We had a marathon 1hr set that went down really well, we got the traditional festival weather of extreme rain but we survived in one piece, and naturally the sun came out as we left. This great little festival has been scaled down a lot as it's gone back to it's roots but there's certainly no shortage of excellent music there, on wandering around there we saw so many diverse electronic acts and heard some monstrous sounds especially those pulsing out from the G-Stage. (It was also highly worthwhile seeing Lou Clause try to fit an air bed into tent half the size, most chucklesome).

Then we went to Glasto…..

Firstly…Never work for Workers Beer Company, they treat you really badly and you miss totally everything!! So my review is so sparse there is no content whatsoever, but I’m sure Em Clause can fill you in as she had the jammy privilege of blagging her way in and seeing it all. (Grumble…)

Anyoo, enough rambling for now, remember to grab our free tune and come to our free gig on Monday!

Cheers
Russ
TVC

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a little word from the guys at  The Glade Festival...if your heading down come along to The Rabbit Hole stage to see us on Friday at 8pm!! Don't be late.....

Recently, legendary DJ Nick Warren asked the web community "What is the Rabbit Hole?.....I'm playing there this summer!". ................
All sorts of answers came back, but we liked this one:
We stumbled on this secret club......... A giant White Rabbit was in charge and The Mad Hatter was the doorman handing out carrots... The entrance to the tunnel was … (SECRET DETAILS DELETED).This was the ACTUAL Rabbit Hole! To enter Wonderland you had to answer a Lewis Carrol riddle, get given a carrot, then get on your hands and knees and crawl through a winding tunnel lit with fairy lights. You eventually emerge into a club, with a raised underlit dancefloor, DJ booth, toadstools. Once inside we were greeted by a very tall tranny dressed as Alice and the Queen of Hearts who stood astride the entrance giving birth to people emerging into the club.
We stayed there far, far too long...... aiming to head there again this year!!”
This year at the Glade, The Rabbit Hole is host to some brilliant new talent from the world of breaking bands including;

FRIDAY
2pm.Lace on Lipstick;  These girls come to open up your ears with extraordinary acapella skill and wit. Three beautiful girls with a devious repertoire. http://www.myspace.com/laceonlipstick
4pm. Dan Smith; Hugely capable and inspiring young singer-songwriter with a touch of the Mumfords and heart-on your-sleeve honesty.http://www.myspace.com/dansmithuk
6pm. Scubaroots;  Jaques Cousteau's favourite band takes us through a root and branch shake up, splashing us into a racing river of colourful up-beat shiny brass only to leave us beached and breathless with a Prawn Cocktail BBQ and thousand island dressing spattered all over our faces.....
7pm. Likkido. Oh, maybe that description above was meant for this guy. Think of Disco Camp, a cream tea and a selection of your kindly uncle's underwear catalogues. Come, dance and laugh with this mighty purveyor of high cheese. His ability to get a whole tent dancing to the lyric, "Pinchy, pinchy kiss kiss" will astound and amaze.
10pm. Secret Cinema; They were runners up in the Glastonbury Emerging Talent Competition. Fantastic full-band musicianship with grand storytelling and technical brilliance. Shhhhhh.....don't tell anyone!  http://www.myspace.com/secretcinemaband
12.Midnight; The Mad Cows have been lampooning their way through the festival scene for many years now. Led by the White Rabbit himself, they make funk look like psychedelic stand-up, peddling their very own brand of "Post Modern Bovine Smut Funk".  http://www.myspace.com/themadcows185
2am.'Oui Ja Yes' are electronic dance masters, expert at doing live what you thought could never be done! Si si! http://www.myspace.com/ouijayes

SATURDAY.
3pm Susanna Waters; Another sensitive up-and coming singer songwriter in the best Rabbit Hole tradition.
5pm. Eat More Cake. Fat electronica with a sweet vocal topping. Don't watch your weight, watch these guys.
7pm Scumbag Philosopher; He really does do what it says on the tin...... He philosophises and he's a scumbag.
9pm. Thrill Collins; Celebrity drummer/actor Phil Collins tried to slap a super injunction on this lot for "Coming in his hair tonight"......They responded by covering as many other artists as humanly possible.
10.30; Black Daniel; Witty, self deprecating pop with a wry nip in the tale. http://www.myspace.com/blackdanielspace
12. midnight;  Three Trapped Tigers. Avant guard live-techno-jazz outfit to release the wild cat within. We guarantee you will never hear live music like this anywhere else.http://www.myspace.com/threetrappedtigers
2pm.Concrete Disco. They came to the London Rabbit Hole....They opened the night and tore the place apart before anyone new what was happening . Expect them to do a similar thing tonight. Like a concrete block falling from a 7 story building, they will hit your head hard.http://www.myspace.com/concretedisco
3.30am.Junkyard Scientists; Far from the scrapheap and experimenting wildly with their instruments, these funkadelic professors step up to the challenge of creating a 21st century Funkenstein monster.
SUNDAY

4pm. Will And The People ; Freedom for all,great tunes for the many,lyrics for a revolution and sharp ska rhythms that hit you like an ice-pick in the back of the neck, Will and his people raise the flag and storm the barracade of mediocrity. Cooler than a Siberian Gulag , but with a warmth of performance that'll make you feel like you are inside Castro's underpants..... Perfect music for Sunday afternoon. http://www.myspace.com/willandthepeople
6pm. Rhizomes; These guys KNOW how to do reggae. Their singer sounds like he was raised in Jamaica, wet nursed by Mamma Marley, has one of those sweet voices that soars like an african eagle....... and the band is tight as a Nun's wimple. Perfect music for Sunday afternoon. http://www.myspace.com/rhizomesreggae
8pm.Chapa; Last chance to see these guys before they rock the stadiums of the free world. Brilliant songwriting and majestic musicianship, they produce a grandiose spectacle for the Rabbit Hole. Perfect for Sunday evening.
11pm. The Shoestrung; Are going to untie your shoes and lift the tent off your head on Sunday night. A  modern Hybrid of the 60's and 70's .... rolling stoned, arctic monkeys on acid. Perfect for Sunday Evening.http://www.myspace.com/theshoestrung
So if you want to answer the riddle of The White Rabbit, engage with a Wonderland of lunatics, dance to astounding new bands and immerse yourself in pychedelic madness… come tumbling down The Rabbit Hole and see for yourselves.
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In celebration of our show supporting Andy Bellof Erasure last week we thought it's a good time to say a little thanks and take stock of all things electro.

Last Friday night at The Queen Of Hoxton something special happened. It was one of those kind of nights that rarely pushes all the buttons in everyway, everything from the great bands and Dj's to the lovely atmosphere, plus never have we had the pleasure to work with such a lovely bunch of people as the gang from The Trash Society whom we thank for giving us a support slot for Monsieur Bell on his own night "A Quiet Life". This was on the eve of Erasure's own headline show which helped to celebrate the Mute record label and also featured legends from the label such as Add N to X and the legendary Vince Clarke, to be playing amongst such royalty as this was simply humbling for us.

The night was so well organised and the Dj’s between bands really built the night, all the other acts we’re pure quality and I really recommend checking out 2 great bands - the 48k and Kites. Andy Bell played a fantastic hit laden set proving his voice is still as outstanding as it ever was then we we’re left to relax and dance the night away to a close with a full on classics set from Badloader making sure no-one went home without sore feet.

 

All in all it was one of those nights that doesn’t come around often and we really recommend you get yourself down to one of  the Session nights that the same crew run with Mat Horne every third Saturday of the month.

While we’re still in party mode come and join us on Twitter each day as we’ll be putting up a tune from the world of electro synthpop as a celebration of all those that inspired us and came before.   

Also be sure to catch up on all the goings on at the Mute weekender with video clips of The Assembly with Fergal Sharkey, Yazoo, Erasure and Alan Wilder joining Nitzer Ebb for an outstanding rendition of Personal Jesus. Catch it all here.

Now we’re going to scuttle off to prepare a new shiny set for our Glade festival shindig!

Keeping the summertime rollin and speak to you soon!

TVC


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There's surely only one winner this Friday the 13th! 

Bit of a heads up if you don’t know already, it’s a great scoop for us and time to polish Moogy.

Andy Bell from Erasure has put on his own night, he’ll be DJ’ing and playing a live set for a huge party on the weekend of the MUTE RECORDS London takeover on Friday 13th May 2011 @ Shoreditch venue The Queen Of Hoxton.

The night is called "Quiet Life", It’s on the eve of their huge show at the Roundhouse and is promised to be a wall to wall explosion of electro pop. It has loads of Mute records folks djing such as Add N to X, and Mark Moore from S’Express plus Lady P, Badloader, also a full live set from ourselves The Vanity Clause and The 48k. Definitely worth a trip down methinks!

It runs from 8pm till 2am/ Free entry before 9pm, £6 after

You can buy advance tickets here …

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We all know the music industry is shifting with the powers going back to the bands so naturally we’re a little curious as to how this will pan out in the long term. Time will tell but without any funding or marketing for small to mid ranged artist and the big labels only sticking with one or two trustworthy massive artist is the passive punter soon only going to be aware of what’s been wave’d in their face and be unlikely to look beneath the surface? I know most alternative music has always been overlooked by the mainstream punter and it’s not really bothered us anyway but there is a worry that we could end up with 20 billion "alternate artist" not being listened to by anyone and a sofa generation that only think 5 bands are valid music. In one mere generation’s time could the divide between alternative and "popular" music become huge?

There really is a lot more hard work in it for artists with smaller reward, It’s already clear we have to now be part time business people and do most of the behind the scenes stuff ourselves, even the days of the mate willing to be your manager has long gone as he doesn’t want to sit indoors online spamming as many radio stations or a&r men as possible, he’s not got the option of just getting out there and joining the fun and earn a few quid anymore, you've pretty much gotta go out and prove you've done a bucketload of admin and got 20 thousand facebook fans before anyone will give you a platform.

If we are all to survive the one thing that’s clear is that we all will have to be part time business people now. So Is actually having to write a brilliant song more important to get heard now too? It seems the ones that do the best will have to be really business smart with a strong will to persist as well as having a never ending supply of 3 minute amazing songs to appeal to the shuffle generation.

I think this seems a lot more of a problem over here as we have such an over saturated music scene for such a small island and It’s almost embarrassing to see everyone fighting to be heard in one small place, maybe the band that has nurtured the right combination of attitude, business sav and pure talent will be the only ones that last the duration now. The world is a big place but is there anyone reading this outside of the UK that has similar fears or see a different situation?

Plus are bands cutting short their creative potential to now only appeal to the mainstream by removing their kazoo solo’s and replacing it with autotune just to make a semi living.

To be continued next week with "The New Pan Pipe revolution"…..

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 Born from an inspired moment of  lunacy, we decided we'd share this little gift out for free to everyone. We have a brand new remix of Lifeline which style wise will be sure to bring back memories is 80’s in every sense of the word. Under the guise of “Bang Ce Soir!” this remix has been put together using nothing but the sounds of the earliest games consoles. 

So switch off  Thundercats and turn off your Rick Astley nonsense, just sit down, plug in your ZX Spectrum, dig out your copy of Manic Miner and enjoy the slightly demented version of our classic tune. We’ve put it up as a free download so please feel free to grab it pass it around! Spread the love! "Lifeline" 8-Bit Bang Ce Soir! Mix.

The original tune is from our debut album “Fractured” and can be heard on our website home page or you can buy the downloads from itunes or amazon or get a real futuristic shiny compact disk version here.

All music from the debut album from “Bang Ce Soir!” is currently totally free to download too so come and grab what you can from.... Bang Ce Soir! on Soundcloud.

Hope you all enjoy!
TVC
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..and so time has come for new beginnings, our first show with our brand new members Emma and Darren is nearly upon us, fresh out of boot camp and all primed to unleash synth fury the the world once again as a 4 piece, we're really happy to have both of them on board and look forward to our many adventures to come. We feel we've got the balance right this time after much searching and I'm sure you'll all agree once you see them in action.
 
Our first gig with the 4 of us will be on this Thursday the 14th April at The Grey Horse in Kingston, Surrey. We really hope you can all make it along, we'll be headlining the event but make sure you get there early to check out the other acts - Emily Chudy, Knowledge for Chickens. and James Honey.

We're also very excited to announce we are playing the legendary Glade festival this summer on 10th June plus we are adding many other shows all the time so please check our events page for all of our listings. Between our shows we'll be working on a whole bunch of new tunes which we feel to be our strongest yet so we'll be sneaking some of these in our set over the next few months too and working on the Follow up to Fractured.

Also for anyone who can't get enough of their electro and synthpop we played our last gig as a duo at "Synthetic" at The Cavendish Arms a couple of weeks ago, this was a great night dedicate to purely electro bands and there is a great  review of the night posted over here at Jumjim.

Many thanks and hope to see you all in Kingston!
TVC


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Bang Ce Soir 04/05/2011
 
Whilst producing and recording our next batch of songs I've found some time to put together a little mini album under the guise of  "Bang Ce Soir!". 

It's a collection of instrumental tracks which have found themselves very free form in structure and without the restraints of traditional songwriting. These tunes have flowed out naturally in a more spontaneous nature which may give some insight towards the more open minded approach towards the heart and soul of the next era of The Vanity Clause. There may appear to be some obvious influences to spot within these tunes along with a less obvious conflicting  journey of emotions.  Feel free to come over and download the tracks from "Bang Ce Soir!" at Soundcloud here!

If you like what you hear please come and follow on twitter.
I hope you enjoy!
Russ
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 Anyone who has been down to one of our gigs this year will have noted our changing line up. Ever since we parted company with original member David Woods in the middle of last year, we have been searching for the perfect line up. And we thought we had it last summer, when we recruited Neil and James. Sadly, it didn’t work out and by January this year, it was back to just me and Russ. All this has changed again and we are currently gearing up for another big line up reveal at our next gig on 14th April at The Grey Horse in Kingston. 

Enter: Emma Stone (not Hollywood future Gwen Stacy Emma Stone, but the future of Electronica and from posh Oxford, Emma Stone). Em is going to be providing us with a much needed boost to my vocals on the live set, with some already great harmonies and she will be tinkering the ivories. In fact, Emma is the very first member of The Vanity Clause that can actually read music! 

Now there’s another girl in the band, we were talking about girl stuff at the weekend (mainly hair) and it occurred to both of us that we may now need some kind of co-ordinated styling; which fills us both with dread! Thankfully we have similar tastes (one word; unconventional!) and neither of us will ever be at home on the set of “The only way is Essex” (I doubt I will ever get my head around the concept of a vajazzle! And did I mention Emma is from Posh Oxford??). Neither of us are comfortable at the suggestion of anything too revealing…….. 

So, in the absence of the bands very own Gok Wan, we came to the conclusion that we will have to be comfortable, but sexy and slightly co-ordinated. Something would also need to be taken from our similar quirkiness, but turned into a stylish look that stands out. Sadly, this is as far as we have got. I am sure we will have it together by 14th April, but if there are any budding fashionistas out there who have any hints and tips for us, please post away. The sublime to the ridiculous all welcome! J

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