Melonz Mag Launch

I am always interested in all things ‘Created in Birmingham‘ and think I’ve found the latest project to follow…

Melonzmag is a new magazine venture developed by Birmingham City University 3rd year media students Natalie Chillington, Laura Blood and Katherine Higgs.

From reading the blog it seems that the girls are huge kitsch jewellery fans which is awesome given that I’m overly partial to sites such as Heidi Seeker and Lady Luck Rules OK! Plus the blog provides links to some cool vintage stuff. They also feature some music events from the Midlands area (surely I have a ‘Melonz shaped heart’!?!)

You can grab a copy of Melonz Mags’ first issue soon hopefully! They’ll be taking it to all good independent record stores, so I guess the best thing is to keep an eye at the Melonz Mag blog for details…

The following is taken from the ‘about page’ of the Melonz blog and I’m guessing pretty much sums up the magazine too…

Would you rather gouge your eyes out with a shoehorn than watch Hollyoaks? Welcome one and all to the blog page of Melonz Magazine.

We are a new, small (but not underestimated), West Midlands-based women’s magazine for women who believe there is more to life than celebrities, X-Factor and diet fads. We promise to deliver a witty, honest and entertaining outlook on life for those of us who would rather live an interesting existence than talk about Paris Hilton and the price of bread.

Fun times at Mouldy Loaf

My boyfriend Alex and his friend Neil set up a business a few years back called Mouldy Loaf. They started with a shop in Stratford….and although that’s gone now they now have their online shop (see hyperlink) and now have a shop in the Custard Factory. Although an undeniably cool space, and a very cool shop design (go have a look and see what I mean) I think it’s sometimes hard to attract new customers along.

Perhaps if there was a space next to Cow Vintage (formerly the Big Yellow Vintage Store) then they would do really well from alternative-lovin’ customers but unfortunately unless its gone midnight and the Custard Factory’s legendary parties are going strong, those people rarely venture beyond the Digbeth Subway.

Mouldy Loaf is now joining forces with local silk screen printers Cut Out and are sharing the Custard Factory shop space. Cut Out of course printed the Created in Birmingham Acorn Hospice T Shirt which you can get in the shop complete with a charming brown tag which tells you what number you are in possession of (there are 50 unisex shirts and 50 tote bags.) So if you haven’t got yours yet clearly you should go have a nosey!

Mouldy Loaf deserves and should be an enterprise that becomes vital to the Birmingham creative scene. It supports up and coming artists such as local cartoonist Gaz Barnett. You can find more artists and about them on the Mouldy Loaf Myspace page.

Here are some photos from the shoot we did for the website. I turned up in my lipstick ‘ready for my closeup’ and had a plastic bear face shoved on my mug. Charming!!!

This film was made for Al’s (Alex Buckmaster) Visual Communications project at BCU. Thanks to Nicky Getgood for Twittering and blogging about it!

Operation Mousemat

Today in the Burnfm studio I came up with…an idea!

Basically in the OLRC (library on the Selly Oak campus) there are old mousemats next to every computer. These were sponsored by a now defunct computer company called DCS plc. My idea is to replace these mousemats with Burnfm.com mousemats. It’s a hugely ambitious idea, even if it doesn’t sound like it (I mean mousemats for goodness sake!) However mousemats are not posters – they are likely to last for a few years at least and remain where they are. They will be next to the computers, hopefully inspiring people to listen as they work and they will also imprint Burnfm’s name and image firmly in people’s minds. There are students who haven’t heard of us.

If we can get Burnfm mousemats into at least the Main Library and the OLRC then we will definitely be reaching out to people. Then if we can branch out to the other 7 computer cluster areas we’ll be getting somewhere.

If anyone has any idea who to approach about this, be it through printing or in terms of who to approach at the Uni (I really don’t know, but have tried emailing the IT services as a start…will talk to the Main Library staff in person as soon as I can.)

Budget wise I know that unless we get some kind of sponsorship, we won’t be able to get enough mousemats, but ideally I’d like to start at 500 and see where we can go from there…

Any ideas give me an email at frankiepromotes@googlemail.com or comment….

Thanks!

Frank x

Birmingham’s Got Talent

Hope to see you there tonight! (I’m on after 7.)

third_edition_v2

Birmingham’s Got Talent

I sent in a video entry for the Birmingham St Mary’s Hospice Birmingham’s Got Talent competition ages ago and got a phone call this morning to say I’m through to the final next wednesday at the Jam House. It was rather a shock I can tell you! I sent them a video of myself and Nick performing ‘Untitled’ but watching it back I realise it really wasn’t my best performance, hence why I really am surprised!

I don’t think I’ll be performing Untitled at the event as I’m not sure how long I’ll be playing for, I think with the short length of my songs probably two. I doubt Nick, the guitarist in the above video is going to be free to play so I might be on my own! If I am then I’ll probably play ‘Three Floors HIgh‘ because I feel that works on its own, just me.

Yesterday I did some work for Chris Unitt at Fazley Studios (the studios are amazing!) I basically tried to find as many dance focused companies as possible for Chris’ work with West Midlands Dance. The company that I’d particularly like to see after looking at over 100 schools, agencys and production companies is Blue Eyed Soul who are an inclusive dance company who involve anyone they can, no matter what ability or disability that one may have.

On my way home I popped into Mouldy Loaf, a shop in the Custard Factory that commissions local artists to create unique T-Shirt designs. It made me think of a slighty ‘grown up’ Lazy Oaf (who I absolutely love!) They have a couple of offers on at the moment and I couldn’t resist a tshirt with a cloud on it. (I like clouds. Especially ones that talk.)

Feeling considerably ‘arty’ I finally recorded some stuff in my room. I decided to rearrange a song called…’An Arrangement’ and here it is…

An Arrangement by GetFrank

Unfortunately I mixed the bass too low and you can’t really hear it but ah well! Please download and pass on if you have time/like it. Stick it in a blog, twitter, facebook, myspace or even email! I do not mind, just as long as people know its me. I wrote, played and recorded the entire thing – hence its scrappy nature!!!

Get Frank needs you!

I’ve just been offered at support slot for Dan Smith at The Rainbow pub with 444 Club promotions on the 29th May.

I played with Dan Smith at the Yardbird last month and he was awesome, (think male Regina Spektor with a synth.)

So basically I need to build up a band with keys, bass, guitar and drums and for that I need people. Anyone really! If you’re interested email me, frankiepromotes@googlemail.com. You can listen to ‘fragments’ of my stuff on my myspace, watch me and friend Nick playing some stuff on Youtube and also grab some downloads of old songs on my soundcloud.

I don’t care about virtuosos or skills or anything. Keeping time is a good thing to have as is having instruments (although I’ve got some of those of course!)

So spread the word and if possible, come on board…it will be fun, promise!

Frank x

Get Frank gets featured…

Martin from Urbanfly (follow his tweets here,) has featured my live Rhubarb Radio version of ‘Disappointed in Me’ on his blog which was a lovely surprise. The track is available to download for free with a few others from my soundcloud.

I’ve met a few people in the last couple of days who have mentioned recording with me which would be great – I need to get some decent sounding tracks as currently I’m far too lazy. I like the group feeling of recording and its fairly uninspiring cobbling things together on my own. I call the recordings I’ve made so far ‘fragments’ because none of them are complete. Often I’ll be unhappy with the vocals but because I just want to get it down, I put up with unsatisfactory takes.

The song I really want to work on is ‘So Far Away’ (makeshift video below.) I recorded it as I wrote it, (as I usually do) I want to make it longer and use it to play around with my voice a bit more. I don’t really stretch myself vocally – its time to use my training! I’ll put the first version on my soundcloud as I’ve not uploaded anything for a while….

Frank x

How do you wear yours?

This year Topshop are selling the official Fashion Targets Breast Cancer T shirts for Breakthrough Breast Cancer. Above are some photos of me wearing mine. I saw this video on the Topshop site and had to have one! The song used is pretty cool…

The tee has been updated from the old light blue circle design to a rather ‘now’ mono colourscheme. The oversized look fits in nicely with the ‘baggy top/ leggings look’ that seems to be appearing everywhere. I only wear leggings for drama however I tried on some purple, slightly high waisted ones under my new tee in the Topshop changing rooms and actually quite liked them… Perhaps when student loan comes in I’ll go crazy and get some, but probably shiny black – who knows! I’ve always been a dress or skirt girl but leggings can go under right? In the pics I was desperately trying to show what I was accessorizing the tee with (to go with the TS ‘How will you wear yours’ type campaign.) hence the picture of my purple clad legs in the air!

I really want to show you all a picture of my new skirt which is from the charity shop at the end of my road (45 secs walk away!) Its the same pattern that I’ve seen on a lot of scarfs recently. Originally it was a lot longer and I cut it and did a makeshift sewing job of the hem. I was going to wear it as a dress but then thought that I’d wear it more as a skirt… It was £2….result! (Sorry this is an impromptue post so no time to change…)

I also got a blue cheerleader type skirt from COW on Digbeth high street today for a bargainous £3. I love cobalt blue, particuarly with white…

As readers of my blog probably know, I don’t tend to blog about clothes too much, however I’ve developed a bit of a fetish for fashion recently…not so much trends, just drooling over Love magazine and hair accessories in pretty much every shop I go into. You can probably see from the photos that my instruments (there’s more of them on the opp. side of the room to my shoes) and my shoes are fighting it out for space. I probably have about 30 pairs of shoes in my room currently. There’s some on the various ledges and in the hallway. I’m terrible! My collection is probably not worth anything because all of my shoes tend to be sale items. If you ask how much any pairs of my shoes cost, I’ll almost certainly be able to tell you…

Now…go buy that T-shirt (if not for you, for someone else. Its a calorie free, charity earning alternative to the ‘how do you eat yours’ creme eggs…but you can always get creme eggs as well!)

Frank x

ps.

Thankyou to Chris Unitt for buying me a listerine prezzie after my ‘7 things‘ blog. Anyone else wanting to donate, let me know!!!

7 Things you need never know about me…

Ooh I feel a bit Miley Cyrus!

So I have been set a challenge by Ms Gigbeth herself, aka the lovely Clare Edwards (who on turn given the task by Jaki Booth.)

1. My first job was before I was one (I think) modelling. I modelled for Cow & Gate and Lloyds TSB shareholders. They dressed me up as a boy for the latter because apparently all babies can look like a boy if you dress them in blue!

2. I wanted to be an opera singer but didn’t pass highly at grade 6 or 7 voice so didn’t audition for conservatoires. Then I got distinction at grade 8. Whoops.

3. I adore listerine, but cannot afford it!

4. I don’t get starstruck much but after I interviewed The Coral at Lounge on the Farm this year I got a bit overwhelmed and had to momentarily hide in a portaloo.

5. I always get people saying to me ‘Ah people who have curly hair always want straight hair.’ But I like my hair, it’s just a tad annoying at times!

6. I got involved in all things creative in Brum after trying to sign Chris Unitt up to Laura Marling’s mailing list in March 2008 (and then bumping into him and Steve Gerrard two days later at an Envy and Other Sins gig.) For some reason I always think this was actually November 2007…I have just proved myself wrong.

7. The blog I visit most religiously is Selina Jervis’s Flying Saucer. Addictive.

So I have to name several bloggers to take up the challenge…however I don’t want to repeat names…agh!

Ok:

Video of the day…

Gig tonight… see previous post…