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Posted: 12/09/2004 - 12:04
by Chris Abbott
> the visualization could have been used more
Not with the time and resources we had: it wasn't even sure we'd have the projector until a week before the event, for financial reasons...

Having a more complex visual would also have added another layer of complexity to an already nastily complex event.

I'm not sure there's any point in discussing what BIT Live wasn't: let's just discuss what it was!

Chris

Posted: 12/09/2004 - 12:08
by hyperhack
Good to see someone else picked up on the visuals element! Shame the screen wasnt used more, and after looking at the set from pics from Brighton2003 to this years the set kind of seemed a bit flat? It looked liked the lighting was done better last year, just didnt seem to have the impact of last years set?

Don't know if anyone else would agree with me that went to the last one?

Posted: 12/09/2004 - 13:27
by Subzero
Ahhh well, i'll be there next year.....








oh wait, there isnt one next year!!!
Chris can I have my money back now? ;)

Posted: 12/09/2004 - 13:36
by hyperhack
words of Ben Daglish "You may have heard theres not going to be anymore? B*LL*CKS!!!!"

'The Show Must Go On'

:lol:

Posted: 12/09/2004 - 14:15
by Feekzoid
I would just like to say....


That it was f'kin brilliant!

I would like to have had more time to meet everyone and chat, but as it was it was great talking to Marcel, Slaygon, Rambones, Tomsk, Glyn, Tas, Chris, Boz et all!

I thought the performances were outstanding, and I also think that this is too good a thing to let slip away, and it should be done again, and again! Hell I'd even love to get back on a bass guitar or synth in a live scenario, brought tears of nostalgia to these old eyes seeing those guys perform, complete with equipment glitches on the night!

Posted: 12/09/2004 - 14:30
by JasonPage
Brilliant stuff.
Thanks to Chris and co. for making it such a cool night.
Also nice to meet some more of you again in person (Kwed, Rambones, Marcel...).
And, of course, Mr Knight - you Rock.
(Not too sure about that singing voice though... :D ). Hope your throat clears up soon, mate.

If that was the last ever, then it was certainly one hell of an event to go out on.

Posted: 12/09/2004 - 15:15
by rambones
Honest to god ?

The whole event was a blast, from the p... resent!

A few bugs in the mixerpult, but otherwise fantastic.
What do you expect from 'amateur' bands and semiprofessional organizers ?

You should be very grateful for what is given to you, life only happens once in a cycle you know.

Greetz to all I talked to, so that's about 99% of all 'hangarounds' - also hi to some unknowns, god bless ya for coming!

Cya

Posted: 12/09/2004 - 15:19
by Matrix
@Hyperhack...

Brighton was done in a building that puts concerts on for the likes of "the Sugerbabes" etc.... it was a top vanue, very very hard to top - 2004 was in the church at LSO St Lukes - that in consideration plus cost, i think they did an awesome job and made the best of what they had.

I dont believe the goal was to outperform last years event in Brighton - actually, id have thought that impossible, the Brighton event just took ur breath away.... but its a BIG advance on the Gossips/Soho event (if youd have been there it was a fairer comparrison lol)....

In the Bit Live's Chris had several goals.... things like bringing composers and fans together, getting the underground "scene" more noticed... where to perform etc .... the only thing to top this would be to have the LSO itself playing the music :D "Symphinic SID" or whatever.... but thats a serious no-no lol - unless you just won the lottery :)

Im certain we ALL hope for another BitLive style event, I have great memories of BitLive - and im content with that. :) ..... FOR NOW.... (come next year ive no doubt ill be foaming at the mouth lol)

Posted: 12/09/2004 - 15:55
by AdamDawes
My honest opinion: simply brilliant.

PPOT rocked as much as usual and were very funny to boot. I really felt for them when the guitar packed in at the beginning (must have been so frustrating) but they certainly didn't let it spoil the show. I'd have loved to have heard them perform Comic Bakery again (especially as I know the words now) but the Sacred Armour of Antiriad made up for it -- cracking tune.

The C64 Mafia were certainly a bit different! Rap isn't really a style of music I enjoy but it was fun to hear them rapping about C64 games, especially the one about the Forbidden Forest.

Visa Röster were the biggest and most unexpected surprise for me. I was lucky enough to hear them doing their sound-check during the afternoon and realised straight away that this act was going to be something special. And it definitely was. Much respect to you Pex and the rest. It must have been quite daunting standing there and singing solo in front of so many people. I have your CD in my car now and it's great fun to listen to.

The audience as a SID chip? I think perhaps that proved that making SID music is more difficult than it looks. ;-) Ben, you were obviously born for the stage, and were very entertaining last night.

Finally on to SID'80s. Another great set, including Deflektor (my favourite of the songs they've played). Watching PPOT dancing to Rasputin was almost as good as listening to it being performed. My only complaint about SID'80s was that at the end they stopped and went off stage -- would have been better if they'd carried on forever.

Chris, this was another brilliant event which I feel privileged to have been able to attend. It was easily as good as Brighton. It will be a real shame if there are no more BITLive events but I'll always treasure the memories of the ones I experienced. My thanks and respect to you.

Also it was great to put faces to a few more names -- wish I'd known who a few more people were!

Here's to the next BITLive, whatever, wherever and whenever that may be...

Posted: 12/09/2004 - 18:16
by Kenz
Absolute and utter top, top, TOP event. And I'm not just saying that cos I helped put it together (in my own little lug-stuff-around-and-help-with-the-website type way) ... There's no way to describe how much fun we had - although the pictures I'm gonna put online in the next few days should show that ... :)

So many good memories - including lots of neck prickling lovely moments during the concert (had to wipe away a tear of joy a couple of times) and completely FANTASTIC people - really great atmosphere. Not just during the show but also in the pub(s) before and afterwards.

To all who came and everyone I met, massive THANK YOU from me and Natz for all the fun we had!! I hope you had as much fun as we did!

Sorry I couldn't get any of the new Xmas Chortles CGI onto the big screen - there was no way of getting an image from a DVD disc up there. And Natz' laptop PC ran out of battery so I couldn't even show it on there - but don't worry, I'll be adding details of the new DVD to the Xmas Chortles site soon - complete with lots of clips and downloads.

Now I'm off to have a REST!!!!

Posted: 12/09/2004 - 18:17
by Benn
Well OK... if *honest* opinions are being called for, let's boogie....

First off though, the major thanks - to Chris for managing to pull it all together yet again, and managing to stay cool throughout the day (even while being stressed out by my wingeing on about the lack of stage management), to all the performers, all the big boys whose names end with 'Z, and of course everybody that turned up. Yet again, *I* had a ball...no sleep, but a lot of fun.

On with the show. All the BIT lives have been completely different events, which is part of the beauty. The thing keeps evolving (and needs to further if it's to carry on...but more of that later), and in my eyes, for the better.

Birmingham was basically a "meet and greet" - everybody turned up - lots of programmers (Tony, Jeff etc.) as well as composers, and just about every name there was in the remix scene - there was a 'VIP' lounge for Christ's sake, which was packed. The music was all DJ'ed, there were podium dancers...it was pretty much a normal night out at a nightclub that just happened to be full of C64 'celebs'.

Gossips was a completely different kettle of fish - 2 big live bands + assorted others in a hot and sweaty packed-to-the-gills little nightclub that was loud, atmospheric and the kind of gig that I like playing - everybody bouncing up and down at the front and singing along - 'standing room only'. I got to play with PPOT for the first time, and had a go at being Master of Ceremonies also, which was patchy, but fun. The 'celebs' were there also, but it was a lot harder to find anywhere quiet enough for a chat :)

By Brighton, we'd got the formula down nicely - afternoon 'social' with the exhibition - photo op's etc. - and then the evening gig, again featuring 2 bands, assorted solos/duo's etc., with the big difference being that this time, the *composers* were playing. Rob showed us the skill that made me so enjoy jamming with him all those years ago, and I got to be in a band with Mark, Reyn, Andreas and Marcel. SID 80's got 2 full days rehearsal, and we spent each evening (well, all bloody night - 3 or 4am each time, I seem to recall) pinning down the arrangements, jamming and generally 'gelling' as a band. Musically, the gig was great - PPOT get better every year, and my only criticism was maybe the scale was *too* large - it was a big venue (there was a lot of space between the stage and the audience), and personally, I felt it difficult to be 'intimate' with the crowd. It was a 'sit-down' affair, and certainly had not much happening on the hot-sweaty-bodies-bouncing-up-and-down front.

This year though had a lovely intimacy. The size was just right - a near-full house, in raked seating that came close to the stage, and I truly felt for the first time that I could communicate with the audience - I couldn't really have made the 'Eastenders' thing work at either Gossips or Brighton - and there was almost a sentimentality attached to the affair - the 'hard core' sceners coming along to what may well be the last ever BIT Live (though as well, there were a number of 'first-timers' who certainly seemed to enjoy it as much as the 'regulars'). PPOT were on cracking form (I told you all it would take would be losing the 'dots' guys), and who could have failed to have been impressed by Visa Roster? Despite SID 80's various gremlins (emergency bass player [who, I have to say coped incredibly well - Jon's a bloody star] who only had 1 days rehearsal, my crap guitar playing etc.), I think we managed well, and although it was also a sit-down affair, there were legs flying everywhere at the end of Rasputin. Standing ovations all round.

My personal favourite feedback was from one of the guys who ran the studio where we'd been rehearsing. He'd never seen a C64 in his life, and knew none of the music, and had just come along out of curiosity to check out the results of our two days at his place. He made a point of coming up afterwards and saying that the evening was one of the best gigs he'd *ever* been to - he spends all day hearing bands, and I trusted his quality judgements. A great night, and Mark and I found a couple of reasons for wanting to move to Sweden...

There were major problems though. These things are *difficult* to pull off, and (in its current form) extremely expensive. Chris only just managed to sort the finances this year, and will still probably end up making a large loss. (Please *do* buy the DVD - we need your £20...if we sell enough, then maybe I can get my travel expenses back...). All the performers do it on basically an expenses-only basis because we enjoy it, but it's bloody hard work. I had less than 12 hours sleep in total over the three days I was in London, and all I was doing was the 'performance' bit - I'm sure Chris had less.

One criticism seems to have been the lack of 'faces'. This wasn't really a meet'n'greet at all though - this was a gig. It was unfortunate that Rob couldn't make it (for various personal reasons), and all sorts of things conspired to prevent people like Tony (holiday booked) and Dave (all sorts - but I really really tried) coming down, but for many though, it would have been pretty much coming just to watch the gig, and maybe have a few drinks afterwards.

I read a couple of criticisms too of the lack of 'visuals'. Sorry - but if you wanted to watch a projector all night, you could have stayed in your bedroom and played a load of SID's with Winamp visualisations in a darkened room. Last night was about live performance - in all its raw glory, warts and all.

We'd like to have sold more tickets (though, as I said, in the end it was damn-near full), but I think Mark hit the nail on the head when he said "well, everybody that just wanted to come down to shake God^H^H^HRob Hubbard's hand has done it by now." Been there, done that, had the T-shirt signed by Galway.

So - what are we left with? Will there be another BIT live? Well, everybody who was there knows my opinion - I have too much fun getting together with the guys once a year to let it stop now. So how do we make it work? I think this year's format got it right - this is a gig, not a convention. It's about the music...basically, it's a genre, just like Punk, Folk, Jazz, whatever. And we know how good it can be and want to play it as well as we can, and present it to you fine folks in as near-as-possible to the finest form it can be. So I vote for the gig carrying on, even if the surrounding kerfuffle dies...this year, for instance, the performers only managed 10 minutes in the pub saying "Hi" before the show, as the rest of the afternoon we were to concerned with wanting to make the evening show a success.

After a late-night vodka-fueled conflab between Mark, Kenz & myself, we decided to hassle PPOT to host a do next year in Copenhagen, which they think can pay for itself. Certainly, we'd be able to persuade more mainland Europe-based people to come, and the logistics would be easier in terms of getting performers from all over Europe to play. As to whether Chris would be interested in running the show as usual, I couldn't say - I've only just got back myself and haven't sounded him out about it yet (I thought I'd give the poor guy a few days to recover), but even if not, I'm sure something will happen - there's too many people wanting it to happen to let it fizzle out. I'm convinced the event can go from strength to strength - I know, as a professional gigging muso (not generally guitar, I hasten to add for anybody that's still wincing over some of my bad notes), that if SID 80's had more than 10 hours rehearsal once a year, we'd be a shit-hot combo, and as I said earlier, PPOT just get better every year I see them. (Thinking of it, four years ago they were pretty much the only band in the world that played SID stuff - now we've got a handful, and who knows how many in five years time?)

That's enough from me. Thanks again to everybody that showed up and gave me my annual "feel like a star" day :) I'd be grateful for feedback - Copenhagen 2005? Yes? Wanna buy a ticket now? :)

Benn.

Posted: 12/09/2004 - 18:27
by Kenz
Great stuff Benn - I forgot to mention the other highlight of the weekend - those two vodka fuelled evenings! It warms my cockles to think BitLive Copenhagen 2005 could be the result of an idea hatched thanks to our ramblings as we demolished two bottles of Voddie. :)

Consider us THERE!!!! Can't f'kin wait!! :D

"Free the Singapore two!" Hehe!

Posted: 12/09/2004 - 18:30
by rambones
Well, what you write Benn, just confirms me one more time that everybody here is tapping into the collective conssiousness that we are in.

The things you want are the same as everybody that I ever met on this subject.

The thing is just, we didn't have any email in 1987.

We just had some names on the screen, and those names built up a desire to materialize it - to meet the guy behind the name and live together, be a part of something, not just be a specctator.

You are right now Benn, the last standing man, the physicall embodyment of this collective dream, so I surely can understand that you dont want this to stop, you havent even started yet in fact!!!!

Doing the audience as 3 voices is EXACTLY what this is about.!

I cried my heart out, I'wa waited so long..

Posted: 12/09/2004 - 18:30
by Matrix
You know what i love Ben ? .. your impromptu FILL IN's lol .... ur awesome lol ... that east enders thing was genius lol .... sry i didnt get this year, there were medical reasons preventing my attendance.... but i did catch it on Slay Radio (BIG Ole Thx to the for streaming and the intense GUFFAWS i suffered along with a bust Spleen at the "Do you have your headphones on, No, You Styoopid TaWatt..... I need to know if im online, FUCK !" line lol ....

Hey did anyone bag a shot of my poster, or did it get nicked this year too lol ...

Posted: 12/09/2004 - 18:37
by Kenz
I've got a nice BitLive 2004 poster for you here Matrix - I'll get that in the post to you sharpish. :)

/note to self - must get one done for Mark and Benn too - er, and anyone else who wants one!