The AutistiX Bio update February 2018
Happy New Year for 2018 from The AutistiX!
It’s a new year and well overdue for an update from the band. We are excited to tell you about all the great things going on that have kept us very busy in the past few months!
The big news is that we have just released our new EP called ‘The Meadow Sunshine’. (Click on the EP name to connect to our store on itunes). We’re very happy with our newest EP! It features 4 new songs: 1. ‘Positive’ 2. ‘Not the Same’ 3. 'My Future Life' and 4. ‘Heaven’.
Our first gig of the year will be our launch gig on the afternoon of Sunday 11th March, for our new EP The Meadow Sunshine. It will be at the Monarch at our favourite launch gig venue in Chalk Farm, https://monarchbar.com/. The event will be 4-6pm. We will start at 4pm with a support act (to be announced) and we will be on stage promptly at 5pm so we hope that you will come along in good time to see us performing our new songs! This will be a family friendly, all ages, gig! We will send a gig poster very soon.
Before that we are being filmed for a tv programme for BBC3, which is an online station, called ‘Amazing Humans’. We are being interviewed and filmed this week! We will let you know when the show will be available online!
After that, we have a really exciting trip coming up: we’re going to perform a couple of gigs in Liverpool at the world renowned ‘Cavern Club’ at the start of Autism Awareness Week, on Monday 26th and Tuesday 27th March on behalf of the National Autistic Society. Just in case you don’t know, this is where the Beatles started out over 50 years ago! We will be performing lots of Beatles songs and plenty of our own songs too. It will be a chance for those from ‘up North’ to come along to see us. It’s also in aid of the NAS (National Autistic Society). It’s being organized by our friend Simon Weitzman, whom we met last year at our gig at the Beatles 1Day Festival in London. Simon is making a Beatles fan film ‘Here, There and Everywhere’ that will include The AutistiX. It is due out at the end of the summer 2018 so we will keep you informed about that as the year progresses.
Then we are going to perform at the Beatles 1Day festival in London for our second year in May, which will be in Twickenham this year. Then later in May we have a new gig in Birchington, Kent at the Feasibility Festival, promoting people with disabilities. We will be headlining at this event!
To recap on 2017: it was a busy year for us! We played several gigs at ‘Involve’ in Essex, Soda Beats at Hoodoos Lounge in Croydon, our 5th year at Beatles Day in Hastings, and a new gig at Beatles One Day in Chiswick London, a few local summer festivals including South End Green in Hampstead, the UK’s first ever Disability Pride event in Brighton. Our drummer Saul was pictured in a BBC news article dancing with one of his college peers from St John’s College, a special college that Saul attends part of the academic week. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-sussex-40542288.
The AutistiX were interviewed for the Weekend programme on the BBC World Service, which was broadcasted at the beginning of January.
Brief band history and mission
We are a unique rock band creating our own songs. We have been together since April 2010.
We are especially original as our 3 youngest members have autism, making our music even more special, plus we have 2 dads and sons in the band:
Jack Beaven Duggan (electric guitar/backing vocals)
Saul Zur-Szpiro (drums and backing vocals)
Graham Spragg (bass guitar)
Jim Connelly (lead singer)
John Duggan, Jack's father, John (electric guitar)
Michael, Saul's father, (harmonica)
‘The AutistiX’ are keen to be recognised for our musical talent. We are proud to include musicians with autism. We aim to increase the inclusion of musicians with disabilities, but we are not a ‘disability band’. We write and perform our own music.
The band performs at well known London music venues, local festivals, and charity gigs including playing for over 1100 people who gave us a standing ovation, especially following our impromptu performance of the Beatles’ Help! together with Sir Tom Jones!!!
Our music video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U2qFEcpPEX0 shows a rough recording of one of our new songs on the EP, ‘My Future Life’. One of our older videos is 'Just The Same' is on youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ilytN26eI1Q
Our minidoc, The AutistiX, is called ‘Autism Rocks - The AutistiX’ is on the Guardian website: http://www.theguardian.com/news/video/2015/aug/10/autism-rocks-meet-the-boys-from-the-autistix-video or on vimeo, where it is a ‘staff pick’: www.vimeo.com/135851503
A Munich TV station, Galileo TV/Prosieben TV made a programme about The AutistiX and autism: http://www.galileo.tv/life/the-autistix-eine-rockband-mit-einer-unglaublichen-geschichte/
Shawn Hammond from USA magazine Premier Guitar wrote about The AutistiX: http://www.premierguitar.com/articles/23522-the-autistix-butterflies-demons. Our interview with Nick March at the BBC (last 5 minutes!) http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/w172vsq7rvkf9dp. We were also featured in an article in a Brazilian publication to inspire young people about developing their talents and achieving their dreams http://superspectro.com.br/noticia/conheca-the-autistix-a-banda-de-rock-britanica-formada-por-jovens-com-autismo
Here’s a sample from our gig at this year’s Beatles Day:
https://youtu.be/z5XaD9k3gcE ‘Gimme Some Truth’ and ‘You Can’t Do That’
For more information, contact Susan Zur-Szpiro, Band Manager on 07973835102. Check out our social media: www.theautistix.com, www.facebook.com/theautistix, www.twitter.com/theautistix.
We’re on itunes, soundcloud, spotify, youtube, vimeo. etc
Happy New Year for 2018 from The AutistiX!
It’s a new year and well overdue for an update from the band. We are excited to tell you about all the great things going on that have kept us very busy in the past few months!
The big news is that we have just released our new EP called ‘The Meadow Sunshine’. (Click on the EP name to connect to our store on itunes). We’re very happy with our newest EP! It features 4 new songs: 1. ‘Positive’ 2. ‘Not the Same’ 3. 'My Future Life' and 4. ‘Heaven’.
Our first gig of the year will be our launch gig on the afternoon of Sunday 11th March, for our new EP The Meadow Sunshine. It will be at the Monarch at our favourite launch gig venue in Chalk Farm, https://monarchbar.com/. The event will be 4-6pm. We will start at 4pm with a support act (to be announced) and we will be on stage promptly at 5pm so we hope that you will come along in good time to see us performing our new songs! This will be a family friendly, all ages, gig! We will send a gig poster very soon.
Before that we are being filmed for a tv programme for BBC3, which is an online station, called ‘Amazing Humans’. We are being interviewed and filmed this week! We will let you know when the show will be available online!
After that, we have a really exciting trip coming up: we’re going to perform a couple of gigs in Liverpool at the world renowned ‘Cavern Club’ at the start of Autism Awareness Week, on Monday 26th and Tuesday 27th March on behalf of the National Autistic Society. Just in case you don’t know, this is where the Beatles started out over 50 years ago! We will be performing lots of Beatles songs and plenty of our own songs too. It will be a chance for those from ‘up North’ to come along to see us. It’s also in aid of the NAS (National Autistic Society). It’s being organized by our friend Simon Weitzman, whom we met last year at our gig at the Beatles 1Day Festival in London. Simon is making a Beatles fan film ‘Here, There and Everywhere’ that will include The AutistiX. It is due out at the end of the summer 2018 so we will keep you informed about that as the year progresses.
Then we are going to perform at the Beatles 1Day festival in London for our second year in May, which will be in Twickenham this year. Then later in May we have a new gig in Birchington, Kent at the Feasibility Festival, promoting people with disabilities. We will be headlining at this event!
To recap on 2017: it was a busy year for us! We played several gigs at ‘Involve’ in Essex, Soda Beats at Hoodoos Lounge in Croydon, our 5th year at Beatles Day in Hastings, and a new gig at Beatles One Day in Chiswick London, a few local summer festivals including South End Green in Hampstead, the UK’s first ever Disability Pride event in Brighton. Our drummer Saul was pictured in a BBC news article dancing with one of his college peers from St John’s College, a special college that Saul attends part of the academic week. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-sussex-40542288.
The AutistiX were interviewed for the Weekend programme on the BBC World Service, which was broadcasted at the beginning of January.
Brief band history and mission
We are a unique rock band creating our own songs. We have been together since April 2010.
We are especially original as our 3 youngest members have autism, making our music even more special, plus we have 2 dads and sons in the band:
Jack Beaven Duggan (electric guitar/backing vocals)
Saul Zur-Szpiro (drums and backing vocals)
Graham Spragg (bass guitar)
Jim Connelly (lead singer)
John Duggan, Jack's father, John (electric guitar)
Michael, Saul's father, (harmonica)
‘The AutistiX’ are keen to be recognised for our musical talent. We are proud to include musicians with autism. We aim to increase the inclusion of musicians with disabilities, but we are not a ‘disability band’. We write and perform our own music.
The band performs at well known London music venues, local festivals, and charity gigs including playing for over 1100 people who gave us a standing ovation, especially following our impromptu performance of the Beatles’ Help! together with Sir Tom Jones!!!
Our music video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U2qFEcpPEX0 shows a rough recording of one of our new songs on the EP, ‘My Future Life’. One of our older videos is 'Just The Same' is on youtube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ilytN26eI1Q
Our minidoc, The AutistiX, is called ‘Autism Rocks - The AutistiX’ is on the Guardian website: http://www.theguardian.com/news/video/2015/aug/10/autism-rocks-meet-the-boys-from-the-autistix-video or on vimeo, where it is a ‘staff pick’: www.vimeo.com/135851503
A Munich TV station, Galileo TV/Prosieben TV made a programme about The AutistiX and autism: http://www.galileo.tv/life/the-autistix-eine-rockband-mit-einer-unglaublichen-geschichte/
Shawn Hammond from USA magazine Premier Guitar wrote about The AutistiX: http://www.premierguitar.com/articles/23522-the-autistix-butterflies-demons. Our interview with Nick March at the BBC (last 5 minutes!) http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/w172vsq7rvkf9dp. We were also featured in an article in a Brazilian publication to inspire young people about developing their talents and achieving their dreams http://superspectro.com.br/noticia/conheca-the-autistix-a-banda-de-rock-britanica-formada-por-jovens-com-autismo
Here’s a sample from our gig at this year’s Beatles Day:
https://youtu.be/z5XaD9k3gcE ‘Gimme Some Truth’ and ‘You Can’t Do That’
For more information, contact Susan Zur-Szpiro, Band Manager on 07973835102. Check out our social media: www.theautistix.com, www.facebook.com/theautistix, www.twitter.com/theautistix.
We’re on itunes, soundcloud, spotify, youtube, vimeo. etc
