Ellen & The Escapades X Hope & Social

Check out this video from a recent session between two Leeds acts, the ace Ellen and The Escapades with the equally awesome Hope & Social. 

It is always really interesting to see two bands collaborate and although we expected a lot when we heard they guys were hooking up, we were not left disappointed :) The track has already been getting airplay on BBC 6 Music and lots more in the Hebe office!

Both bands have new albums out / coming out. Hope & Social with Cotton Wool and Knotted Wood, while Ellen and The Escapades launch All The Crooked Scenes at Brudenell Social Club next month. 

HEBE X ICS

We met ICS back in October 2010. Team Hebe attended a Harvey Nichols event and saw the boys perform for the first time alongside a catwalk. We loved their sound which was, and still is, difficult to pin down, so we introduced ourselves to the band and so began the Hebe/ICS love affair.

In May 2011 we produced Leeds In Barcelona: A Creative Encounter which took Leeds creative talent over to Barcelona for a special showcase event. This was the perfect opportunity to collaborate with ICS for the first time, which was what we had been wanting to do since we met them. It gave ICS a great opportunity to perform to a European audience of opinion-formers and we knew they were the perfect band to take as they are ‘fresh, innovative and heavily influenced by the underground of the city and the fashion scene (Lee, Hebe May 2011)’.

Josh performing in Barcelona

After the Creative Encounter

The Barcelona Creative Encounter was great for many reasons but one of the most important was the relationships that were formed on the trip. When you have fashion designers, DJs, bands and media specialists hanging together for three days you are constantly talking creative collaborations and getting to know more about what each other is about. 

On the trip we introduced ICS to our friends at Back to Basics: Dave Beer and Tristan Da Cunha. The guys got on like a house on fire and we were soon talking of what we could do when we got back to Leeds.

We all already knew in the back of our minds that we needed to work together in an official capacity, but obviously first we had to drink lots of beer, watch documentaries about The Clash and party together before any deal was agreed!

After this hard work was done, so was the deal and now ICS are officially managed by Team Hebe and Dave Beer! The boys performed at the Back to Basics 20th anniversary bash with Bez and Pritch which was fun and are scheduled to play Live at Leeds on May 5th. Keep checking the ICS website and Facebook page for updates about upcoming gigs and track releases. In the meantime check out a track from the new EP, Cassette Tapes below...

 ICS do a one-time acoustic set at Lee's birthday party

The Hebe Week In Pics (and there is a video!)

ICS Playing Back to Basics 20th Birthday Bash Last Weekend (Sound is not great but enjoy!)

Howard Marks playing some 50's music in Basics!Pritch (Dirty Sanchez) having a laugh @ BasicsSTP and PritchCoffee and Christmas trees at Out Of The WoodsAwesome libraryMore of Lee's toys!Trip to London!Awesome print from Thought Bubble

Leeds International Film festival: The Thing

Last week Team Hebe, and some friends went along to the UK premier of The Thing which was screened at the Leeds International Film Festival. As regular cinema goers we were very happy to see this film a month early as we had talked about it a lot when we saw the trailer a few weeks ago. We were also the sponsor of the film, so we had a little shout out before it started.

Director: Matthijs Van Heijningen Jr.

Starring: Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Joel Edgerton and Ulrich Thomsen

Just to confirm, this film is a prequel to the original John Carpenter's The Thing(1982), NOT a remake. The name obviously confuses people but I love the fact it’s almost a remake but yet it’s not. It works really well that the film can copy the formula of the original yet be a different story, in this way, the characters do not have to be overly compared to Kurt Russell and his crew.

Plot

The story revolves around a group of scientists sent to Antarctica to look at a ‘discovery’ out there. Kate Lloyd (Die Hard’s daughter, Mary Elizabeth Winstead), her crew and some Norweigen scientists realise the discovery is not only an alien life form but one that can replicate human DNA and ‘become’ one of them. As they struggle to work out who is themselves and who is not, they are picked off one by one by The Thing.

The Good

The suspense is bang on. I literally jumped in my seat more than once. Then once the action kicks in, the gore is amazing. I normally don’t like gore, but this was gore/science so it was interesting as well as stomach churning. I heard people behind me laughing, not because it was stupid, but because it was so intense at certain points in the film. A couple of the scenes brought back strong memories of the first film in great way. It was so similar to the original, yet different and new. I must point out that in today’s horror film market, this is a cut above the rest. Remakes such as Nightmare On Elm Street and John Carpenter's The Fog do not do justice to the originals but this makes a better stab at it and Winstead shows she is good actress without compromising her self-respect.

The Bad

The only things that could have been improved were the characters and their relationships, I would have liked for the characters to have been more defined, and maybe slightly more interesting. Maybe that’s a bit cliché but the only characters that really stood out to me were Kate Lloyd and LLars(Jørgen Langhelle) but that is me just nitpicking, maybe putting the characters into certain brackets would have made the film more predictable.

In the original film the characters were so engrossing and you actually cared about each of them in some way. This is one of the main differences between the two films.

Rating

8/10 in comparison to todays horror flicks, 7/10 overall 

Adam Tensta - The Monkey (with Spoek Mathambo)

Our next Creative Encounter with Stockholm is coming soon and we want to keep you up to date with what some of the main players are up to. Check out this new video from Adam Tensta and get ready!