Clwb Ifor Bach/Multimedia/Rubberbandits

Having discovered the Rubberbandits through Youtube, I instantly had big love for these two Irish mentalists, their comedy, videos & music. All of which award winning, I think they even have an MTV show on the go, wey hey! Anyhoo, last night I was chuffed to see that they were coming to Cardiff to gig at Clwb Ifor Bach…

I don’t think the Irish Pony drivers had the marketing push they deserved, Cardiff can be proper lame for not letting us know what’s going on here, it’s always a case of us going “Oh, there’s a food festival tomorrow is there? Tidy!”. Last night had a nice crowd (plenty of nodding heads and a token OAP hippy over-enthusiastically reliving his LSD days) but a proper campaign would have packed out the place. Watching my plastic bag-covered Youtube idols sing and dance like they’d just stepped out of Southern Exposure 1994, I got every penny’s worth of my ten bucks ticket money. All good.

Loved the multimedia footage showing on the screen behind, they make really cool vids that work well both online and as a backdrop for live sets. I also relished the live art element introduced by means of  mental stuff like Willie O’DJ spinning the decks dressed up as their local politician  Willie O’Dea. I particularly liked the bit where he pulled his trousers down to reveal saggy pants, but that’s just me.

They’ve got a supercute website feeding in from youtube, facebook and twitter, with an events calendar (basic but does the job), links off to youtube etc. and a blog integration. The site also links off to bigcartel from a ‘buy stuff here’ link (not currently working, mind, get onto the Magento gypsy web gurus!).

I actually love their site, wouldn’t mind it getting punk’d by BED (but I would say that, wouldn’t I!)… be good to see full screen vids, have bigger better image galleries, more scope for user interaction e.g. for fans to be able to check in, comment, upload pics relating to specific gig dates. I think their e-commerce should be fully integrated too. I like the store we did for Atticus, maybe summit along those lines:

… yeh, an e-commerce site but pumped full of multimedia content too, with merchandise, CDs, downloads, plastic carrier bags, spastic hawks,  “I Wanna Fight Your Father” branded t-shirts, signed worn pants… the world’s their lobster!

Functionality similar to what we did for Placebo would be groovy – like a gigs page which not only shows gigs/dates/locations but allows fans to write gig feedback, upload photos or add memorabilia.  Few pics below, but best bet is to check out and have a play yourselves on Placeboworld.

Would be really fab if the landing page had a personal video message from the Rubberbandits that looked like a live stream, or an interactive game about a Horse Outside, and a ‘Design a carrier bag’ corner, where you can create your very own Rubberbandits carrier bag to put over your head (to come with a strict warning against putting plastic bags over your head, of course.) Going off on one now.

So, here’s a few pics from last night :-) … and to any cool bands, artists, mentalists or moguls out there who are thinking about doing cool stuff online, bring it on – there’s nothing we like better than getting stuck into super-rad all-singing all-dancing multimedia multi-purpose, full-on functionality drenched websites that give the user a real experience. Don’t get a site, get a hub, make a channel baby! And breathe. I LOVE RUBBERBANDITS. That is all. So here’s some pics. Tidy.