Music promo – Living it Live

Tell us why the SA London music scene is so exciting.
Coz SA music is laying its roots firmly in the UK!  Acts like Arno Carstens, Livingston, Dorp, Mann Friday, Starseed, Robin Auld, Tony Cox, The View From Below and plenty more have moved here and are making themselves known and respected.  It’s wonderful to see SA music gaining international respect at this rapid rate!

And not to mention all the South African artists who come to the UK to test the water or just play a gig or two as part of a wider tour. The variety is so immense – from Chris Chameleon to Cassette, James Stewart to Johnny Clegg, Prime Circle to The Parlotones, Karma to Nibs van der Spuy – and that’s not even mentioning all the jazz and more traditional African music!

Is there a market for South African music in the UK?
There is definitely a market not just in the UK but internationally!  Acts like Seether, Goldfish, MacStanley (Flat Stanley), Arno Carstens, The Parlotones etc all have international record deals.  Fabulous music doesn’t have any boundaries…if it’s good enough it will be played around the world.  If an SA act wants to play specifically to a SA audience outside of SA then the UK is the biggest crowd they will find and Living It Live provides the access the fans and the artists need to each other.

What kind of music does your events company organise for?
Living it Live is into all sorts of genres.  Johnny Clegg is world music,  Karma is a folk/rock’ish acoustic singer songwriter;, Starseed are melodic heavy rock, Mann Friday are melodic indie rock… a bit like a box of chocolates really. 

Which SA acts should we be keeping our eye on?
There are so many good ones springing up all the time but definitely keep your eye on SA based Jesse Clegg (yes, he is Johnny’s son!)  who’s debut single, ‘Today’ went straight into No.1 on 94.7 Highveld Stereo’s Home Brew Charts.  Also, London based rock quartet, The View From Below who have recently released an EP.

What’s the best thing about your job?
The constant learning curve and the really interesting people we get to meet and work with.  It also allows us to be creative in a way we want to be and not the way some corporate would expect us to be if we were working a 9-5 desk job. 

What’s the worst thing about your job?
Not having much down time and dealing with promoters who take the “P” out of musicians and their talent i.e. acting as the middle man and keeping all the proceeds….that get’s Living It Live’s goat!

What’s been the most outlandish request you’ve ever received from a client?
Hmmm, nothing that stands out!  The bands we work with are really nice down to earth chaps who don’t think they are diva’s when it comes to rider lists, requests etc…. 

Tell us about your coolest experience on the job.
When we arranged for Karma to become the first SA musician to launch an album in the world famous London Eye.  This launch of “Even If She Tried” was an exclusive acoustic show which overlooked the London lights while we sipped on wine and Karma sang.  Did you know Karma was scared of heights? Well, nor did we until she nervously wriggled onto the pod.  

Also, the ‘Week You Made Us Famous’ campaign when Living It Live launched Mann Friday’s single “Sunburn and Wonder” with the aim of getting into the UK Top 40 Charts through a massive underground poster campaign, advertising slots on Xfm,  BBC World News and SABC interviews, street teams, NME Magazine adverts and limited sleep for about 2 months!  

What are you looking forward to in 2009? 
Living It Live have staaaax of projects up our sleeve … one of them is that we are going to be writing the Entertainment section for SAPromo Magazine which we are SUPER excited about.   We are taking Mann Friday on tour with Plush around SA and Zimbabwe, a little project with Seether in the early part of the year and another surprise surrounding Karma’s ‘09 show dates.

We at SA PROMO are at the back of the queue at a packed gig, and really need to get in front of the queue as we can see the venue is about to run out of beer. What’s the best way to do it?
Pretend you are in SA and bribe the bouncer! …or you could just hang with us, we’re always close to the band… and the beer!

See you at the front!

Contact the Living It Live ladies;  Hazel Hoole, Kelly Joseph, Sue Northam and Bev Tustin on livingitlive@sapromo.com and let us know if you have any interesting Entertainment things going on we should know about…we would love to hear from you.