The Thyme Machine – like The Flaming Lips on a £20 budget
As Trust The Wizards get set to promote their first ever Liverpool gig, Getintothis’ Will Neville looks forward to a wildly magical musical night at Maguire’s featuring The Thyme Machine and Ballard.
Trust The Wizards are promoting their first ever gig at Maguire’s Pizza Bar in Liverpool on August 6. The magical threesome are the hosts of a music podcast and can often be seen at gigs in Liverpool and the North West.
Headliners are The Thyme Machine from Lancaster, playing their first gig in the city, who leap out from the rest of the pack by being fronted by a leopard, aka Kriss Foster. He originally learned guitar as part of his Duke of Edinburgh Award, and the band regularly performs at the Edinburgh Fringe.
Songs title include I’m In Love With The Girl From The Argos Catalogue, The Only Statue Cleaner In This Town and Second Choice Goalkeeper which gives a flavour of how seriously they take themselves, with the closest comparison to these ears being the mighty I, Ludicrous.
Lead singer Foster told us, “live I’d say I’m really inspired by showmen – Freddie Mercury, Paul Stanley and Frank Sidebottom. We’re a bit like The Flaming Lips on a £20 budget. We’re planning quite a rocky, upbeat set for the Liverpool gig so there’ll be a lot of the new album, our third, Going Steady With The Thyme Machine.”
Chorizo Garbanzo, one of the wizardly promoters said, “If you like the lyrics of bands like Half Man Half Biscuit and They Might Be Giants, and you want to see a band whose singer dresses as a leopard, then The Thyme Machine are the band for you!”
Support act and bard of Bolton, Ballard, has been a regular on Trust The Wizards‘ monthly podcasts, which feature an eclectic mix of music, both old and new. Ballard describes his sound as “lo-fi, 60s-influenced guitar pop, rough, ready and bloody catchy”, which is a pretty accurate summary.
A description echoed by Kriss Foster, who mentioned his “absolutely catchy, great tunes, really great tunes”. Ballard’s most recent release is the digital-only EP We Are Violence that came out in March, with his most recent, excellent album Napoleon coming out a year earlier.
This is likely to be the first of many more gigs promoted by the Trust The Wizards team:
“Over the last 3 years, we’ve been in contact with a lot of new bands whose music we’ve played on the podcast. These bands quite often ask us ‘can you help us get a gig in Liverpool?’ Rather than sit around moaning about how these bands never play up our way, we thought we’d have a go at doing something about it.”
That’s something the city can always use more of. So it’s great news that they are also promoting John Peel faves Spare Snare supported by Fort Baxter at Maguire’s on September 9, and then ex-Levellers 5 man JD Meatyard and poet Michael Conroy at the same venue on October 22.
Tickets for The Thyme Machine and Ballard are only £5.
