A new festival is gracing our city! Beat the Streets is a multi-venue event in aid of improving the lives of the homeless people in Nottingham. According to their website, they raised the extraordinary amount of £100,000 for Framework. This is an extraordinary amount as the suggested ‘donation’ was £10 for each ticket but you could get a ticket for as low as £5. All proceedings were raised for Framework; this included tickets, bar and merchandise.
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All great Nottingham venues embraced this event and over 80 artists joined their forces to make this festival a great winter warmer. Unfortunately, it was a busy week ahead and I could not stay all day out so I decided I would stick to one venue for this gig. Of course, by now you know my favorite one… The Bodega. I arrived at 4pm. Upstairs the venue was packed. On the stage was a band that sounded a bit like reggae a bit of rap… all I know is it wasn’t my style. The gig guide said the band was Kwoli Black. I only stayed for a few minutes and admit I didn’t give them a chance but decided to head down to the acoustic sessions. There a girl was setting up her guitar right at the edge of the venue – right next to the door. Very interesting they have the ‘stage’ at the end of the bar. One would assume they would have the singer further in the venue. |
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Mollie Ralph, has quite an impressive voice. She sang a lot of covers. Even though most people were preoccupied at the bar trying to buy their drinks, Mollie’s voice caught everyone’s attention, and all clapped at the end of all her songs. She also sang a couple of originals and they were quite catchy. Miss misery and Chaos on the Streets. I was quite impressed by her. Just a girl with her guitar- very powerful. I hope she continues, we need clean clear female voices. My favourite was by far Etta James ‘At last’. And it’s great to see she has also posted in youtube…enjoy!!!
After Mollie's performance ended, I thought I would try my luck again upstairs. This time the venue was overcrowded. Not just packed! On the stage was a young man with an infectious personality! Rob Green. The crowd seemed to be familiar of him. His voice, oh, his voice. I won’t explain his voice, I’ll let you hear it for yourself.
All his songs seem to have great lyrics. One of them is Blue. He said it was very personal to him. Just listen to the lyrics. Rob Green ended his gig with a very vivid mashup of 90s songs. It was extraordinary that all youngsters attending the gig knew the songs! I grew up with those songs and seeing this generation singing them... it’s odd – to say the least.
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At the end of Rob Green's performance, it was time for me to leave. I may have got a small flavour of Beat the Streets 2018 but it was a good one! On my way to the bus stop, I passed by McDs - I asked one of the employees there which one's shift ended before 10pm. A girl said she was and I gave her my wristband. She didn't know what it was for and I explained. She was very happy! I hope she too got a small but good flavour of this great Festival!
Beat the Streets 2019 has already been organised for Sunday 27th January 2019. Don't miss it!
