Krakatoa

We had such a great show last night that Sad Ivan was smiling. Look out for more shows this summer. 'Cos we're kickin' ass and takin' names. Thanks so much to The Sound Studio for great hosting and sound and Tova and Greg for an opening act that was intimidating to follow.

And a heckin' good time was had by all. Thanks again SurfaRosa. That place combines friendliness with competence in delightful harmony. And the audience feels it. Thanks also to Surface of the Sun for opening for us with some slinky '70s sounds rarely heard in Cape Town. We'll be back at the Sound Studio next week to try out some new moves. Watch this space.

We all feel like this sometimes. Join us for braaivleis, booze, and blunderbuss guitars at SurfaRosa tomorrow afternoon and push the alienation and ennui away for a few hours. "Live deliciously with Krakatoa."

Our little warm-up gig on Saturday. Report: we are warm. Ready for our Saturday, 3 November Tiki barbecue gig at SurfaRosa.

As per our last post on sea nymphs, excited to read this. Joy is away on the very Mediterranean where Circe once bewitched Oddyseus. The rest of us are putting together a special one-off show in the meantime. Lots to perfect.

Sea Nymph Gustave Adolf Mossa, 1909 Sea nymphs are our patron capricious supernatural beings.

Scientists have uncovered an ancient connection between surf guitar and heavy metal...including a bunch of hitherto unknown classic Norwegian surf acts like The Burzums, The Mayhems, and The Darkthrones. What do you think of this sinister link between the happiest music of Summer, and those cave-dwelling heavy metal goblins?

People don't always recognise that to get great bands that people are mad to see, you need loads of venues that put on crap bands. It's really a numbers game. Authorities in many cities favour the residents who are bothered by the noise because there's no economically viable music scene. Meanwhile, the reason there's no economically viable music scene is that young bands don't have anywhere to become good. Places like Britain and Ontario Canada have realised that if you make it easy for live music, it rapidly becomes a valuable economic sector that creates a mass of support jobs. Meanwhile, in places like Sydney Australia, cops shut down venues while shaking their heads and wondering where the vibrant music scene went.

When you've been practising the double harmonic minor scale for an hour...

Last night's ROAR show made me realise how much we're going to miss it. Shout-out to Mudslinger for being the toughest opening act to follow. Tonight's scheme: turn up the 13th Floor Elevators to full blast, drink wine, make a mutton/leek pie. It's been another perfect day in Africa folks.

Hawaiian night fisherman in 1948. That's how you did that.

Mr. Poopybutthole says: "Ooooh-eeee! St-stay away from that Kilauea volcano Hawaiians! Oh my."

We in Krakatoa refuse to support local music. We go and see bands because they kick ass and it's crazy good fun. Saturday was no exception. The Durban bands were knock-outs. The Stand-out was Hadeda - a two-piece psych-rock outfit with a candy-apple red Fender Jaguar busting out bass and guitar octaves at the same time, and a drummer who hammered away like an Orangutan. Not a flip-flop to be seen. I dunno what's going on in Durban, but *something* is happening there. We bumped into André from Medicine Boy - probably the best new-era psychedelic band in South Africa. And The Thirty Eights - our brothers in surf-guitar - impressed the hell out of a bunch of Californians we roped in from an international TV production. I hope there'll be a bunch more of these daytime braai and dynamite music events at Surfa Rosa in the future. So don't support local music. Support your life in Cape Town by going to shows and having a ball.

We've got plans for the weekend... Gonna head to Surfa Rosa at midday (maybe stopping briefly at Lefties for RIBZ) to check out surf guitar comrades The Thirty Eights and a line up of Captonian and Durban bands (they'll be the ones in flip-flops holding bunny-chows... we assume). We hope to see you there in that great Tiki themed venue where we'll be soakin' up the craft beer and maybe a Mai-tai or two. (sharing as an image, because FB doesn't like to share events)

Get in that weekend mood (long weekend in South Africa) by taking in some Hawaiian steel guitar music. *Putting the YT link in the first comment* to try prevent FB from hiding it from you. Put it on in the background and feel the Polynesian sounds flow through you. This Hawaiian style of playing American guitars with a steel bar set off a craze throughout the coloniser country that led directly to the blues slide guitar phenomenon. And it's still alive and well today. And the very first guitars with electric pickups were lap guitars for playing Hawaiian style.

Chanteuse, Françoise Hardy, rocking a suit by the "Trouser King," Courrèges - via sweetjanespopboutique.blogspot.co.za Don't say you don't see all sorts here 😂

... though Alan favours Hanuman, the mysterious, mischievous monkey god and companion of Ram.

Friday! It has the incredible power to bring a smile even to the face or our Sad Ivan - guitarist extraordinaire and devotee of Bacchus, the god of wine.

Not that we're in any kind of position to throw the first stone...

Lemme try this again instead of complaining 😅 So we love the experience of getting to hear live surf guitar music from the other side of the stage. And we love how The Thirty Eights do like they do. Come join us 5 May at the great Surfa Rosa as we take in those reverb guitars with our hands wrapped around beers instead of guitar necks.

Sad to say but FB just isn't the way for bands to interact with people who love their music like we all thought it was going to be. Just posted a link to another band's show that is super relevant to Krakatoa listeners and it's not even visible on the page. Looks like we're going to have to go retro with our electronic communications too! #cyberhipsters

Alan ditched google play when he realised you don't get ad-free youtube except in like, 5 countries, didn't stick with Deezer after a month's trial because the app kept crashing despite being fully up to date, and is now trying out spotify - which makes it really easy to discover new music and obscure playlists. Just a pity they pay artists among the least of all of these. What platforms are you all listening to music on? CDs? Vinyl? Paid downloads? Pirating (you naughty things!)? Or one of the streaming services?

's cover photo

Vintage portrait of a young Javanese woman.

Practise last night and the new tunes are sounding really tight now. We're going to get a room recording of our practise on Saturday afternoon so that those of you who haven't heard us for a few years can hear what we sound like now. But we're feeling pretty confident that our show next Thursday evening at Surfa Rosa in town is going to be our most exciting yet.