There won’t be many people who have heard of Andy Baio but he delivered a very interesting prediction on Twitter this week (@waxpancake).

“Spotify’s U.S. launch is going to destroy digital album sales. The celestial jukebox makes downloading, legal or not, feel dumb.”

And maybe he has a point.

When compared to Spotify’s “almost any song at the touch of a button” approach downloading seems a very clunky way of collecting music.

However Spotify isn’t in the car, and not every internet connection is perfect, so for many the CD and mp3 player will remain a firm fixture.

Plus new bands won’t solely commit to a service that doesn’t yet deliver a great return when your songs are played.

So the best way for up-and-coming artists to make instant cash from song writing is CD sales at gigs and the past fortnight has seen a rash of EP releases.

It continues this Saturday with The Queue launching ‘Enquiring Time. ..’ at the Soul Cellar.

They’ll be supported by Cardiff’s ‘Brother Steve and a new Southampton act ‘Welcome Pariah!.

The Queue’s early recordings were heavily influenced by the all conquering sound of Oasis and although they are leaving some of that behind they found themselves taking another avenue into the lives of the Gallaghers.

In May they played the first in a series of acoustic shows in the Manchester branch of Liam’s ‘Pretty Green‘ clothing stores.

With more gigs to come we’ll no doubt see if clothes make the band.

First published in the Daily Echo 24th June 2011

For me, last Friday has become ‘unsigned Friday’.

In the morning we held meetings about a compilation CD full of unsigned artists, the evening’s task was judging five unsigned bands in the ‘Southampton Takedown’ at the Talking Heads and between those events I was invited to present a radio show on a national DAB station that only plays unsigned music.

The winners of ‘Southampton Takedown’ were ‘Plastic Toys‘ and they’ll now be supporting ‘YouMeAtSix’ when they play The Salisbury Takedown on July 26^th.

‘Plastic Toys’ narrowly beat deep grunge rockers ‘Burn The Fleet‘ who win the unofficial runners-up prize of an acoustic set at ‘Showcase UK’ in the Soul Cellar on Monday 20^th.

Meanwhile the CD is a collaboration between ‘Showcase UK‘ and ‘Angry Badger Records‘ and titled “Showcase Sett“.

Julian Aplin’s label is fast becoming a feature in the South’s music scene and this album will give 16 acts from Southampton and Portsmouth a great boost.

We’re also using Southampton artists for the cover and sleeve design and with one glimpse you’ll understand why the first collection is called ‘Propeller‘.

It’s released on Saturday 1^st August with a four band show at the Soul Cellar featuring ‘Dlugokecki‘, ‘The Queue‘, ‘Moody Tuesday‘ & ‘Thinking For Tuesday‘.

And finally the radio station is ‘Amazing Radio‘ which I believe is going to shake up both the radio and music industries.

It’s a great thrill and honour to be asked to join them and I’ll only be playing music from the South coast.

First published in the Daily Echo, Friday 10th July www.dailyecho.co.uk/leisure/music/news/4486773./