Venue Review: The Haunt, Brighton

After visiting The Haunt  (a nightclub located on Brighton seafront) twice over the last couple of months- first seeing Brother & Bones and then Bear's Den, I can state with some confidence that it is my favourite venue to attend pretty intimate gigs. 

I've been to a relatively large collection of venues across London, Surrey and Brighton- ranging widely in size, but I've found The Haunt to be one of the best. Although the venue is small, on both of my visits the gigs were sold out and a full house seemed to have aided the great atmosphere. Despite two sell out gigs, I spent less than 5 minutes queuing outside  and for cloakrooms in both gigs combined.  Also, the stage and front of the crowd area has a tall ceiling  (its the main screening room of an old converted cinema), which to me prevented the venue from feeling cramped or stuffy, unlike other venues of similar sizes. The quality of sound was fantastic, much like that of larger venues such as Brighton Dome (this was probably so clearly highlighted to me by the fact that I was seeing such incredible musicians). The size of The Haunt meant that Bear's Den were able to perform one song unplugged, which is always a fantastic experience, so being a size to allow for the occasional unplugged song is great.

At the end of both shows, the artists came out to chat to fans- having the opportunity to meet an artist after a gig has always appealed to me, so knowing that its possible (as long as the artist wants to, of course) for this to occur at The Haunt is another determining factor in making it my favourite venue. 

The Haunt hosts many great events, particularly those hosted by Communion. On January it will host the Communion Live club night, featuring artists including Young Kato and Matthew and the Atlas. It's also hosting the Brighton leg on the Communion presents New Faces Tour, featuring "four of 2014′s most hotly tipped new artists" – Luke Sital Singh, Eliza and The Bear (I can confirm from my own experiences that they'll put on a great show),Farewell JR and Annie Eve. Tickets for both events are still on sale on the venue's website.


I will be returning to The Haunt in March to see Dan Croll (discussed in a previous post) and as made quite obvious from this post, I cannot wait! 

Venue Webiste: http://www.thehauntbrighton.co.uk/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thehauntbrighton
Twitter: https://twitter.com/HauntBrighton

My Top 10 BBC Radio 1 Live Lounge Covers

Over the years the BBC Radio 1 live lounge has provided us with some magnificent and bizarre covers, here's a run down of my top ten live lounge covers of all time: 

10. Crazy (Gnarls Barkley) – The Kooks

9. Crystallized (The XX) – Gorillaz

8. Video Games (Lana Del Ray) – Kasabian

7. Tessellate (Alt J) – Mumford & Sons

6. Earthquake (Labrinth) – Clean Bandit

5. Bleeding Love (Leona Lewis) – Mystery Jets

4. White Noise (Disclosure) - Peace

3. Hollaback Girl (Gwen Stefani) - Foals

2. Hold On, We’re Going Home (Drake) – Arctic Monkeys

1. Slide Away (Oasis) – Jake Bugg

Have you Heard?- The Dust of Men

I discovered The Dust of Men whilst browsing www.noisetrade.com, a site featured in a previous post of mine (here).  They are a five-piece alt rock band from Wisconsin over in the States. With a sound described as being "built on an aggressive foundation of alternative rock, framed with folk and roofed with revival music", the closest artists I can compare them to are the likes of Filligar, City and Colour and Matthew and the Atlas. The Dust of Men however, certainly have a sound of their own. 

The Dust of Men's debut album was recorded at Bon Iver's April Base studio and is titled "What the Morning Shows". (see end of post for download links). Fortunately for me, the band made three of the tracks from the record available for free download on NoiseTrade, in a collection titled "Three Songs from What the Morning Shows". I'm confident that like myself, the download of these tracks will lead people to seek the full album. 

If you were to visit the bands website (again, see below for links), you would find a compelling story of lead vocalist and songwriter Grant Schultz's personal journey "from darkness to light" after struggling with severe addictions and depression. Personally, I find that the sharing of some background information of an artist or band which, to some extent, explains why and how the music that you listening to has come together has a magnificent effect of deepening the power of emotion within a song or (in this case) entire album, making it all the more extraordinary to listen to. "What the Morning Shows" tells a story of revival, that without a need for bio reading, can be clearly felt throughout the record. 

Here's a track from the album, Children Come Running:

Official Website: http://thedustofmen.com/
Download "What the Morning Shows": https://itunes.apple.com/album/what-the-morning-shows/id740704362

Soundcloud: https://soundcloud.com/thedustofmen

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thedustofmen/

Twitter: https://twitter.com/thedustofmen (@thedustofmen)