The Brook, 466 Portswood Road, Portswood, Southampton SO17 3SD
Box Office Hours - 1.00pm - 7.00pm Mon - Sat (023) 8055 5366
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The Brook is the best 600 Capacity live music venue hosting national and international Blues, Rock, R'n'B, Funk, Punk, DJs, Indie and many other things including Tributes. Because of the fine calibre of bands that we have, people travel from all over Hampshire, Dorset, Sussex and the Isle of Wight. People often come from Portsmouth, Winchester, Bournemouth, Salisbury, Brighton, Reading & Poole, to check-out the most friendly and very best place to see shows in the South of England. It's not just the punters that say that - it's the bands!!! "Best dressing room on the circuit!"

"This is most definitely the best gig in the South!"

“Technically they stand head to head with the best of their generation...Jon Boden plays fiddle with an earthy vigour that's utterly compelling and sings in a frantic breathless manner as if the hounds of hell are taking lumps out of his backside, while John Spiers harmonises and plays urgent driving melodeon to a very high standard indeed...halfway to reinventing the style without even realising it…" fRoots Magazine

Jon Boden was named Folk Singer of the Year at 2010 BBC Folk Awards.

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Founders of Bellowhead…Spiers & Boden

Jon Boden - winner of the Folk Singer of the Year at the BBC Folk Awards 2010

In spring 2011 Spiers & Boden will head out on the road on a 10th anniversary tour which includes a birthday party show at Shepherd’s Bush Empire with special guests including Eliza Carthy. This will mark a decade of touring a recording for one of the most popular duos on the vibrant English folk scene.

Described by The Guardian as “the finest instrumental duo on the traditional scene” and twice winners of the BBC Radio 2 folk award for Best Duo, Spiers and Boden have made the genre of spontaneous, punky English folk very much their own stomping ground. Loud, proud, and with just a few acoustic instruments, they create a multitude of textures upon which they present traditional stories and dance music which have taken them on to the main stages of major festivals.

“Technically they stand head to head with the best of their generation...Jon Boden plays fiddle with an earthy vigour that's utterly compelling and sings in a frantic breathless manner as if the hounds of hell are taking lumps out of his backside, while John Spiers harmonises and plays urgent driving melodeon to a very high standard indeed...halfway to reinventing the style without even realising it…" fRoots Magazine

"Dynamics, drive and passion" BBC Radio 2 folk website

The irrepressible performances of John Spiers and Jon Boden have ensured they are in high demand with venues and major festivals through out the world and past performances have included, in the UK, Cambridge Folk
Festival, WOMAD and Larmer Tree Festival and abroad have included Roskilde Festival (Denmark), Nordsjofestivalen (Norway) and Namest Nad Oslavou (Czech Republic).

Their fifth album, Vagabond, was released on Navigator May 26th 2008. The eleven tracks on the album focus on the role of the itinerant and outsider, a theme prominent in traditional material, from ‘Robin Hood’ to the ‘Beggar Boy’.

Winners of the Best Duo category at the BBC Radio 2 Folk Awards in both 2004 and 2006, and a Critic’s choice nomination at the BBC World Music Awards, and nominees for the same award in 2009, John & Jon are also founding members of the wildly ambitious eleven piece big-band folk phenomenon, Bellowhead (BBC Folk Awards for Best Live Act in 2005, 2007, 2008, Observer Top 20 albums of 2007).

They are currently Artist in Residence at London’s Southbank as part of Bellowhead, an appointment which has led to a series of performances on The Southbank including a sold out show by Bellowhead to over 1,000 people in the Royal Festival Hall Ballroom in on New Year’s Eve 2009.

They have also enjoyed a long-term collaboration with Eliza Carthy as The Rat Catchers and performed on her Nationwide Mercury Prize nominated album Anglicana.

Jon Boden (singer, fiddle, guitar, stomp-box) follows in the footsteps of many of the great folk-singers with his theatrical style. Born in 1977 in Chicago, he grew up in Winchester and graduated in Medieval Studies from Durham and Composition for Theatre from the London College of Music. As well as forming half of Spiers & Boden and singing lead vocals in Bellowhead, Jon has also found time to release his own, self-penned album of contemporary indie rock songs, ‘Painted Lady’.

John Spiers (melodeon, concertina) was born in Birmingham and grew up in Abingdon (home to one of the few truly traditional morris sides) with a morris dancing father. He has a Masters degree in Natural Sciences from King's College Cambridge and has carved his own space in the folk scene with his unique blending of traditional squeezebox styles with his knowledge of contemporary dance music to create an infectious acoustic groove which provides the infectious rhythm of Spiers & Boden.

“Anyone who needs convincing that the current folk revival is becoming as intriguing, varied and experimental as it was back in the 1960s should check out the remarkable career of John Spiers and Jon Boden. In just a few years, they have established themselves as the finest instrumental duo on the traditional scene, and the contemporary equivalent of Martin Carthy and Dave Swarbrick….” The Guardian

Spiers & Boden’s new album ‘The Works’ was released July 2011.

Eight piece soul band give you two hours of classic soul... as if you didn't know

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Time to dance the night away with the band who make every gig a party night! Those that have followed the band will know that the Rufus Stone Soul Band, based in their home town of Southampton, has been around in many guises since their start in late 1984. After all this time you would expect that some of the sparkle would have gone, not a bit. They still have the same distinctive sound, which ensures that they get the maximum involvement from their audience.

Over the years they have built a loyal following and it is this support that has kept the band not only on the road but still as soulful as when they started. The music is authentic soul with selections from The Blues Brothers and The Commitments, but the bulk of the set comes from the soul greats such as Otis Redding, James Brown, Wilson Pickett, Joe Tex and many others.

During their time together there have been a number of highlights that include support to some of the top soul artists like Jimmy Ruffin, Edwin Starr, Curtis Mayfield, Geno Washington, Ben E King, and Gloria Gaynor.

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Twenty years after their million selling album Spartacus reached No 1 in the UK album charts, legendary Liverpool band The Farm have reformed to play live again in 2011. The group who had eight top forty hit singles in the UK including Groovy Train and All Together Now that were a soundtrack for a generation will be returning to the stage with their original line –up.

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Fish's music defies trends and fashion, it's a brave statement in these days of banal musical small talk. His career, spanning over 20 years of the entertainment industry, is notable for his charismatic stage performances and uncompromising lyrics.

Graeme Smith, S1play: "...being at one of his gigs is like being entertained by a boisterous host at a particularly loud private party."

Edinburgh Evening News: "It's all great fun, and the crowd loved it. But in full flow Fish prowls the stage, a sinister and brooding figure. Dynamic and powerful, he roars out the lyrics with undiluted passion, at all times in total control of the crowd. A national tabloid recently suggested that Fish was no longer relevant to the music industry. If that is true then the music industry has lost touch with great music, entertainment, passion and lyrics that make you stop and think."

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Passenger

The brainchild of 26-year-old Brighton born singer/songwriter Mike Rosenberg, Passenger is redefining the troubadour for the 21st century. Formerly a five-piece band, Passenger has now pared back to basics, quite literally bringing music to the streets on a series of lengthy busking journeys across Australia, America and the United Kingdom. A classic journeyman musician, cut from the same mould as Van Morrison, Neil Young and John Prine, Passenger has the unique ability to move from the humorous to heartbreaking with every song.

After six months spent crisscrossing the UK with his debut album Wicked Man’s Rest, Passenger’s markedly stripped down and soulful second album Wide Eyes Blind Love was brought to the public as it was created: on the road. Setting up on street corners across the UK and Australia, Passenger halted passers by in their hundreds; all connecting to the mellifluous tones and powerfully hewn lyrics emanating from this lone figure and his guitar. This is music as Passenger means it to be, unvarnished and honest, just pure talent and powerful tunes that tap straight into the crowd.

Struck by the dynamic freedom of the troubadour life, Passenger developed the grass roots method of Wide Eyes Blind Love into the germ of a new album. Impressively and entirely funded by monies pooled from busking, Passenger set about recording a series of collaborations with musical friends met along the way. Flight of the Crow is the remarkable result of Passenger’s intrepid journey, with Australian artists Lior, Josh Pyke, Katie Noonan, Boy & Bear, Kate Miller Heidke, Philadelphia Grand Jury, Brian Campeau and Elana Stone, Matt Corby, Jess Chalker and Dead Letter Chorus all lending their voices to this serendipitous creative venture. Flight of the Crow was recorded in Sydney’s famous BJB studios over February and March of 2010, and co-produced by Berkfinger (AKA Simon Berkleman from Philadelphia Grand Jury).

As a second album born of the road, Flight of the Crow speaks to the compelling quality of Passenger’s music and the striking sincerity of his lyrics, both of which are matched by his dedication to this grass roots style of craftsmanship and collaboration. How utterly remarkable that a lone musician can travel the globe, and literally from the street, connect with some of Australia’s finest musical talents to produce a self-funded album. This is the stuff of legend, with Passenger clearly evoking the humble, hardworking creativity of the troubadours of old.

An uncommon talent, with an uncommon ethic . . . who really does leave you with . . . Wide Eyes, Blind Love . . .

Stu Larsen

The last months have seen him exploring & wandering all over the world. Through Australia, New Zealand, Japan, Germany, the United Kingdom and the United States, road tripping with friends, playing unexpected shows in unexpected places, staying in the homes of old and new friends all along the way.

Somewhere amongst all that, there was time for the recording of a new EP affectionately entitled RYEFORD. Stu Larsen flew in good friends and fellow singer/songwriters Luke Thompson (New Zealand) and Tim Hart (Sydney / Boy & Bear) to Brisbane, Australia and headed west to an old farmhouse where they met up with engineer Caleb James (Leo Nine / Rhubarb) to spend the week in isolation, recording five new tracks for the EP.
With planned travels through Australia, New Zealand, Europe, UK and maybe more for 2011, who knows what the coming years will hold for Stu Larsen? It's becoming apparent that not even Stu himself knows the answer to that question. Keep in touch as this adventure unfolds.

Dlugokecki

'Dlugokecki' is a musical project fronted by Ben Dlugokecki (pronounced- Der-loo-go-ken-ski) - An extraordinarily talented 30 year old prolific singer/songwriter based in Southampton, England. He is joined by Andy Wild (Keys, vocals), Boyd (Drums), Tim Jackson (Guitars), Aidan Hampson (Bass) & Kelly Robinson (Backing Vocals). Their music has been compared to the likes of David Gray, Paul Simon, Elbow and Damian Rice. In May 2012 – the band release the brand new studio album 'Putting the Track in Front of the Train'.

Five of their biggest shows to date were supporting million-selling artists 'David Gray', 'Snow Patrol', 'Corinne-Bailey Rae', 'The Proclaimers' and 'Lu Lu' on their world tours, playing to thousands of people. In 2009 they played the South by Southwest Festival in Austin, Texas also playing 2 shows in New York to great acclaim. In 2010, they released a 34 track double album spanning the 10 years of 'Dlugokecki' – celebrating the event with a tour and sell-out show in their hometown.

They have also played alongside 'Starsailor', 'British Sea Power', ‘Badly Drawn Boy’, 'Mouldy Peaches', Brit-award nominees 'Beth Rowley' and 'Nerina Pallot', 'The Webb Sisters', 'Ben's Brother' , 'Longview', 'Sandi Thom' , 'Paddy Casey', 'The Bluetones', 'Chris Difford (Squeeze)', 'Goodbooks', 'The Drifters', 'John Power (CAST/The La's)', 'Nizlopi', ‘Howard Jones’ and the mighty 'Chesney Hawkes'.

Some other highlights over the last 5 years include reaching the final 8 of the 'Sennheiser Best Unsigned Artist 2006' out of 2000 entries, playing the 2008 ASCAP showcase at the London Barfly, having their music in the i-tunes music store, being named artist of the month on the 'Musician's Channel' on Sky and the debut music video ‘Set in Stone’ played daily. They recently won 3 regional awards for live performance at 'The Mag Awards'.

Their music has been used on the soundtrack of Channel 4 hit show Ny-Lon, they have recorded in Metropolis Studio, London and have had a twelve-day session in Ibiza and have had five tracks heavily featured in episodes of Channel 4's "Hollyoaks".

In 2006, Dlugokecki released a collection of Studio Recordings called 'Before The Storm'. In 2007’s 'How Do You Do?' tour was a massive success - with Dlugokecki performances at the top of the Spinnaker Tower, Old Trafford, Stonehenge, Blackpool Pleasure Beach, The Ferry across the Mersey and at 3,200ft at the top of Mount Snowdon in Wales. The tour resulted in a mass media exposure - including segments on BBC Radio and BBC One News. In 2008 the band finished their mini-album 'Let this be Right' which sold 1000 copies in it's first week! In 2009 the band played The Shepherds Bush Empire in tribute to legend ‘Matthew Jay’. In 2010 they signed their first USA publishing deal in LA. In 2011, Dlugokecki played their first gig at Liverpool’s Cavern Club – the birthplace of The Beatles!

Opening times and showtimes vary, depending on the day, the artist, and whether there is a support or not. The times shown below are given as a rough guide and may be subject to change. Please check the times when you book your tickets. To avoid disappointment buy your tickets in advance and get here early.

Box Office Hours are 1pm-7pm Monday to Saturday 023 8055 5366

The Brook is an eighteen plus venue, (unless otherwise stated) although children of fourteen and upwards can come to shows if accompanied by an adult over the age of twenty one. Anyone under sixteen MUST be out of the building by midnight. This is the law.

No more than two fourteen plus per adult.

Please note that on the advice of Southampton Police - we only accept Passports or Photo Driving Licences as acceptable proof of age to buy alcohol. We do NOT accept any other form of age identification. We do NOT accept any national proof of age scheme cards. If you are lucky enough to look young - you will need I.D. If you are bringing under 18's with you, we accept any form of I.D.