September 2008
Flannel in chart with Madonna and the Chemical Brothers shocker! Read all about it here!
January 2007
Flannel has an entry in Wikipedia. You can check it out here. What’s nice is that no-one here knows who wrote it. Great!
Brighton bands cover Flannel shocker: The Trucks have covered New Kind Of Man, and Los Albertos have put a version of Let’s all go to a Ketamine Party as a hidden track on their rather good album Information Overload. Check em out! www.myspace.com/thetrucksbrighton and www.myspace.com/losalbertos.
Al and Ally Moorhead used to run the Golden Moon stage at Glastonbury festival. Ally wrote this to his partner Sal just after Bloke died It bought laughter through the sad stuff:
Flannel bassist and all round mechanics wizard died recently in a tragic accident in the South of France, where he'd moved with his family. No wild tale of excess here - he slipped off a bridge and fell down a ravine. We're all too stunned to take it in.
A tribute site to the man has been set up here. Please visit it and donate money to a fund for his family.
Al and Ally Moorhead used to run the Golden Moon stage at Glastonbury festival. Ally wrote this to his partner Sal just after Bloke died It bought laughter through the sad stuff:
We knew Bloke through his band Flannel. There was no question of Flannel not playing our venue, the Golden Moon Cafe and, later, the Greenpeace tent, at Glastonbury. We were never disappointed by their performance on stage, and their off-stage antics were pretty hard to beat too. The punk karaoke that they organised was the stuff of legend.
We got to know the band as individuals on a social basis, too, and we are proud to call Bloke one of our dearest friends. His energy and his inimitable humour lightened every situation. Everything became the most outrageous fun when Bloke was involved. He was relentlessly upbeat and saw the best in everyone, too. I remember visiting Brighton once, and Bloke picked me up at the station. He kept saying "Ally Moorhead, visiting Flannel. That's so cool." His support for the work we put in to doing Glastonbury was the sort of thing that was so very rare, but which made the effort so worthwhile.
We stopped doing the stage but kept in touch with the band. Alan toured with them in Ireland a couple of times, and we were all thrown out of the Millennium Dome together, which was one of my proudest moments. In 2001 we went to Glastonbury as 'punters', smuggled in, in the back of Bloke's van. He put a pair of black glasses on Stan, who was driving, and hung out of the window shouting "get out of the way, the driver's blind." And people moved! Alan remembers the ending to that weekend:
Bloke had assured us we wouldn't get a flat tyre, so the fact his van didn't have a spare wheel was not going to be a problem. Leaving Glastonbury, the inevitable happened. I remember thinking of washing machines as we humped along on three wheels, those of us on the mattress in the back trying not to wince when we hit the roof. I was clinging on to Bloke's seat when the police appeared at the side of the road. They had noticed our vans peculiar lurching rhythm amongst the long convoy of vehicles on the narrow country road. "Put your hazards on and just keep going" I suggested, "tell them you just can't stop here." Bloke was wearing ridiculous black goggles underneath his pink hair, and as we drew level with the police he managed to launch half his body out of the drivers window, while still driving the van. He was inches from the coppers face and exclaimed: "CAN'T STOP MATE I'M A HAZARD!"
Rest in peace, Bloke. We hope you're safe, wherever you are, and that we'll see you again next time around.
In Brighton for a couple of gigs. Happy days to Adrian and Dawn and thanks to their son Caruso for Djing. Here's Flannel doing (Let's all go to a) Ketamine Party with legendary Brighton samba combo Carnival Collective.
Splitting up has proven quite a popular option really......! Here's a list of some of the gigs we've done since we split up. We fully intend to remain split up cos ve been doing really well. Which means you can still book us, so if you wanna do that check the contact page above.....and a new album is in the pipeline n all!
Schnews, Brighton's direct action activist newsletter, produced a ten year anniversary book in October 2004. The launch party was on Saturday October 16 at the Coronet, Elephant and Castle, London. It featured the Inner Field Sound System, ska kings n queens Top Cats and Babyhead and others, as well as Flannel!
Check out the Schnews website.
We were in the upstairs bar. Here's you lot...!
Thanks to Iain for photos and stage management and for sending our tuner back(!), and also to Tony and Tommo for lending us guitar and amps and all the rest!
Here's part of an interview Cosmo did as part of the Schnews 10th anniversary book. Flannel provided support on a few dates for the first ever Schlive alternative news tour (1996).
And also... in Glastonbury 2003 and 2004 we did a couple of shows in the Groovie Movie solar powered cinema tent. These featured Bad Manners keyboards maestro Rickesh McSlick, Gepetto and Sladey performing DJ acrobatics and Josie from Red Dragon Puppets doing Teenage Kicks...at the tender age of 12! Full marks!
You can check out some VIDEO FOOTAGE taken by Matt Black (Coldcut/Ninjatune) here . (Handy hint!!!!: Double click on the screen when it comes up to see it more clearly!). Edited by the Rt. Hon. Jim Aynsley, OBE. Big thanks to all those who supplied the pedal power for the electricity!
We did a mental gig as part of a a benefit for Afghan refugees January 2002, (Afghan Pligh Night, with Alabama 3 and Super Fury Animals doing a DJ set amongst . Check out the photos now I've managed to get them off Annette and scan them in!