July 10, 2009: Well done to Gong Fei, who have been voted best T Break act by 46% of The Pop Cop readers. You can see the Dundee band at T in the Park tomorrow from 12.00-12.30pm.
July 9, 2009: The List magazine have handily published the full running order and stage times for T in the Park here.
Jack's Mannequin's Glasgow gig on August 31 has been moved up from King Tut's to the QMU.
July 8, 2009: Follow me, follow me, leave your home and family. The Pop Cop is now on Twitter. Join us here.
July 7, 2009: Yeah Yeahs Yeahs are playing Glasgow's O2 Academy on December 4. Tickets go on sale on Friday.
July 6, 2009: Your Sound, the unsigned network run by King Tut's, will fund a five-date Scottish tour for two bands in September. There is a shortlist of six candidates so it's up to you to vote for who you want to see most. Your choice are Barn Owl, Bronto Skylift, Call To Mind, Lions. chase. tigers, My Cousin I Bid You Farewell and RBRBR. We're rooting for MCIBYF.
July 3, 2009: More cracking gigs to look forward to in Scotland have just been announced: There Will Be Fireworks are at Edinburgh's Electric Circus on July 14 and Aberdeen's Drummonds on July 15; Beerjacket is at Glasgow's King Tut's on August 8; Metric are at Edinburgh's Picture House on August 25; Jamie T is at Glasgow's Barrowlands on October 9; Bat For Lashes is at Glasgow's Academy on October 19 and Edinburgh's Picture House on October 20.
July 2, 2009: Holy shiz! Jack's Mannequin are playing their first ever gig in Scotland on August 31 to kick-off a four-date UK tour. Tickets for King Tut's, Glasgow go on sale at 9am today from here. We might just burst with excitement.
July 1, 2009: Maximo Park will play Glasgow Barrowlands on October 7. Tickets go on sale on Friday at 9am from the usual outlets.
June 30, 2009: The Gap, a small radio and promotions group based in West Lothian, are putting on a three-day festival called SOSfest at The GRV in Edinburgh from August 21-23, with headliners Tommy Reilly, The Xcerts and Sergeant. All shows are over-14s and there are loads of up-and-coming Scottish artists on each bill. Tickets cost £13.50 per day.
June 29, 2009: The Pixies are playing Glasgow's SECC on October 4. Tickets go on sale on Friday at 9am.
June 26, 2009: So RIP not just Michael Jackson but Steven Wells, a legendary writer at NME in the 80s and 90s. He once described Belle & Sebastian as "self-loving, knock-kneed, passive aggressive, dressed-up-in-kiddy-clothes, mock-pop-creepiness peddling, smug, underachieving, real-pop-hating no-talents celebrating their own inadequacy with music so white it's translucent".
June 25, 2009: The Pop Cop chose Roddy Hart as the first Scottish ambassador of the Music Alliance Pact and next week he'll be representing the nation again. The Glaswegian will be playing at the Scottish Parliament on Wednesday to mark its 10th anniversary, just after the Queen addresses the chamber.
June 24, 2009: The Twilight Sad will perform their first Scottish headline gig of the year at Edinburgh's Bongo Club on July 2. Tickets are available here.
June 23, 2009: The Flying Duck venue in Glasgow is hosting a 16-band mini-festival on Sunday called Define Pop vs Club Overdrive. The full line-up is: CLUB OVERDRIVE STAGE: 16.30 Rollor, 17.20 Arca Felix, 18.10 United Fruit, 19.00 Hey Vampires, 19.50 Hey Enemy, 20.40 Das Filth, 21.30 Any Color Black, 22.20 Super Adventure Club; DEFINE POP STAGE: 16.40 My Cousin I Bid You Farewell, 17.30 The Martial Arts, 18.20 Free Korps, 19.10 Dirty Cuts, 20.00 Fridge Magnets, 20.50 Futuristic Reto Champions, 21.40 The Debuts, 22.30 Sugar Crisis. Tickets can be purchased for £8 from here.
June 22, 2009: De Rosa have split up. The gig they had scheduled for tomorrow at Glasgow's Oran Mor is therefore not happening.
June 19, 2009: Some newly-announced concerts to tell you about: Frightened Rabbit are playing a semi-secret free gig at The Goat in Glasgow on June 21, Ian Broudie (The Lightning Seeds) is at Edinburgh's Cabaret Voltaire on August 25, The Rumble Strips play Glasgow's ABC2 on September 28 and Grizzly Bear are at Glasgow's ABC1 on November 2.
June 18, 2009: Stuart Murdoch's God Help The Girl group made their first live outing yesterday afternoon at Lansdowne Parish Church in Glasgow, playing six songs to an invite-only audience. The performance was filmed so it should be up on their website in the near future.
June 17, 2009: Biffy Clyro have announced some Scottish dates: August 21 at Edinburgh's Corn Exchange, November 1 at Dundee's Caird Hall and November 2-3 at Glasgow's Barrowland. Tickets go on sale on Friday... or you could click here to access exclusive pre-sale tickets right now. Don't say we're not good to you.
June 16, 2009: Idlewild have begun mailing out copies of their new album Post Electric Blues to the 3,000 fans who pre-ordered it on their website. It is expected to get a conventional retail release in the next couple of months.
June 15, 2009: EXCLUSIVE: Perez Hilton's scheduled appearance at the Edinburgh International Television Festival at the end of August has been cancelled. No explanation has been given yet.
June 12, 2009: Tickets are on sale today for Editors at the Edinburgh Picture House on October 12 and Glasgow Barrowland on October 13.
June 10, 2009: The line-up for The Edge Festival in Edinburgh has just been announced and there's a disappointing lack of genuinely big names, although plenty of talent. The full rollcall is: David Byrne, The Stranglers, Calvin Harris, The Streets, Amanda Palmer, Enter Shikari, Emiliana Torrini, Broken Records, Frightened Rabbit, The Bluetones, Múm, Andrew Bird, Mumford & Sons, SOMA Night, Young Fathers, Unicorn Kid, Foy Vance, Your Sound Showcase and Malcolm Middleton. Gigs are scheduled from August 8-27 at the Playhouse, Picture House, Queens Hall, Studio 24 and Cabaret Voltaire. Tickets are available from Ticketmaster.
June 9, 2009: Organisers of this year's Scotcampus Freshers' Festival are looking for bands/artists to play at George Square, Glasgow on October 1-2. Anyone interested should email nicole@scotcampus.com with their band name, photo, web link and 50 words on why they should play.
June 8, 2009: Paisley boy Paolo Nutini has scored his first No.1 album with Sunny Side Up, which is a pretty brave departure from his debut pop album so fair play to him.
June 6, 2009: Biffy Clyro are playing at the Alhambra Theatre in Dunfermline on June 13 as a warm-up for Rockness. Tickets are on sale here priced £20.30.
June 5, 2009: We Were Promised Jetpacks and The Twilight Sad will both be performing short sets at HMV Buchanan Street, Glasgow on June 15 at 5pm. They'll also be signing stuff, preferably their CDs.
June 4, 2009: The line-up for The Edge Festival, the music arm of the Edinburgh Fringe which runs throughout August, will be unveiled on June 10.
June 3, 2009: Katy Perry has moved her imminent sell-out date at the Glasgow Barrowlands from June 6 to August 21 because she can make more money by going to a Russian awards show in Moscow instead. Muse are playing Glasgow's SECC on November 9. Tickets are available to buy from 9am on Friday and cost £41.25. Ouch. Also on sale that morning are tickets for the MOBO Awards at the SECC on September 30.
June 2, 2009: Silversun Pickups' Glasgow gig on July 1 has been moved from Stereo to Oran Mor.
June 1, 2009: Youth music project The Great Rock ‘n’ Roll Swindle is looking for five Glasgow acts of any genre to arrange, record and perform their own music, accompanied by members of eclectic group Music At The Brewhouse, for a special showcase gig at the Old Fruitmarket on November 25. Applicants must be between 16-25, resident in Glasgow and have been playing their own material for over a year. Interested bands/musicians can apply here before the June 22 deadline.
May 29, 2009: Stirling isn't known as being a hotbed for avant-garde music, but it will become precisely that with Le Weekend Festival which runs from this evening until Sunday and is now in its 12th year. Acts playing include Jazzsteppa & The Moody Boyz and Trembling Bells but not Broadcast, who cancelled their scheduled appearance at the last minute because they are "working on their next album" (i.e. they couldn't be arsed).
May 28, 2009: Calvin Harris is playing a few Scottish dates at the end of the year, namely The Picture House, Edinburgh on November 1; The Ironworks, Inverness on November 2; Fat Sam's, Dundee on November 3; and O2 Academy, Glasgow on November 4. Tickets will be going on sale soon.
May 27, 2009: A new 250-capacity venue is opening on June 2 in Market Street, Edinburgh called The Electric Circus. Even if you're not bothered about live music and club nights, you can't say no to private karaoke rooms.
May 26, 2009: There are a blizzard of album launches in Glasgow to stick in your diary: Malcolm Middleton (Waxing Gibbous) at Mono on May 31 (free); My Latest Novel (Deaths & Entrances) at Stereo on June 6; We Were Promised Jetpacks (These Four Walls) at King Tut's on June 15; Beerjacket (Animosity) at Oran Mor on June 17; There Will Be Fireworks (There Will Be Fireworks) at Nice ‘n’ Sleazy on July 1.
May 25, 2009: Glasgow band Cassidy have signed a £400,000, four-album deal with Mercury Records. Good on 'em.
May 22, 2009: Lock up your sons. Ubiquitous celebrity blogger Perez Hilton will give a talk at the Edinburgh International Television Festival. But even that won't top the appearance of The Wire actor Dominic West (Jimmy McNulty) and show creator David Simon. The festival runs from August 28-30.
May 21, 2009: Kirkintilloch lass Katie Sutherland, who was told to change her name to Pearl And The Puppets because it would improve her chances of getting a record deal (hey, it worked for Florence, Noah and Reverend) has signed to Universal. It's reassuring to know major labels are still run by imbeciles.
May 20, 2009: OK, so you spend more time than is healthy than on Facebook, MySpace, Bebo... now you can get paid for it. The Arches in Glasgow are looking for an Online Officer to generate publicity for their events through social networking sites and blogging. The job is 3 days per week, 10am-6pm, £15-17k pro rata. The application form is available here. If you'd prefer a job that's more likely to change people's lives, Live Music Now Scotland have a vacancy for a Development Officer in Edinburgh. See here for details.
May 19, 2009: Paolo Nutini, who sings like a jakey in his new single Candy, is playing two free in-store gigs on June 1 - HMV Buchanan Street, Glasgow at 1pm and HMV Lothian Road, Edinburgh at 7pm. Wristbands are available from 8am on the day.
May 18, 2009: A petition calling for Scotland to have its own entry in the Eurovision Song Contest has been lodged at Holyrood. Lynn Allan, one of the founders of the group Scotland In Eurovision, summed up the mood of the nation thus: "We have some spectacular talent in Scotland. Susan Boyle is testament to that." Twat.
May 15, 2009: Line-up details for next month's West End Festival in Glasgow are beginning to emerge. Acts playing at Òran Mór include Beerjacket on June 17, De Rosa on June 23, Emiliana Torrini on June 24 (in Auditorium) and the long-awaited live return of MAP favourites There Will Be Fireworks on June 24.
May 14, 2009: The Belladrum Tartan Heart festival in Inverness-shire on August 7/8 has been boosted by the additions of Noah And The Whale and Broken Records.
May 13, 2009: Robert Hubbert, former guitarist of Glasgow band El Hombre Trajeado, has launched a new kind of show, Will Play For Food - which is exactly how it sounds. He will do an acoustic set for you and your friends at your house for free as long as you make him dinner in return. Who knows, maybe you'll get an encore if you bring out the dessert.
May 12, 2009: The Sauchiehall Crawl is going ahead on Saturday, October 24. Last year's inaugural one-street event in Glasgow saw almost a dozen acts play across ABC 2, Nice 'n' Sleazy and The Beat Club. No word yet on which bands and venues will be involved this time.
May 11, 2009: T in the Park has added Camera Obscura (Friday, July 10, Futures Stage), Mumford & Sons (Saturday, July 11, King Tut's Tent) and The Maccabees (Friday, July 10, King Tut's Tent) to its festival line-up.
May 9, 2009: First it was the Homecoming festival on Irvine Beach then Beepfest and now The Outsider Festival has been cancelled. The event near Aviemore was due to be headlined by Teenage Fanclub and Sharleen Spiteri on June 27-28.
May 8, 2009: Dotjr song Where Stars Fall Down is featured in the trailer (fast-forward 35 seconds) for What Goes Up, a summer movie featuring Hilary Duff and Steve Coogan.
May 7, 2009: Beepfest has been cancelled. The all-day event had been due to take place on Saturday at the Glasgow School of Art with over a dozen acts including Aberfeldy and Norman Blake (Teenage Fanclub). Manchester-based curators The Beep Seals, who were planning to split up after playing at the festival, blamed "various reasons beyond our control" for scrapping it.
May 6, 2009: The sixth annual Tigerfest gets underway today, with gigs in Edinburgh this week, Dunfermline next week and Aberdeen the week after. Artists on show include King Creosote, James Yorkston, Lord Cut-Glass, Ballboy, Aberfeldy, Meursault and Found. Click here for full line-up details.
May 5, 2009: Scottish post-punk new wave band TV21, who split up in 1982 immediately after supporting The Rolling Stones, will play a launch gig at Edinburgh's Voodoo Rooms on May 24 to celebrate the release of their second album, Forever 22, almost three decades after their debut came out. Frightened Rabbit singer Scott Hutchison and We Were Promised Jetpacks counterpart Adam Thompson will also be playing acoustic sets on the night. TV21 member Ally Palmer happens to be the dad of Jetpacks guitarist Michael. Tickets cost £6 plus postage.
May 4, 2009: EXCLUSIVE(always wanted to write that): Those Dancing Days singer Linnea Jönsson is jetting in from Sweden tomorrow to add vocals to a new God Help The Girl song that won't be on the forthcoming album. Look out for The Pop Cop's interview with Belle & Sebastian frontman Stuart Murdoch very soon.
May 3, 2009: It's not often that Doves make the front page of a national newspaper but the Sunday Mail and News of the World both reported that the first guy in Scotland to be confirmed with swine flu had been in the crowd at the Edinburgh Picture House for the Manchester band's gig on April 23. Before he was quarantined. It's just a wee cough, you'll get over it.
May 1, 2009: Hockey are playing Edinburgh's Cabaret Voltaire (tickets) on September 19 and Glasgow's King Tut's (tickets) on September 20. It'll set you back £9.52 + postage.
April 30, 2009: Free music time, wooh! To download a 26-song compilation of bands playing at Hinterland just visit here, click the Ticket Holders button, enter the download code 63H9HG77 and your email address. Check your email for a link from 7digital and click the Download Now button. The tracklisting is as follows:
Broken Records - Lies
Little Man Tate - Hey Little Sweetie
The Answering Machine - Another City, Another Sorry
Jesus H. Foxx - I'm Half The Man You Were
Eugene McGuinness - Moscow State Circus
Fangs - S.I.C.K.O. (remix)
Remember Remember - Up In A Blue Light
Three Trapped Tigers - 1
Theophilus London - Cold Pillow
Come On Gang! - Wheels
The Wave Pictures - Puncture My Ride
Edie Sedgwick - Sissy Spacek
Elks - Four Pale Letters
Phantom - We Float
Guanoman - Kaiseki
Geordi La Force - If They Ain't Vertical, They Are Horizontal
Panama Kings - Children
The Ray Summers - Ballad Of The Bitter Man
Soft Toy Emergency - White Lights
The Lines - Tracey
Manda Rin - Do The Static
Burn The Negative - Lights
The Lovely Eggs - Have You Ever Heard A Digital Accordion?
Desalvo - Ripper Situation
Wintermute - Disco Load-Out
These Monsters - Fleets Of Black Hovercraft
April 29, 2009: Far be it from us to suggest that tickets for Hinterland aren't selling very well, but the organisers are literally giving away a "limited number" of two-day passes for free if you email info@hinterlandfestival.com today with your name and how many wristbands you want. You will get email confirmation if your request is successful. Thanks to Peenko for the heads-up.
April 28, 2009: Green Day are playing at Glasgow's SECC on October 19. Tickets go on sale on Friday at 10am. Their new album 21st Century Breakdown is out on May 15.
April 27, 2009: The latest additions to T in the Park are Doves, Idlewild, Iglu & Hartly, Patrick Wolf, Dinosaur Pile-Up and Vagabond.
April 26, 2009: Uber-cool LA band Silversun Pickups, who gave us the six-minute modern classic Lazy Eye, are playing at Glasgow's Stereo on July 1. Tickets are on sale here priced £10.08, not including delivery.
April 25, 2009: Malcolm Middleton has pretty much guaranteed his place in The Pop Cop's best songs of 2009 list with Red Travellin' Socks, the first single from his new album Waxing Gibbous out in June. It's pop heaven.
April 24, 2009: Hot young things Boycotts will be appearing at the Montrose Music Festival, headlined by the mighty Deacon Blue on May 28/29. And they will also be supporting Cage The Elephant at Glasgow's QMU on May 18.
April 23, 2009: Cumbernauld favourites The Dykeenies will mark the release of their new single Sounds Of The City (which incidentally is the best thing they've done) with a secret over-18s fan-only gig in Glasgow on Monday. We could probably procure a couple of guesties if anyone fancies it - just email us at the usual address.
Limbo Live Vol 01 - a compilation featuring Scottish bands Zoey Van Goey, Found, Punch And The Apostles, Meursault, Over The Wall, Come On Gang!, Kid Canaveral, Night Noise Team, Haight Ashbury, Thieves In Suits, Sparrow And The Workshop, Cancel The Astronauts, A-lix and Isosceles - is released today. All 14 tracks were recorded live at The Voodoo Rooms, Edinburgh and can be bought here for £6.30 - or £4 if you go to the launch party tonight when nine of the bands are playing.
April 22, 2009: Must-see YouTube video time. Check out trial cyclist Danny MacAskill doing insane stunts on the streets of Edinburgh to the stirring strains of The Funeral by Band Of Horses here.
April 21, 2009: Edinburgh heroes Broken Records will kickstart their UK summer tour with three Scottish dates: June 2: Aberdeen Moshulu; June 3: Glasgow King Tut's; June 4: Dundee Doghouse.
April 20, 2009: The full schedule for next week's Hinterland festival is now online here with stage times and venues. Two new additions to the line-up are Beerjacket and Cassidy.
Camera Obscura are not playing at Hinterland, but they are on the telly tonight. You can catch them on Channel 4 at 12.55am (so technically Tuesday morning) for a 15-minute live performance and interview.
April 18, 2009: Scotland, a country that has produced no music of black origin that we know of, will host this year's MOBO Awards. The star-studded ceremony (Lemar! JLS!) will take place on September 30 at Glasgow's SECC. Our cyncism might disappear if we get invited.
April 17, 2009: Crikey, it's all happening on the festival front. The Homecoming Festival, due to take place at Irvine Beach on May 2-3 has been cancelled due to "financial" problems. Charging £100 for a weekend ticket to see Reverend And The Makers and Ms Dynamite probably wasn't the most sound business plan.
If you bought tickets (seriously?), we suggest you divert your refund towards Hinterland. Tickets are on sale here for the reduced price of £33.75 (weekend) and £18.75 (one day) until midnight tonight.
The latest acts to sign up for T in the Park are Noisettes, VV Brown, The Horrors, The Twang, Tommy Reilly, The Temper Trap and Will And The People.
April 16, 2009: Edinburgh/Glasgow events magazine The List is advertising for a new editor. Candidates must be "calm and good-humoured". If that's you then apply here before the April 24 deadline.
April 15, 2009: The Pop Cop can exclusively reveal some line-up details for the Hinterland festival in Glasgow. On April 30, The Fall are at The Arches, The Xcerts are at The Art School and Tommy Reilly is at King Tut's. On May 1, Sons & Daughters are at The Arches, Broken Records are at The Classic Grand and We Were Promised Jetpacks are at ABC2.
April 14, 2009: The line-up for annual indie shindig Tigerfest has been announced. Among the highlights sprawled across Dunfermline, Edinburgh and Aberdeen next month are King Creosote, James Yorkston, De Rosa and Aberfeldy. Also on show is the first full band performance from Lord Cut-Glass, ex-Delgados singer Alun Woodward's rather delicious new pop project.
April 13, 2009: The wonderful Okkervil River are stopping off at Glasgow's Oran Mor on September 9 as part of their UK tour. You can buy a ticket now from here for £15.85.
April 12, 2009: Congratulations to freakishly tall Dumfries disco dude Calvin Harris, whose song I'm Not Alone has made him the first Scot to have a No.1 in the UK singles charts since Leon Jackson in 2007.
April 11, 2009: De Rosa are supporting Doves on three dates in England next week (Cambridge's Corn Exchange, April 15; Brighton's Dome, April 16; Birmingham's O2 Academy, April 17). A little-known fact is that De Rosa member Andrew Bush's old band Pariah supported Doves at King Tut's nine years ago.
April 10, 2009: Any unsigned acts wanting to play at this year's T in the Park have until April 15 to submit their demos here in order to be in the running to get on the T Break stage.
April 9, 2009: Beth Ditto and her Gossip chums are playing at The Arches in Glasgow on May 30. Tickets costing £16.80 each are on sale now from here.
April 8, 2009: Isle of Lewis singer-songwriter and former Music Alliance Pact pick Dotjr has put up a cover of Kings of Leon's Use Somebody on his MySpace. It's pretty lush.
April 7, 2009: Glasgow venue The Arches has just extended the run of Alien Wars by another five months due to popular demand. Alien Wars, which is an interactive total reality adventure similar to the Aliens films, now runs until August 31.
April 6, 2009: Teenage Fanclub have been announced as Sunday headliners (June 28) for The Outsider Festival near Aviemore. Guitarist Ray McGinley said: "We've just finished out new record and this is us emerging into real life again. We don't know if it will be out in time for the festival but we'll definitely be playing some new songs as well as things you've heard before."
April 3, 2009: The upcoming Friendly Fires/Hockey double bill has proved so popular that both Scottish shows have been moved up to larger venues. The Edinburgh gig on May 6 has been switched from Studio 24 to the Picture House, while the one in Glasgow on May 7 has been switched from the QMU to ABC 1.
April 2, 2009: Kyle Falconer's inability to handle his drink saw The View leave yet more fans disappointed. The Dundee band's singer took ill two songs into their show at Austria's Snowbombing Festival through excessive alcohol consumption. Last October, Kyle was so drunk he was unable to perform at a gig in Nottingham.
April 1, 2009: Singer-songwriter Roddy Hart has been invited to represent our proud nation at Scotland Week in America. The Glaswegian boy wonder is playing at the St Andrews Bar in New York on April 3 and April 10.
March 31, 2009: If you don't want to hedge your bets on winning The Pop Cop competition then you'll be keen to know that today is the last day you can buy a two-day Hinterland early-bird ticket for £38.75. It'll be £7 more expensive from April 1.
March 30, 2009: The ABC will be renamed O2 ABC Glasgow after the Academy Music Group became majority shareholders. AMG, which is owned by Live Nation, already runs the O2 Academy in the city.
March 28, 2009: The first acts have been announced for this year's Outsider Festival near Aviemore. On the bill on June 27-28 are The Futureheads, We Were Promised Jetpacks, King Creosote, Malcolm Middleton, James Yorkston, The Phantom Band, Drever, McCusker & Woomble, Attic Lights and Lau. And Sharleen Spiteri. Early-bird weekend tickets costing £60 (inc bookng fee) are on sale until April 13. Should be a good 'un.
March 27, 2009: Gig sketcher Jenny Soep, who was recently featured on The Pop Cop, will launch her Sketching The Scene solo show at Mono in Glasgow on April 6. She will also be drawing David Byrne on March 31 and at the Hinterland festival.
March 26, 2009: All Of My Days by Scottish singer-songwriter Alexi Murdoch is being used on the trailer for Sam Mendes' new movie Away We Go.
March 25, 2009: Manic Street Preachers will play the Glasgow Barrowlands on May 25. Tickets priced £25 each (not including fees) go on sale from Friday, 9.30am from here.
March 24, 2009: Frightened Rabbit are set for their biggest headlining show yet. They have announced on their MySpace that they are playing Edinburgh's Queens Hall on August 21, which would coincide with The Edge festival, although according to the venue website, the gig has not been confirmed and they would kindly ask fans to stop calling them about it!
March 23, 2009: Mumford & Sons have cancelled their gig at Stereo, Glasgow on April 4. If you want to see them in Scotland you can now catch them at Studio 24, Edinburgh on May 1 supporting The Maccabees and at King Tut's, Glasgow on September 12.

Monday, June 16, 2008

Win the rarest Belle & Sebastian DVD in existence

A couple of months ago, you may remember we wrote about the day we discovered some lost gems while rummaging through our music collection. What we didn't tell you was that the most priceless item we came across was a full video of one of the most exclusive gigs BELLE & SEBASTIAN have ever played... and we're going to give it away to whoever wants it the most.

On February 28, 2001, the band appeared in the John McIntyre Hall at Glasgow University in support of Stuart Murdoch's bid to become rector of the university. The capacity was limited to just 250 students, most of whom sat on the carpeted floor to watch Belle & Sebastian play what was their first show in two years. The free afternoon gig lasted 40 minutes, with Murdoch also taking questions from the audience between songs about his rector credentials.

The "campaign rally" - as it was officially labelled - was memorable for many reasons. It was the first time the Glasgow group had publicly played Fuck This Shit and Big John Shaft (both of which were released a year later on the Storytelling soundtrack), they covered Sympathy For The Devil by The Rolling Stones and Isobel Campbell bizarrely wore a thick brown coat back-to-front during the last of the eight songs, Legal Man.

The concert did spark some amusing tabloid-world controversy. Two days before it, the Daily Record accused Murdoch of playing the gig in an attempt to bribe students to vote for him. In the end, though, the singer was pipped to the rector post by unfunny Canadian comedian Greg Hemphill.

Anyway, to show our appreciation for all the positive feedback we received following our 1st birthday post and to mark another landmark (this is The Pop Cop's 200 post), we've decided to run a competition to win a DVD of Belle & Sebastian's full gig at Glasgow University.

The show, which was professionally filmed on three different video cameras in the hall, was made into a VHS cassette (this was 2001 remember) and later converted into DVD. Having acquired the film from its source, The Pop Cop has the only copy that exists on the planet so getting your hands on it would probably be like winning the lottery for anyone who likes the band.

As we said earlier, we're going to give it away to whoever wants it the most. So here's what you need to do. Read carefully...

The winner of the DVD will be the person who posts links to The Pop Cop homepage (http://thepopcop.blogspot.com/) to the most number of UNIQUE websites by 23.59 GMT on June 30. These links can go on messageboards, social network sites, forums, other blogs, etc, but they MUST be accompanied by something that identifies yourself as the author (like a username or pseudonym) - that way you can prove who added the links. You MUST also keep a tally of the number of links you have posted AND have the direct website addresses in which they can be found, so that we can verify your claim.

Finally, on July 1, send us a single email to thepopcop@gmail.com with your final tally and a list of verifiable links. Whoever has the most will be sent the Belle & Sebastian DVD by post, to wherever you are in the world, simple as that.

For one example of the kind of thing we're looking for, take a look at the picture on the right.

4 Belle & Sebastian - Slow Graffiti
4 Belle & Sebastian - There's Too Much Love

1 comments:

Insomnius said...

So, the competition is to see who can generate the most spam? That doesn't strike me as particularly awesome.

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