DonkeyBox on Spotify

Spotify

We are delighted to announce that our music is now available for free on yet another source online. This is the up and coming and very popular Spotify.

We are thankful to our digital distributors CD Baby for getting us into Spotify. Not every artist can directly upload to Spotify and you need a distributor first to get on there.

Thankfully our music has been on digital distribution for quite some time and finally after many months we have been added to the Spotify catalogue.

So just type in “donkeybox” (all one word not donkey box) and press play

 

Cover Versions of Great Songs

Katy Perry is going to be done by DonkeyBox

It almost feels like the really really early days of DonkeyBox. The days when we were learning some covers just to gel as a band and learn to play together!

We rarely play covers gig now, having our defined sound and song list. But a rare moon does come when a long gig calls and a party atmosphere is required. It is then that we pull out a few of the hottest rock covers.

And this time we are learning covers that we have never ever done before and it is really exciting to learn these songs.

You’ll be able to hear these covers at our Rochdale gig but just to hint at some covers

Here are some new artists we will be emulating.

• Jimi Hendrix/Bob Dylan (A Bob Dylan song covered by Hendrix and now us)
• The Rolling Stones
• The Killers
• Katy Perry (Well maybe..)

And lots more!

Requests?

Sure we take them too, just add a comment down here.

What do DragonForce and DonkeyBox have in common?

The shred machines of DragonForce and DonkeyBox

Besides the weird names which involve an animal and the even weirder reason for name capitalisation, these two bands have more in common than you would think!

Yes they are both rock bands, yes they are loud..but the bands have almost crossed paths once on the same stage believe it or not.

It was the summer of 2001 when lead guitarist and drummer from DonkeyBox popped into the Imperial College Jemfest and on that small stage there was this guitarist dude who was playing some mildmelting guitar solos on his Ibanez guitar.

It was all about the Ibanez guitars that little event and those guys at the end seemed the perfect headline act.

Fast forward about 3 years and omg these guys have changed name slightly to DragonForce and a force to be reckoned with, they have made it in mainstream rock music!

On that night we did not gig with DragonForce, we hadn’t been formed and they had only just started out. The organiser of the Jemfest had his own band on stage as well, Cereal Killer. About a year later when DonkeyBox formed we finally gigged with Cereal Killer as well. This way we had gigged with a band that had gigged with DragonForce.

The small world of rock n roll that we live in.

First gig outside London ever!

A 17 year old bass player in a town near Manchester, England playing gig after gig, weekend after weekend…getting paid for it too. It was a rock dream come true.

Fast forward in  time a few years and the bass player has moved to London and in circa 2008 joins DonkeyBox. And then takes the whole band back up north to where it all began for him!

Ladies and gents, we are talking a very special gig here. Our first one ever outside London. By applying for a gig in America we were already well pumped to travel and when bass player Martin Ewart arranged a gig at his home town on the eve of this birthday..well, we had to hit the road.

The gig is scheduled for Saturday 12th September. Watch this space for more details.

New Album Recording

We are very very excited about this!

After a successful production, distribution and sales of our promo EP Backstage Pass we are now going for a full length studio album production. We are still thrashing out what songs will go on it exactly.

We have been in touch with our producer from last time, Indee Rehal Sagoo and visited his studios. Also this time we’ll have additional support from Niraj Chag of Buzz-erk studios who works as a composer, producer and artist. Please do check both of their material out.

The album/EP should be out at some point in early 2010. This means the band will be hard at work in the background and you will see us a little less at gigs.

Tower Tavern Gig – 18th September 2009

DonkeyBox flyer

While the gig before at the exact venue was a miracle of sheer organisation, this one very nearly didn’t happen either!

In fact an hour after we had played on set, the venue was shut down for playing music too loud. This time the license was not renewed and the landlord had to stop the last band from going on stage. We were speechless as the lights went out and the last band went home…without going on stage!

As for those who were there, they enjoyed a tighter and more consolidated set than the last gig. “Society Made Me This Way” was played for the second time now and we pulled off a smashing outro with blending the “Terminator 2″ theme and “The Score” intro. We were so determined to get this transition right after the last gig where it was rusty and messy, and boy we nailed it this time, BIG.

This gig was very different too in terms of how we felt, we were pumped from the excitement of our SxSW application and we were visiting our producer the following day. This showed so well in our set. We were also extremely lucky to have a photographer friend who took some great black and white shots of the band on the night.

We also had some new sign ups for our fan mailing list, which is great news as we slowly but surely build our mailing list.

iTunes Sales of Backstage Pass EP Continue

Backstage Pass EP by DonkeyBox

We are so excited every time we get even the tiniest bit of money for the sales of Backstage Pass EP, we have to blog it here, right now!

Our Backstage Pass EP produced merely as a promo demo in the summer of 2007 was released via our awesome distributors CD Baby in 2008. During September 2009 we received the handsome sum of $21.57 which is the highest sales figures we have received for a single month since the EP started selling.

Given that there are only 3 real tracks on that EP, this is a very encouraging fact and shows the business potential and smart thinking of the band. It is after all called the music “business” and we’ve proved that we can sell our music now, month after month.

Many thanks to all our loyal fans and customers. We will make sure our next album/EP will be even better

Jessica Alba excited about DonkeyBox SxSW application

Jessica Alba is excited about DonkeyBox

Wow news spreads fast! Many of you already know that Jessica Alba has written to us before way back in December 2008.

Well, she certainly has been following the Box and was well excited when she heard that we are hoping to play a showcase gig at the South by Southwest 2010 festival in Austin, Texas. Here is what she wrote to us:

Guys I am really happy that you want to come to America. Austin is a really cool place and I have been there for the film festival. You guys are so sweet and you really deserve to play there

So there you have it, what better then to have an endorsement from the vivacious lady herself. We would certainly not want to dissapoint this one fan of rock music then, so wish us really good luck for the application to go there!

Tower Tavern Gig – 29th August 2009

Tower Tavern Flyer

This was the gig that almost never happened (again). Originally scheduled to play the Luna Lounge on this date, the venue actually closed down and we were left stranded! So we frantically found a slot at Tower Tavern on the same evening. And Tower Tavern was the place where we had the previous gig cancelled. So it was all a bit shaky…

But the show sure went ahead come the 29th of August..and what a show!

For almost 2 years we have been playing a standard 30 minutes set that always has the same songs in pretty much the same order. Any new songs that have been added are generally fitted into that overall song order.

But this time we were cooking up a surprise

We completely changed the set order, no longer opening with the Terminator 2 theme. Not only that but we revived an old song after 2 years. “Society Made Me This Way” was dedicated to the demise of Big Brother. Yet another shocker was that we removed “Set Me Free” from the set entirely.

Although not a packed venue, the ones who were there had a real treat with some front row dancers for all our songs!

This gig was yet another testament to the Box surviving adverse conditions and still putting on a show, thanks to all those who made it there. The show must go on!

Playing in America? – South by Southwest (SXSW)

We just can’t hold our excitement on this!

We’ve just applied to play in the famous South by Southwest (SXSW) festival in Austin, Texas. This means that if we are selected we will be flying all the way to America to play a gig at the world’s most famous music festival.

We initially got the idea for this festival from a couple of friends who were visiting bass player Martin from the States. They mentioned this festival to us and really encouraged us to play there. So we did a bit of research and after a little while we went for it and applied to play!

We’ll know if we are selected to play there in January.

But this is great news for many of our supporters and fans in the US. We had started mailing out CDs in 2007 and making friends there via social networking. And given that two bandmates have never been to the US before, this really is very exciting news for us.

Wish us the best of luck!