Oxfordshire’s Next Big Thing competition semifinalists

Posted on by simonminter

Jack FM and FM107.9’s ‘Next Big Thing’ competition has reached its semifinal stage – 20 acts have been chosen from a total of 127 entries, who will now each record a new studio track at SAE Oxford. These 20 acts will then be cut down to five, who will perform a show at the O2 Academy in April, after which a panel of judges will select an overall winner. The overall winner of the ‘Next Big Thing’ competition will win a spot at the Wychwood Festival and a recording session worth £2,000. Tune into Jack FM or FM107.9 for more details, and to hear all of the bands over the coming weeks.

The final 20 bands are:

1. The Keyz
2. Moon
3. Dirty Rotten Scoundrels
4. Beck Lanehart
5. Coco and Sparks
6. International Jetsetters
7. Foxy
8. Hangman Charlie
9. Quadraphobe
10. Walter Pico
11. Secret Rivals
12. From Light To Sound
13. Motion In Colour
14. Spiral 25
15. The Scholars
16. InLight
17. Liddington
18. The Medicin
19. Templars
20. Vixens

  • kev

    slow motion rock…

    another way of saying “perhaps the most dull, miserable, and boring band i’ve come across while working for nightshift, but your mates so have a great review”

  • TheWrongWay

    11.

  • bev

    can someone explain how thats relevant?

  • http://www.spiral25.com/ Joe

    Kev,

    Oh dear. Here, have your toys back…

    You are entitled to your opinion, it doesn’t bother me personally, I’m not the only person in the band but I’m pretty sure if you have anything constructive to say then we’ll take it on board. So far you’ve not given any constructive criticism. I also question your motives for giving your criticism because it smacks of sour grapes. Why bother?

    I have tried to be lighthearted about this but unfortunately you’re like a randy Jack Russell with a bad temper. Now here you are, not content with throwing your toys out of your pram on the punt thread, on this thread doing the same. The only person you are really winding up is yourself.

  • http://www.gappytooth.com gappy

    Ronut has nothing to do with the judging of this, as well you know. Nor do any other Nutshaft/Oxfordglands personnel, so far as I know.

    So, any credit S25 get here is purely based on someone’s enjoyment of them, no favouritism involved (there’s none for The Punt either, of course, but I can’t prove that). I think the fact that InLight & The Keyz, 2 acts who’ve had pastings by local reviewers, are on the shortlist shows that this is unconnected to any scenester illuminati svengalism.

    Scenester, Illuminati & Svengalism shall be playing a Vac Pop night in the near future, I’m sure…

  • http://www.myspace.com/thescholarsuk Tim Mobbs

    We (The Scholars) also took a bit of a beating on Oxfordbands with our first demo so I’d highly doubt there’s any favouritism going on. I was brought to the attention of this competition thanks to Oxbands though so thanks a lot guys, hope it turns out to be successful.

    Tim

  • robin

    we are number 1. wonder why

  • Robin

    Lol!

    Who the f**k put that comment above saying its from me. I did not put it by the way people in case anyone actually thought I said that. Some people eh…

  • Andrew

    Anyone know when they plan to announce which 5 are playing the academy gig?

  • http://www.myspace.com/thescholarsuk Tim Mobbs

    Announced this morning – Pretty random selection and some horrendous mixing in the final tracks!

  • Robin

    Hey Tim,

    You are right a pretty random selection. I thought you guys would make the top 5, but I was wrong!

  • Lister

    2 of the top 5 aren’t in the top 20?!

  • Phill

    Some horrendous mixing? Really, which tracks? Cos they sound pretty decent to me – especially as they were recorded live in 3 hours weren’t they? If anything it sounds like the top 5 have better quality mp3s than the others – not the mixing

  • Dave G

    Lister: we weren’t originally picked for the top-20. Someone dropped out and we were called up from the reserve list.

    -Dave G

  • tlwr

    you forgot the great DIRTY ROYALS a true oxfordshire original!!!!

  • http://www.spiral25.com/ Joe

    I can see why they picked those 5, having listened to all of the tracks now my personal favourite from the top 5 is Beck Lanehart.

    “Some horrendous mixing? Really, which tracks? Cos they sound pretty decent to me – especially as they were recorded live in 3 hours weren’t they?”
    Yeah, can’t really fault the mixing given the time constraints that SAE had to record and mix them, they did a really good job, our track came out really well. We only had about an hour and a half though due to things running late for the band before us and so much messing around getting the monitors right so they didn’t distort or pick up too much of the guitars. We managed to do about 5 takes though so turned out OK.

  • http://www.myspace.com/thescholarsuk Tim

    It definitely sounds like the top 5’s mixes are of a better quality – not hinting at conspiracy or anything but simply comparing how our mix turned out to what we’re used to. We’re lucky enough to have access to a very flash studio a stones throw away from where we all live which I suppose may have been our undoing – we’re perhaps too used to top notch stuff and spending certain amounts of time EQing, mixing, mastering and balancing. Big fan of Witches and glad to see them in the top 5 though!