Brighton Jams a.k.a. The Jam Central Band

Brighton Jams is a funk/disco/ska-oriented jamming collective based in Brighton. Most of us have been jamming together for a great many years and under various more formalised band guises such as Brown Star, Shifty, Lords Of The Carousel and Off The Waggon. The original Brighton Jams events were known as Jam Central, and centred on a legendary fortnightly friday night residency at Grand Central during 2003-2005 which sadly came to an end due to the opening of the Nightingale Theatre upstairs. (We're quite loud.)

An open Brighton Jams event like the original Jam Central sessions is pure funky sweaty chaos, but always threaded through with a surprising coherence, and always aimed squarely at the dancefloor. To keep the changes flowing we sometimes use The Inspiratron, a unique audience-participation tool for suggesting changes to the musicians. The display is projected onto a large screen and every time a member of the audience hits the button, a random combination of ideas is shown for a few seconds.



After we lost Grand Central as a venue, we hosted several nights at Polar Central (now The Hope) but the sound and vibe in there was awful and the management insisted on charging for entry, something which totally went against the original ethic of our earlier success. As if to put things straight, we then put out two free live shows for Radio Reverb during the Brighton Festival - one from a packed main room in Scream Studios and the other from a rammed-to-the-rafters Prince Albert, and these captured completely the original essence of our roof-busting mayhem ('hot shit mate, hot shit...' as one sweaty punter opined to me after the Scream session.)

The core Jam Central Band lineup described above has played right through the night at several free/house parties and small festivals, including

• in the middle of the South Downs at sunrise
  (Innerfield/BustTheBox 2003 - video here - photos here)
• up a mountain in Spain - Rocket Festival 2005
• full-on all-night bar jam - Frickley Festival 2006

When the sun's coming up and the party's still rocking, the altered states of the musicians can warp at times into pure psychedelic genius, and the video evidence can seem like it's fallen through a time warp from a festival of the early seventies... oh those dizzy heights...

During 2006 we hosted several nights at The Globe, Middle Street, but it just didn't quite work. The drums were always 'too loud'.... and we wanted them mic'ed up! Our speciality is warming up half-empty pubs early on, and ending the night playing to a packed sweaty lively mob... hitting them hard with spiralling slabs of improvised funk, ska & psychedelic disco... It works best when the people playing have years of experience on stage, rhythm in their bones, and a flair for wild inspiration when it comes to the crunch. Fortunately most of the people who get involved have those qualities and more...

Mini claim to fame: One of our earlier jams was in the bar at The Pressure Point, supporting The Egg in the main room. Some of us later jammed with them at a house party.

We're currently looking for new central Brighton venues. Please get in touch if you run a pub or bar and think our lively sound could add to your weekend atmosphere. We need:

• The odd friday night slot
• Free entry to all
• Friendly up-for-it crowd
• LOUD live music license
• Taxi money for drum kit etc
• A few drinks each for the core members