Battle Of The Bands

The Talbot, Winton

Featuring: Southern Brotherhood, Sunstone Collective, Soulhole and Brothers Grimmer

On the 26th of April Thomas “Taff” Morse and Ricky Bennetts from local music company “Gigs & Rigs” started the “Best Of Bournemouth” battle of the bands contest at The Talbot Pub in Winton, Bournemouth. The contest was the first of it’s kind in the area since the Dorset Music Awards ended in 2012. The event ran over 4 heats, a semi-final and a final and was open to both bands and solo artists alike. I was honoured to be asked to help judge the event, I knew from the start it was going to be a really difficult task as there is so much amazing talent around the local area, who all have very different styles of performing their music. I approached it with a very open mind as I did not really know what to expect from the acts that entered.

During the heats it was decided that the artists/bands were to go through on a voting system from the audience with everybody in the place asked to pick their top three of the heat. The top two artists of each heat would go through to the Semi- Final. There were some great bands that sadly went out at this stage such a the fantastically talented Monkey’s Uncle, Aaron Gregory and a great singer/songwriter called Aaron Jamie who sang with real passion. The Semi- Final I have to admit was rather hard going with 7 bands, each playing a 30 minute set from 4pm to way past my usual bedtime! The acts that really impressed were Brothers Grimmer, Lyrical Monsoon, Soulhole and Sunstone Collective who all put in really worthy performances to get themselves in the Final.

Battle Of The Bands
1–2–3–4–5–6

One of the Finalists Lyrical Monsoon sadly had to pull out of the final due to other commitments so it was decided to put through another band Southern Brotherhood as the next best of the rest. The final was a really well fought affair and it was great to see some great camaraderie between all the musicians which I’m sure will bring forth some future collaborations. Southern Brotherhood kicked off the final with a solid 45 minute set, which showed a really improved performance from the previous efforts; with some great, new original tunes. Sunstone Collective got everybody dancing with the smooth grooves and great percussion. Brothers Grimmer took entertainment to the next level with some excellent guitar work as well as some energetic break-dancing from dancer Macko. The evening ended on a high with a highly entertaining show from Soulhole, who also really improved on their previous efforts.

Myself and the two other judges put our heads together at the end of the evening to try and come to a decision and thankfully we all had the same opinion on the winners, along with the runners-up. Thomas “Taff” Morse stepped up onto the stage with his microphone in hand and you could feel the tension in the room from all of the excited fans and band members.

The runners-up by a whisker were Soulhole!!

Soul Hole

The winners who were a very popular choice with the audience were invited up to the stage to collect their prize and take applause from the audience and other band members. Brothers Grimmer have been around for a few years now and already have two albums under their belts.

Brothers Grimmer

They are an incredibly hard working band who gig most weekends, as well as putting in a good deal of rehearsals. They have more recently brought in their dancer “Macko” on stage to sing some well chosen covers, which works really well giving the audience some nice variation. The rock-solid rhythm section of the ever smiling Matt (Drums) and Shawn (bass) holds everything together really well; with the bearded frontman Lee getting one beautiful noise from his Fender Stratocaster. I have seen them many times and each time they seem to really up their game with a very high standard of performance. Well deserving winners of a great competition that showed that Bournemouth has so much to offer from a really exciting music scene.

Brothers Grimmer