Jo Jo was a Madame

The Hello Goodbye fundraising jamboree gala extravaganza at Madame Jo Jo's on Wednesday was a splendid affair, with four top notch acts giving it their all to help keep Resonance on air. Jesus Licks kicked the night off with an excellent set accompanied by some exubarant interpretive dancing by a somewhat tired and emotional Gerald Mitchell. I'm listening to their album, 'Terrrible Beauty', as I write this, and mighty fine it is too, especially the excellent 'If You Kill Me', which makes most judicious use of swearing. Then Indigo Moss took to the stage for a highly accomplished set of South London bluegrass - their 'Dang Nabbit' single is a handsome recording, though the version they did on the show for us is for my money even more superior. 'Who was on next?' I hear you cry. Why, it was none other than Hungarian surf guitar breakbeat twosome Akaskodo Teliverek, whose name means 'Rearing Stallions' in their native tongue, don't you know. These fellers were the stars of the show for me... a sort of Central European disco Frank Zappa in very short trousers if you can countenance such a thing. They are permanantly number one in the popular music charts of a parallel (and much more interesting) universe, and proof positive of the need for Resonance to stay on air, if only so that London at least can hear them on a regular basis. In the meantime I urge you to purchase their remarkable eponympous long player on Adadat records. Anyhoo, it was past midnight by the time the Xerox Teens came on, pissed up, on fire and lairy, to play a brief but highly charged set to an audience that had been whittled down to the truly dedicated and inebriated, though Mr Mitchell had by this time thrown in the towel. All in all then, a pretty good night. Perhaps not quite as many people as we'd hoped, and the venue was a bit of a smelly dive for the amount they charged us for the privilege of putting the night on, but we raised about £300 and Richard and I got to play some of our scratchy old post-punk vinyl so we were pretty happy. A final honourable mention must be made for trusty Resonance engineers Robin and Michael,who did stirling work on the door. Cheers gents.