Portland Rise: The Official Blog

Soho

noreply@blogger.com (Portland Rise) — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 20:26:00 +0000

Hi folks, how about a quick update? Why not.

On Saturday night we had a brilliant time at The Spice Of Life in Soho. It was the best set we've played in a while I reckon, we had awesome fun performing and the audience seemed to really go for it. Those two things tend to reinforce each other and make for a top gig...

Esteban were fantastic as the headliner (like we knew they would be). The bassist even used my jack lead! Imagine that! If you don't know their music make sure you take a look.

We'll be releasing Sky as a single on an independent label...we're extremely excited. It's available to listen to at our Myspace and Last.fm pages, but the official release date will be announced soon.

Enjoy the ever-improving weather and stay tuned for more news from the Portland Rise! Not at the same time of course, unless you've got some sort of portable internet device. (Our housemate has one...I personally don't think they'll catch on.)

G

229

noreply@blogger.com (Portland Rise) — Tue, 17 Feb 2009 20:16:00 +0000

Thanks a million to everyone who came to 229 on Great Portland Street on Thursday, you all helped make it one of the best gigs we've ever played. Apparently 104 of you were there just to see us! Not that it matters but I reckon we had the best 'fan to band member' ratio of any of the bands on that night by a looong way, especially considering the 6-person Babysteps and Teitur's string quartet...

The set itself went well despite the fact that we forgot a fairly important MIDI cable. It meant we were limited to a bit of a weak piano sound, but that's never got in our way before...

We were well pleased with the way our fancy-glowing mailing lists (which Paul and Jem made with an obscene amount of duck tape) looked in the dark of the venue, and just like we planned people were drawn to them like moths to a glowing thing. You heard me.

Here's a video of our performance of 'The Autumn Tree', filmed by Greg Spong.

Our friend Dave (who's known us since the Bluefield days) has always hated The Autumn Tree, so we've been mixing it up a bit, adding cool bass licks and sick harmonies etc to try and bring him round. After our set he said "it's getting there." One day...

G x

Photo Shoot!!

noreply@blogger.com (Portland Rise) — Mon, 09 Feb 2009 20:11:00 +0000

So, its been quite an active fortnight for us. Lots of new stuff to catch up on, namely our sexy new Portland Pictures. You lucky things, not only can you listen to our music but you can now gawp at our trim bodies. Last thursday we were fortunate enough to muscle in on a MODO Fashion shoot and take some photos of our shiny new image and i've got to say we're pretty flippin pleased with them. Mr Josh Blacker held the camera and as you can/will/must see he did a really great job. It's almost like we're in a proper band! Anyway big hugs to the Fashion Society for letting us do that. You guys are our heroes!

You can also check out the new photos at http://www.socialphoto.co.uk/

We've also been hard at work updating and smartening up our myspace (check it out at www.myspace.com/portlandrise). There's a couple of new interesting links up, there's a new logo, our new photos and, most importantly, a brand spanking new recording of Sky!!! Those guys at the Animal Farm have really worked wonders with the track and it's really never sounded so good!!! It's only available to listen to at the moment but keep an eye on the myspace and the blog for its release date, we'll hopefully be doing something a little special for that. But in the mean time just indulge you ears with some Portland Goodness.

Anyway, to current issues. Thursday the 12th February is our gig at the 229 club on Great Portland Street and we can't fudging wait. It really looks like it's gonna be a night to remember. We've had such a great response with the ticket sales. We were given 80 tickets to sell and they've literally all gone and this is due, in no small part, to several courageous people (Portland Warriors) who volunteered to help us out with the promoting and selling of the tickets. You guys are also our absolute heroes, thank you so much! We should also mention that even though we don't have any tickets left there are still plenty available on the door. Tickets are £8 on the door but if you send your name to portlandrise@gmail.com we can put you on a guestlist which is only £6 entry.

See map for 229 Venue below

http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=229+Great+Portland+Street,,+Marylebone,,+London,,+W1W+5PN&sll=53.800651,-4.064941&sspn=15.299029,46.40625&ie=UTF8&ll=51.523097,-0.143702&spn=0.00785,0.022659&z=16

Anyway, think that'll do for now. Hopefully we'll be seeing you on thursday, it's gonna be aces! Thanks again to everyone thats helped us out over the last fortnight, you've been amazing!!

Speak soon

Jem

The Rise of a New 'Sky'

noreply@blogger.com (Portland Rise) — Sat, 24 Jan 2009 20:13:00 +0000

What a week it's been. We've been in the studio with producers from The Animal Farm recording Sky (yet again!). It's a fab studio, they really know what they're doing and were fun to record with. They've recently been working with awesome bands like The Brent Flood, Esteban, and Rosalita who we gigged with last year.

Anyhoo, the idea is that we'll finally have a recording worthy of radio-play. In our humble opinion, the track is hot as a dog. We've sent it to be mastered etc but before long we'll be celebrating its release as a single! We'll have a launch gig and everything. Why not.

The worst part about this whole recording experience was lugging the gear around on the tube. It's quite a lot for only three (admittedly hench) guys, but luckily Jem made it far less work by leaving the keyboard stand on the Picadilly line.

So now we're focusing on practicing for our upcoming gigs. The first is this Tuesday (27th Jan) at the UCL Battle of the Bands 2009! Come along and support us as we politely stomp on the competition and go through to the final.

This will be the first of many blogs! Check back regularly to stay updated.

Loves! G

Welcome to the Portland Rise Official Blog

noreply@blogger.com (Portland Rise) — Fri, 23 Jan 2009 22:27:00 +0000

The Portland Rise guys at the UCL Union
(image courtesy of Josh Blacker)