XUK: News

It's hard to believe that we haven't played live since May 2006!! The reason for it has been that when Matt Peter left the band to concentrate on the work of his other band at the time (The Letter Openers) I was determined to continue the XUK tradition of playing exclusively with our musician friends.

Well, now we have our friend Dave Cole in the band. Dave and Ron have played together before and Dave also works with Ron at SIR in Hollywood. I met Dave many times over the last few years at Ron's barbecues. Dave left LA to live in New York but now he's back and playing with us!

At the same time we have been joined by Johnny DeMarco on electric guitar. I've known Johnny for a few years through mutual friends and I originally asked him if he'd be interested in playing with XUK when I bumped into him as he demonstrated the Boss guitar product gear at the 2007 TAXI music conference.

We've been rehearsing and I have to say I am very happy with the expanded sound. Dave's bass playing in the band is excellent and Johnny's solos and additional textures compliment Eric's viola parts, making the live sound a lot richer than in the past.

I look forward to seeing you at the upcoming shows and hope that you like what you hear.

Simon

Ice Blue Eyes - XUK live at The Joint in Los Angeles

For more XUK videos go to www.youtube.com/xukmusic

Well, yes it's the end of 2008 and we are still on hiatus from playing live. But we have posted three demos. Two are instrumental ideas (one guitar/bass, the other guitar/viola) and the third is the germ of a new song-in-progress called "Head Will Roll". It could hint at the direction we'll be going in on our next CD...

Don't worry, we're coming back. Somtime. But for now we're taking a welcome break. I'm in the process of writing some new material. I take my time to write, unlike those prolific types who write several songs a week! Who knows, next time you see us we might be playing some new songs.
Until we find our bass player we'll be lazy, try and stay cool in LA as the temperatures soar! Meanwhile, tell all your friends about our album and play the hell out of it...

Cheers.

Simon

The Next Big Hit is interviewing Simon following up on XUK's interview leading up to South-By-Southwest last month by Indie Insider. Sara Routh will be interviewing him and he will be playing 2 or 3 XUK songs as solo acoustic numbers. If we can get a copy of the show we'll post it in the music section. Check out our other interviews there.

It looks like we're playing El Paso twice - once on the way out and once on the way back. Lucky Devils is on the 15th and Chic's is on the 19th. We'll post details on the calendar as soon as we're confirmed.

Hi, we had a podcast dedicated to XUK, including a little interview in which Robin, Ron and myself talk nonsense to a bemused Jakob Neilson. It's posted in the MUSIC section. Jakob's interviewed us before last year so he knew what he was letting himself in for!

Simon

Our venue and stage times seem to be in flux still. I was just in touch with the organiser of the Heart of Texas Triple Bypass Music Festival and we are now at a venue on Sixth Street (Nuno's on Sixth - 422 E. 6th St.) at 10pm. Who knows, this could change again so if you're going to be in Austin for the festival keep an eye on our CALENDAR for updates.

Well, I scrambled to get some shows to Austin and beyond but it was just too much to accomplish on my own... so I'm disappointed to have to announce that we are postponing the big tour until June/July. This will give me time to get the venues properly lined up.
We will, however, be playing our way to Austin and back. We have a confirmed show in El Paso at Lucky Devils (the best place for live music in El Paso). We hope to get a show in either Phoenix/Tempe/Tucson - or maybe all three. Check the XUK LIVE section for details.
~Simon

Robin Holden just won "2006 DIY Producer of the Year" Award (at the DIY Music Festival and Convention in Hollywood, California) for his work on XUK's "Love Hits". We hope you'll agree with us that it's an accolade well earned for Robin and it reflects well on everyone involved with that massive project! Congratulations Robin!

Robin is currently recording and producing the new O.A.O.T.s album.

Eric and Simon are doing an live, in-studio interview and acoustic performance at killradio.org for the show "..is good" on Thursday 9th February. It will also be available as evidence (admissible in a court of law) in the archives of the web site at some point too.
We'll be playing some songs we don't often play live and some of the standards in a slightly more laid back manner for the show. Tune in and drop out!
We'll archive the show in our MUSIC section a few days after the show.

We recently had a photo session in Santa Barbara and so we'll have some new publicity pictures soon! Haven Hartman, our photographer, was also in attendance at On The Rox so we'll have some more live photos soon as well.

If you're in Los Angeles on Friday, February 3rd, Eric Summer will be accompanying the band Get Set Go at the Key Club on the Sunset Strip. It's the first "Kiss Or Kill Club" of 2006. If you didn't know, Eric and Simon are regular "punters" there. Simon will also be appearing on stage that night with another band Silver Needle! So come along. It's going to be a great night.

Last night we played at BB King's Blues Club on the Universal Studios City Walk. We had some loyal fans turn out to see us compete against four other acts. Eric, Katie and myself stayed to the end to hear XUK announced as the winners of that round! We go on to the semi-finals at the end of February.

Here is the planned tour route. It's not final yet but take a look to see if you're near any of these cities. If not, maybe you have friends there who will come!

March 8th - Los Angeles, CA
March 9th - Pomona, CA
March 10th - San Diego, CA
March 11th - Tucson, AZ
March 12th - Phoenix, AZ
March 13th - (Finals of the Battle of the Bands???)
March 14th - Flagstaff, AZ
March 15th - Albuquerque, NM
March 16th - El Paso, TX
March 18th - Austin, TX
March 21st - Houston, TX
March 22nd - New Orleans, LA
March 23rd - Atlanta, GA
March 24th - Nashville, TN
March 25th - Memphis, TN
March 26th - Little Rock, AR
March 28th - Oklahoma City, OK
March 29th - Kansas City, KS
March 30th - Omaha, NE
March 31st - Denver, CO
April 1st - Colorado Springs, CO
April 2nd - Salt Lake City, UT
April 4th - Boise, ID
April 5th - Seattle, WA
April 6th - Portland, OR
April 7th - Sacramento, CA
April 8th - San Francisco, CA
April 9th - Los Angeles, CA

We're also looking for suggestions for the best venues in these cities. If you have an opinion let us know. Email us at xuk@xukmusic.com

We're getting 2006 off to a good start with some exciting shows. Please check the CALENDAR section for details!

January 1. 2006 - New Pricing on XUK CDs

Our double CD "Love Hits" is now on sale at CD Baby for $17.95 - $5 off the original release price!

If you're lucky enough to catch us live you can get the CD for just $15. Our t-shirts are $10 each in both men's and women's styles.

October 30. 2005 - Tour 2006 and more...

Our first big music festival is "The Heart Of Texas Quadruple-Bypass Music Festival" next March. The festival takes place between the 15th and the 19th of March. In the new year we'll be working on setting up a month-long tour leading up to the festival. Such a tour could take us through California, Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Utah, Colorado, Nebraska, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Tennessee, Georgia, Louisiana, Texas, New Mexico, and possibly even into Canada. If we can work it out it'll entail at least 8,000 miles of travel with 20-25 shows in 30 days. It'll be the first time XUK has ever gone on the road and it's going to be fun and challenging - especially with our extended line-up of a second viola, cell and double bass!

"New Way" continues on the playlist of PulseRated's radio show - Lynsey Hooper's "The A List". It has been played at least five times a week on that show that airs on Sky Channel in the UK.

Also our good friend Paul Hart (the guy who introduced Eric Summer to the band) has used "New Way" as the theme to his final student film project "86 Manners" produced at the Los Angeles Film School. Eric scored the film using "New Way" as a basic theme throughout the movie.

An artist from "Down Under", singer/songwriter Navid Sabet (www.navidsabet.com), recommended us as a "Hot Picks" featured artist on a music website called New Retro (www.newretro.v3.be). They've asked for an article about XUK's experiences thus far in the indie music scene. Please check out these sites when you have a moment. We'll let you know when the article is up.

November 28th will be our first live, in-studio performance and interview at KXLU 88.9 in Los Angeles. Listeners around the world can hear it online at www.kxlu.com. The show starts at 11pm Los Angeles local time (PST).

October 1, 2005 - Here's the New Look!

We hope you like the new look of XUKmusic.com! We think it's going to be easier to look at and navigate. We'll be gradually adding back all the content we had before and hopefully expanding on it with some videos and more audio samples.
Let us know if there are any features you'd like to see and we'll try and set them up. If you have any photos of the band we'd love you to send them. Keep in touch and let us know what you think!
Simon (XUK)