Me and Miss Halliwell... 2008 to 2011.

 

Biography

 

I first saw the name Miss Halliwell in a gig listing for Katie Fitzgerald’s in Stourbridge in July 2008.  I was in pre-production for a documentary about Black Country music at the time and wanted to check out as many local bands as possible.  I used a well known internet networking site to listen to some of their music. Initially I was in two minds, whether they were for real or enormous piss-takers.  I could not fault the music, but I could not tell if the spoken intro to “I’m A Puppy“, in which lead singer Miles shouts at his band, was contrived or not.  The fact that this section of the track was included in the song reveals a lot about the band’s or Miles’ mentality:  he is not afraid to show the music, warts and all, and he wants to indicate that he is in control, that he is calling the shots and is ultimately responsible.

 

I sent a message to the band asking if they would allow me to film their upcoming gig and they agreed.  To say I was blown away by their live performance is an understatement.  It was astonishing and more importantly allowed me to witness the underlying humour in their work.  They are confrontational and angry, they are over-opinionated, but they are also very intelligent and witty.

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I must mention here that Miss Halliwell then, is very different from the band in 2010.  Then they were a three piece: Miles, guitar and voice, CN Support playing bass and Sarah H on drums.  They remained this way until late 2008, when two members of The Mallory Heart (with whom Sarah was already playing drums) joined, playing second guitar (Nicole) and keyboards (Fi).  It was this incarnation that was to record half of “Die Son!  Die!”.

 

So anyway, following the Katie F’s gig, I made a couple of video promos for the band (‘I’m a Puppy’ and ‘kinnell’) and interviewed Miles for my documentary.  During that interview he spoke of his intentions to record and film their next album live.

And so it came to pass.

 

Through the next 9 frustrating months I shelved my documentary and agreed to produce, photograph and edit “Die Son!  Die!”, with Miles writing and directing.  This entailed filming two live performances in Stourbridge and Digbeth, with between 2 and 5 separate camera angles, as well as additional storyline scenes in and around the Black Country.

With Miles’ instructions for the scene running order, I edited the film during the Spring and Summer until the soundtrack was mastered and could be properly added.  The final cut of the film was approved and the DVD was released in September 2009 along with a digital download album of the songs.

 

I will admit that I believed in the project with every ounce of my being.  I thought musically it was the most exciting concept in years and visually it documented a band in full control.  I expected the country’s media to grasp this post-modern post-punk rock band to its breast and catapult its members into a dizzying drug and booze soaked fame.  But it was all but ignored.  The national press passed over every press release I sent and only a couple of the local rags printed the odd, limp paragraph that did nothing to inspire their readers.  Local radio and TV news preferred their usual ‘charity shop’ stories. The final nail in the coffin was the premier of the film at the Public, in West Bromwich (an art gallery so mis-placed and badly directed that its future is very shaky).  It was a poorly attended occasion, only lifted from the misery by a stunning live performance by Miss Halliwell in between the first and second parts of the film.

Financially the night was a disaster and there was a major short fall on the costs for the venue even on top of the door receipts.  As producer and organiser I accepted this responsibility.  Artistically I believe it was on a par with the Sex Pistols playing the Lesser Free Trade Hall... I will be proven right.

 

Miss Halliwell continued to promote the release of the album and DVD and recruited a second drummer Damo, who is currently their only drummer, now Sarah plays guitar.  They then lost original guitarist Nicole, and Miles no longer plays guitar, but generally fucks about with masks, sheets, hats, whilst singing and berating the audience: “this is the future of rock n roll, pay attention”.

And this is the line up they have now.  They have gigged throughout 2010 and released a double A side single and video with label mates The Gruber.  Their live performances range from unparalleled clarity to an unabashed disarray.  I sometimes watch in awe, sometimes through the gaps between my fingers as my hands try and cover my eyes from the traffic accident unfolding in front of me.  They are always utterly entertaining however, and never the same.  Each time I have seen them live they have never played more than 2 songs from an earlier set.  C N Support said that he likes it like this as they are always on edge and never in a comfort zone.  It is bewildering for an audience and impossible to ever get a hold of them: they are elusive almost to a point of invisibility:  when the set finishes they disappear into the venue camouflaging themselves amongst the assembled mass of adoring fans.  They have also even decided to reduce their online presence to just 3 sites and trying to hear any early material in full is almost impossible.

 

Miles has a clear idea of where Miss Halliwell needs to be.  He has an empire in mind, with other bands all feeding from his enormous energy reserves and imagination.  He has a battle though in attempting to bypass the minefield that stands before them and world domination.

The world we now live in is very different from 35 years ago when the last real music revolution occurred.  Then independent record labels and bands could compete in the market.  But the market and media have moved on and so audiences have had to as well.  It is odd that during the 70’s when the UK had only 3 TV channels, there was more time devoted to contemporary music on the terrestrial channels than there is now.  I know there are channels solely devoted to music, but no worthwhile music programs on mainstream tele, where the biggest audiences are… there is no ‘So It Goes’, ‘Old Grey Whistle Test’, ‘Rock Goes to College’ etc.  So now audiences are bombarded with ‘variety’ that has no variety, celebrities with nothing to celebrate and with nothing interesting to say.  Audiences today are much poorer than 40 years ago, because even with a greater pool of information from which to draw, they will still stick to tried and tested avenues of entertainment.  The internet is such a vast collection of information that when you don’t know what you are looking for, you end up looking at rubbish, instead of diamonds amongst the rubbish.

 

Gil Scott Heron wrote in 1970: “the revolution will not be televised, it will be live”, however, now ironically that will happen, it will be televised and it will also be live and it will often be the revolutionaries doing the filming and then posting it on the web.  But nevertheless it may still go unnoticed.

 

Mike Holderness said in 1997 about trying to get attention for your actions:  “If our action is really good, and if it has something fresh and new about it, and if there's no Big Story that has all the news outlets throwing all their resources at it, and if we're lucky, then it may make a better story than several other things happening that day. If it does, a diluted and filtered version of it will be presented to millions of people who would probably not invite us into their homes to tell them in person. Most of them will not be able to recall any concrete fact about it five minutes after they have watched or read the news. Many will, however, retain a vague feeling.”

This is the media we are faced with today.  So would it make you feel any better about being covered on the news, than being totally ignored?  A choice between being noticed by idiots or passed over…?

 

There is a chance that the next music revolution will be very small.  It will have no after shocks and no impact on the general population.  Maybe this is all that we will have to satisfy our hopes and desires.

No matter how much success Miss Halliwell are granted, we should feel lucky they are around: they are an antidote to the dull and straightforward, an answer to the predictable, a shining, bright shaft of pure white light in a world so over-saturated with colour that we cannot differentiate any longer.

Miss Halliwell is the future, whether you notice or not.  My wish, no, my demand is that you take notice.

 

(written by E.REX in early 2011)

 

Discography with elementary recordings:

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Predateoralbumlaunchparty

Imp-imperfection

Die Son! Die! (feature film)

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After 2011...

 

It was with much sadness that on 19 September 2011, I learned that the band Miss Halliwell had ceased to be.  For the years that I knew and worked with them, I can honestly say I have never met a set of more focussed and dedicated artists.  Their energy and creativity seemed boundless, their commitment to the cause never questionable, their ability to always make me smile and happy was beyond doubt... I will miss that most of all.

 

 

Their stunning back catalogue of music is still available, and you can have it if you want.

The queen is dead; long love the king...

 

 

And so a new chapter began with Perhower...

 

...then out of the blue, Miss Halliwell came back; with a few team member changes, but still as stunning as ever.

 

And then she went away and Miles, Sarah and Fi return as The Day Ends...

 

Rivetting