A mouth-watering cash prize is up for grabs in a Battle of the Bands competition at Aberdeen venue Krakatoa.
Entries are now being invited for the heats of the annual Eruption contest at the popular Granite City venue. The contest will run throughout June, July and August this year.
Last year 45 bands from Aberdeen and Aberdeenshire competed for a £2,000 cash prize.
Krakatoa, which is run by a nonprofit worker cooperative, is also now seeking sponsors for Eruption in a bid to boost this year’s prize fund. It is hoped the prize money will go towards the winning band recording an album, video or organizing a national tour.
Recent Eruption winners The Funky Red Pandas will use their prize money to record and produce a video for track Karl-Heinz Rummenigge. The Funky Red Pandas triumphed in the final this February.
The final was also contested by The Brahma Mantra, Aftermath, General Winston and Amateur Hour.
Catalyst for emerging musical talent
Krakatoa Music Promoter Brian Youngson believes this year’s Eruption can be the catalyst for the emergence of many exciting new bands on the Aberdeen music scene.
Brian said: “Eruption is open to artists of any ability and it’s not unheard of for new artists to reach the final stages. The purpose of the contest is to encourage more people to start making music.
“It’s our hope that the prize money goes towards releasing an album, or a video, or organising a national tour. Previous winners have also gone on to appear at festivals.
“By the conclusion of Eruption, at least a dozen brand new support acts will have emerged. Plus another handful that are good enough to appear as local headliners at Krakatoa.
“These will all be playing to sizeable audiences alongside the best grassroots touring acts from elsewhere throughout the following year.”
‘Seeing a future megastar’
Located on Trinity Quay in the city, Krakatoa has been fundamental in growing the grassroots music scene in Aberdeen.
Craig Adams, Krakatoa Fundraising Coordinator, believes attending grassroots concerts such as Eruption for a fraction of the cost can be far more exciting than watching established, expensive, bands.
And at a grassroots show music fans may see the early emergence of a future ‘megastar’ before they become famous.
Craig said: “Virtually all major artists started out playing grassroots venues.
“The energy inherent in a £5 concert can lead to a far more invigorating experience than shelling out £150 to watch some household name trudging through 30 year old material for the zillionth time.
“And if you’re really lucky then it might even come with the cachet of seeing a future megastar for what amounts to spare change.
“Those early gigs are always the best.”
Magma event expands local scene
To aid the development of grassroots music Krakatoa also provide Magma, a weekly networking, performance and workshop event for those involved in local music.
Magma takes place within Krakatoa’s main room, AV production suite and conference room.
The goal of Magma is to help expand Aberdeen’s music scene by encouraging more artists to perform live and gain valuable experience.
It also enables younger artists aged 14 to 18 to perform to an audience in a safe and reputable music venue.
Magma establishes an environment conducive to improvisation and helps facilitate the formation of new bands.
Elias Eiholzer, Magma Coordinator, said: “Krakatoa has developed a pipeline to help take young people from singing Karaoke or playing an instrument in their own bedrooms, to performing at an actual venue.
“To garnering a local following, going out on tour, and hopefully appearing on more prestigious bills in bigger venues than ours.
“Our weekly Magma event functions as the first link in this chain.
“By bringing new bands onto the stage often for the first time.
“Eruption follows on from that by creating an incentive to rehearse more and further improve.”
Championing grassroot musicians
Magma also provides young music engineers with a means to gaining experience by introducing them to state-of-the-art live audio/video streaming and production technology.
Whilst providing a valuable platform to emerging musicians Magma also builds a passionate audience invested in local music at grassroots level.
Hen Beverley, Concert Programmer, said: “Back in 2015 we took the decision to transform our business into a non-profit organisation, whose purpose was to enhance the local grassroots music scene.
“This has switched our focus from figuring out how to maximise bar sales, over to how to best support, enable and champion creativity”.
Those looking to participate in Eruption should contact Krakatoa on: eruption@krakatoa.bar
Potential sponsors should contact Krakatoa on: sponsorship@krakatoa.bar
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