The Musicquarium Blog

Rufus Hound (”comedian / presenter / actor / owner of fine moustache”) contacted us via The Musicquarium website back in March ‘09 with the opening statement of his email reading “I’m booking a party on this date (joint 30th) and having checked out FUNKification online, you guys seem spectacular”. This was a great way to start off the discussion and it all went well from there.

The event was a belated wedding party for Rufus and Beth plus a joint 30th birthday party, making this event the winner of the ‘how many events can you celebrate at one gig’ award for The Musicquarium so far. Rufus wanted the whole 9-piece party band with male and female vocals and 3-piece brass section. The venue was to be the excellent ‘Half Moon’ in Putney, famous for having many big name artists perform there over the years such as Dire Straits, Elvis Costello, Kasabian, Keith Richards, Pat Metheney, Rod Stewart, The Rolling Stones, U2, Van Morrison and The Who. We also agreed to arrange 2 songs for the happy couple that meant a lot to them; ‘Message to Rudy’ by The Specials and ‘9 to 5′ by Dolly Parton.

The event started off with another band called ‘The Teasers’, the lead singer of which was Beth’s sister. The band went down a storm and were a pleasure to work with. After a few speeches Funkification took the stage and kept the party going all night with 2 hour-long sets of funk, soul and pop classics.

Rufus and Beth (and the guests, as you can see from the photos) had a fantastic time and wouldn’t let us leave until we did an encore (or two!)

The photographer at the event (Hannah McGregor from Funky Photographers) was excellent and provided many shots for us to use. A few of them can be seen here:

For those of you that may be interested, the set list for the evening looked something like this:

Set 1

• Play That Funky Music
• We Are Family
• Dancing In The Street
• In The Midnight Hour
• Take Me To The River
• Billie Jean
• Rock With You
• Soul Man
• Respect
• Street Life
• Never Too Much
• Valerie
• Sir Duke
• Shake Your Tailfeather
• I Got You (I Feel Good)
• Reach Out, I’ll Be There
• Message To Rudy

Set 2

• Somebody Else’s Guy
• Celebration
• Blame It On The Boogie
• Hold On I’m Coming
• Sweet Home Alabama
• Knock On Wood
• Signed Sealed Delivered
• Superstition
• Ain’t Nobody
• 9 to 5
• Lady Marmalade
• Disco Inferno
• Car Wash
• Ain’t No Stopping Us Now
• I’ve Had The Time Of My Life
• All Night Long

Venue: http://www.halfmoon.co.uk/

Photographer: http://www.funkyphotographers.co.uk/

Rufus’ website: http://www.vivienneclore.com/artist-details/rufus-hound/

Please contact us for more information on funk soul 70s wedding function bands in London. Please also visit our other site dedicated to wedding function bands in London.

Sat 30th January 2010 saw FUNKification return to the wonderful Claridge’s Hotel (Brook Street, London) to provide the live music for another wedding. The client made their initial enquiry over a year in advance in order to make sure that the band had availability for their event and I am happy to say that the meticulous planning all paid off. The client’s main reasong for choosing FUNKification was the huge repertoire available for the live performance and the fact that the band came highly recommended from another couple of weddings during the previous year.

The event was a fairly intimate affair in the ‘French Salon‘ and the guests packed the dance floor from the first dance right to the end of the night! The live music package chosen for the event was the maximum that FUNKification offers; 3 x 60 minute sets. This amount of live music was only possible as the line-up chosen was a 6-piece band featuring both male and female lead vocals. This meant that the live band played for the majority of the evening (20:00 to 23:30) except for 2 short breaks. With a crowd like this though the band certainly felt appreciated!

The band have performed at Claridge’s on a number of occasions and will hopefully be booked to play there again soon. If you are looking to hire a live band for a wedding at Claridge’s please don’t hesitate to contact us.

Here are a few photos of the event to give you an idea.

The French Salon at Claridge's

Funkification 6-piece live wedding band

FUNKification performs at Claridge's

The live band perform in the French Salon at Claridge's

One of many impressed guests at the wedding at Claridge's

Our live funk / soul / 70s wedding band

Please contact us for more information on funk soul 70s wedding function bands in London.

Please also visit our other site dedicated to wedding function bands in London.

Amberstar had the addition of FUNKification’s brass section when they performed for BG Group’s summer ball in June 2009, making this the largest Amberstar line-up so far; both male and female vocals, guitar, keyboards, bass, drums and 4-piece brass section. As well as providing the dance floor filling party music for the evening, Amberstar also provided an hour of ‘live karaoke’ for those brave employees of BG Group who fancied strutting their stuff in front of 1500 of their closest friends and colleagues! The live karaoke went down amazing well and we highly commend the handful of guests that took part. There were some great voices hiding behind those corporate faces!

Amberstar 10-piece live corporate function band

At the same time as Amberstar performed on the main stage Urban Jazz Collective provided background jazz in the chillout room. The client chose the ever popular line-up of tenor saxophone, double bass and piano to create the perfect atmosphere and provide flexibility of style and repertoire. This continued throughout the evening giving the guests a place to get away from it all if the main dance floor was too busy for them.

FUNKification brass section performing with Amberstar

The event saw the dance floor packed from start to finish, which is impressive when you have over 1000 people there! They wouldn’t let the band leave until they had done at least one encore and ‘Sweet Child O’ Mine’ followed by ‘Don’t Stop Me Now’ was the perfect choice to end with.

Amberstar pack the dance floor

A happy crowd!

Photos kindly provided by www.chantalphotography.com

Amberstar’s set list looked something like this:

Set 1

• Play That Funky Music
• Dancing In The Street
• (I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction
• Johnny Be Goode
• Walking On Sunshine
• Get Down On It
• Thriller
• Footloose
• Cosmic Girl
• Soul Man
• Respect
• Shake Your Tail Feather
• I Feel Good

Set 2

• Summer Of 69
• Valerie
• Mercy
• Sex Machine
• Jump
• Take Your Mama Out
• Blame It On The Boogie
• Good Times
• Le Freak
• Disco Inferno
• Place Your Hands
• Ruby
• Livin On A Prayer
• I Predict A Riot
• Sweet Child O’ Mine
• Don’t Stop Me Now

December 2009 saw FUNKification’s 3rd consecutive annual performance at the Christmas party for Premier Foods at Sopwell House, St. Albans.

The event was opened by DJ Paul Mundy and he was followed by the covers band the ‘Premier Food Fighters’ whose members all come from with the company. They really got the crowd going before the main event; FUNKification in their 13-piece line-up featuring 4 vocalists, 4 brass, full rhythm section plus percussion. The venue had to extend the usual stage in order to fit the whole band on! Needless to say, the band went down a storm as usual with their slick set of funk, soul, 70s and 80s party classics.

Premier Foods have been so impressed with the band each year that they have re-booked for the following year within a month of each previous performance. Each time they choose the same line-up – the huge 13-piece band.  They have now confirmed the 4th event in a row for 2010 too!

Photos from the event shown here were taken by Aidan Harris (www.aidanharris.co.uk)

FUNKification’s set list for the event looked something like this, although a few tunes were dropped on the night due to the schedule running slightly late:

Set 1

• Play That Funky Music
• Best Of My Love
• We Are Family
• Son Of A Preacher Man
• In The Midnight Hour
• Soul Man
• Respect
• Billie Jean
• Thriller
• Shake Your Tailfeather
• I Got You (I Feel Good)
• Mercy
• I Saw Her Standing There
• Never Too Much
• Sir Duke
• Canned Heat
• Cosmic Girl
• Brown Eyed Girl
• Sweet Home Alabama

Set 2

• Let Me Entertain You
• Celebration
• Blame It On The Boogie
• Good Times
• Le Freak
• Superstition
• Ain’t Nobody
• Knock On Wood
• Signed Sealed Delivered
• Rock With You
• The Power Of Love
• Jump
• Somebody Else’s Guy
• Disco Inferno
• Car Wash
• Ain’t No Stopping Us Now
• All Night Long
• Livin’ On A Prayer
• Sweet Child O’ Mine
• ENCORE – Don’t Stop Me Now

Venue: www.sopwellhouse.co.uk

Please contact us for more information on funk soul 70s bands to hire for corporate events in Hertfordshire

2nd December 2009 at The Forge saw the  first performance of the combined FUNKification and Hackney Colliery Band monster line-up. The event was the launch of Caponata restaurant and was an invite only event.

HCB started the evening off with their own unique brand of hip-hop and ‘brass funk’ with the performance starting in the first floor gallery and the band wandering down the stairs, through the crowd and towards the stage. An excellent hour-long set really set the tone for the evening. The second set of live music saw FUNKification’s rhythm section and one of their female vocalists joining HCB on stage to create a monster 13-piece band featuring an awesome 7-piece brass section (2 trumpets, tenor sax, baritone sax, 2 trombones, bass trombone). Tower Of Power eat your heart out!! The set consisted of well known soul and funk covers and the band went down a storm. The site of the huge brass section had some people transfixed for the whole set!

Both HCB and FUNKification are well known to The Forge. This was HCB’s second performance there and are already booked to perform again in May 2010 (see website for details). FUNKification performed there for the wedding party of the owner’s sister in July 2009 and also brought in the new decade with them by headlining their New Year’s Eve party 2009/2010.

Photos from the event shown here were taken by Aidan Harris (www.aidanharris.co.uk)

The set list for FUNKification’s performance looked something like this:

• Signed Sealed Delivered
• Play That Funky Music
• Valerie
• Sir Duke
• Respect
• I Feel Good
• Son Of A Preacher Man
• Working Day & Night
• Ain’t Nobody
• I Wish
• Cosmic Girl
• Rock With You
• Superstition
• Blame It On The Boogie
• Car Wash
• Don’t Stop Me Now
• ENCORE – I Will Survive

Our ever popular swing band, Swing Connection, was chosen to perform as the full 8-piece band at a lavish 40th birthday party on 30th October 2009. We were chosen over all of the local New York bands and the client flew the whole band out to perform at his event. This was the same weekend as the NY marathon AND Halloween, so it was pretty hectic getting there!

The venue was a converted warehouse space on Broadway, New York, USA, and the evening was designed around a ‘Las Vegas’ theme. The main stage and ball room was dressed as a replica of the ‘Sands’ casino and Swing Connection were one of a handful of acts that performed over the course of the evening. Wandering musicians, burlesque acts, tap dancer, an outstanding swing band (that was us of course) and an MC dressed as Cab Calloway! What more could you ask for at your birthday party?!

Swing Connection performed a one hour set of their Ratpack and swing classics and as predicted went down a storm. We even got asked to perform ‘Fly Me To The Moon’ twice but that would have been a little excessive in a one hour set. The final song list (not in order of performance) looked something like this:

• Beyond The Sea
• Can’t Take My Eyes Off You
• Cheek To Cheek
• Come Fly With Me
• Everything
• Fly Me To The Moon
• Hallelujah I Love Her So
• I Can’t Give You Anything But Love
• I Get A Kick Out Of You
• I’ve Got You Under My Skin
• It Had To Be You
• Let’s Face The Music And Dance
• Mack The Knife
• Mess Around
• Moondance
• My Way
• New York, New York
• Summertime
• The Lady Is A Tramp
• They Can’t Take That Away
• Wonderwall

The band received great feedback from the event and we are crossing all our fingers for a repeat booking !?!

Photos shown were taken by the event photographer.