Conglomeration

 07/08/2026

A conglomeration of bands and artists gathered in Congleton tonight having agreed to give up their fees in aid of rasing funds for Saint Luke's Cheshire Hospice.

A totally unrehearsed highlight for me, probably for all of us performing, was - with all musical hands on deck - jamming out a raucous version of Mustang Sally honoured to much missed local musician Dave Speakman who died recently. 

It was a great way to end a little run of gigs that have mainly been to really 'listening' typical gig-going audiences, which are great to play to of course. 

This audience however had much more a vibe of friends going out, raising money for an important charity to them & catching up with each other, perhaps for the first time for some while. So it was quite a noisy, chatty crowd - and why shouldn't they be? They enjoyed all the acts and sang and danced to us and all the others. So while they have been a loud, chatty crowd they were up for lots of fun, friendly & a good challenge to win over. 

If you were among them, and now reading this - thanks for your kindness in coming out for a good cause, and bringing the good times!

Organiser & host Louise playing her
maracas alongside Em. 

Violet Blue

 Today we played the wonderful annual(ish) Garden Party booked by wonderful friends and hosts Martin and Elaine. So many lovely, talented acts and a lovely, neighbourly crowd in a still (despite stacking heatwaves) beautiful leafy garden.

One of many highlights for us was pursuading Diane of Violet Cry to join us for a song on the vocals - a great moment!

Diane joining us on vocals

Glitter Curtain

This time around at for Dress Down Sunday, we were supported very ably not only by our host Jasmine Allen Estate & nineties-esque rockers The Moondogz but by a rather glitzy, golden glitter curtain left up behind us from a previous event.

Hopefully, even without our recovering ace of bass Simon we did our best without him to bring some classy sounds to the lovely crowd who turned up in the refreshingly cooler weather (at last)!

Great to meet some new people at this show, thanks for coming!

The U-Yellows

 Live at Alsager Music Festival 2026

U-Yellows? Or maybe OooYellows? Anyway, there's still only 3 of us so 3/4s of The Blue Yellows with our Simon still off injured. Get well soon! We're missing our friend, missing his wonderful basslines and missing so many songs where his input is absolutely essential.

Nevertheless we braved it onwards to the fantastic atmosphere at The Alsager Music Festival in the very special vibes of the Sunken Garden.

Thanks to the many who lent us their ears and joined in with some songs, gave us some lovely feedback (of the spoken kind) and bought us a beer. 

We loved it - but we can't wait to be 4 again!

Tunes on a Tuesday

 June 7th, 2026

We headed out on what could be a difficult task, playing to a Tuesday night crowd on a World Cup knock-out night AND  still a man down in terms of our ace-of-bass Simon.

We were all releaved to hear from Em who had seen Simon having picked up speaker stands & mic stands from his place. Em's report being that Simon had just had his stitches out, was in good spirits and about to strim his lawn! So, as a man of very few words on a phone, rarely using it to communicate it at all, any fears we had for him were allayed & I'm sure he will be back with us as soon as he's physically able to play again.

The Glebe & it's folk, both regular and those just passing through, were also up for a really good time & were treating this Tuesday as if were a Friday or Saturday night, a lovely, attentive & up-for-it bunch. 

Having headed home on this sultry night, seen a hedgehog on the way home & after a cool shower & a wet walk under the half-moonlit sky, it's already a wonderful stained-glass memory. 

Image by Tim Lee 

Tim Lee opened for us, wowing the 
audience with a set of his lovely songs 

We met the feisty and funny Liz Vincent, 
a big name around here in the DJing world 
back when it was even harder to make waves as a woman in music. 

A Solstice Save

What a beautiful Summer Solstice, thanks for making it a wonderful show for us!

We were up against it - a man down with our brilliant bassist *Simon unable to perform, but you guys in the crowd, at The John McAteer stage & on the sound made it so easy for us.

What a stunning venue The Newton Brewery Inn is, great vibes at the bar, large and stunning outdoor area where we played.

*Get well soon our Simon ❤️

Photo by Ian F. Ball 

📸 Louise Mather 

Midsummer Middlewich -Day 1

 Sometimes you have to rise to the challenge... 

We were at around 50% calling off today's show. Simon, our brilliant bassist had phoned to say he had a hand injury that clearly needed to be seen to as a priority and there was no way he could come along (let alone play bass). We really hope our good friend on those low notes recovers really soon but in the meantime we had to make a decision.

In deciding to go on with the show (there's a saying here somewhere) we needed to work out how to do it. Those songs where Simon's bass is a beautiful counter melody as "a" (if not "THE") main musical theme of the song were out, a couple of songs we don't play normally were in, and many others adapted in terms of playing style, rhythm, frequency & tone.

We were also ably aided by José, our sometimes producer and again this time, sound-guy. 

We got away with it. Get well soon Simon and.. Onwards!

Heavily adapted setlist 

3 wasn't the magic number (for us) 
but we got away with it! 

In-tentions

 

It's a great feeling when you've got a busy festival weekend coming up & you see posts showing a well drilled team preparing.

Photos from Midsummer Middlewich where we're playing;

Saturday - The Turnpike, 2pm 

Sunday Solstice - Newton Brewery, 4pm

It's not a competition (unless it is).

 June 2nd, 2026

The evening marked my 1st (and maybe only) time in the role of a Battle of the Bands judge. I was on the panel at a local college (if you know me personally, you'll know which one it is) to help select winners from 1st year student bands. A really enjoyable night, and great to see such a variety of genres on display as well as fabulously burgeoning new talent. 

The panel's desk

A pre-judgement rest

Magnolia Trees

Em, Simon and I tried a run through of a brand new song in Em's kitchen- Magnolia Trees. 

I'm sure it will evolve further as we play it more & backing vocals & Dave's parts are added.

Sometimes...

 24th April 2026 Tom's Tap 

Sometimes there's magic in the room.

Tonight was one of those nights, & that can never just come from the band - it's a two way/multi-way/musicians-audience - all-one-mind beautiful thing that is so precious, a thing that is becoming more rare as it only happens there in those moments in a room together. 

The wonderful Hayley Strangelove brought the magic and the emotion in, and so much more.

Mike on the desk gave us our best sound yet on stage at Tom's, something that allows us to really did deep into the music we're creating in the moment, putting an aerial out into the cosmos and getting lost in the music ourselves. 

Thank you all so, so much xxx

*P. S. A notable feature of this gig was that or was the 1st show where Em played violin and the first one in which Dave played the bodhran (in addition to thier usual instruments). 

JT 

Em

Dave

Hayley Strangelove x

For Sean Bartley 

I'm Pretty Excited

 Load-in is arranged, songs, a long set is rehearsed, tech-spec sent and... I'm pretty excited about this one in particular!

Come to the Show!

 

I read the news today, oh boy!

 

BYs Live Diary (so far)

 Updated Feb 27th to include confirmation of support from Hayley Strangelove for opening show. 

More to be confirmed and added... 

In the edit.

 Updated 29/01/26

I spent most of yesterday, Sunday editing a band video.

Here's some sneaky stills...

The results can be seen here from March 24th, 2026

The Venerable Bead

 Updated 17/01/2026 

New for 2026

You know when you become a jewellery maker just to try and make original music pay?

Available online and at shows while very limited stocks last. 

BUY HERE

Limited edition 

In-Depth Band Interview

 Back at our EP launch night, radio presenter for Salt Town's Radio, Stuart Green sat down with three of us from the band for a wide ranging discussion about the EP, the band, Em running away with the circus(!) and much more.

That's a Happy New Year

 See you on the other side...

Buy us a Quarfee

Mug kindly bought for me by 
Jonathan White

One of the results of our 'AGM' (see previous post) was the felt need to set up an online payment system.

Our last couple of shows at the wonderful Tom's Tap in Crewe were "pay what you want" affairs, this was our decision having previously sold out shows in ticketed events here, but these particular shows were unusual in either being a support slot or more recently an EP launch show which included only a play-through of 4 tracks, audience Q&A and so on, so we were on for a different kind of night than had previously worked on ticketed nights. 

What we found with the "cash only" aspect of these events were that many present wanted to support us but didn't have cash on them, offering to buy us drinks instead. While this was endearing to have people feel this way, even in the tastiest of brewery-venue (& believe me, Tom's stouts in particular are the best there is) there's a limit to how many freely offered drinks me and the rest of the band can consume(!) especially when packing everything away post-gig is a major, though familiar, undertaking. 

According to some research I read recently  something like 70% of people never carry cash now. Like it or not, queuing up at cash machines to get physical notes out has become a lot less convenient than the alternatives. I have to say that in my own experience since Covid, and particularly since bus services went cash free, I only really have to have cash for my laundrette - & would, to be honest, love it to go to a cash-free option (post-Covid you could start paying by cash for bus fares again, but if you don't have exactly the right amount for the fare on you, you are likely to lose your money or lose your ride as there just isn't the change available when so few use it now). 

We don't mind the pay-what-you-want idea, and have indeed opted for that for a coming show. Most people are quite generous-mined. If they have already opted to go out they are already committed to spending 'some' money, and many will give generously towards a would-be ticket fee before or oftentimes during a show, while they're enjoying it. 

This option opens it up to the many who now never have cash on them, and have lost the habit of queuing up at a cash point, and are probably not missing the growing tension of knowing your train or bus will soon leave for the gig while you're queuing up for cash! 

So.. feel free to support us at a gig, or indeed any time at https://buymeacoffee.com/theblueyellows