24 September 2012
Nathalie Bonney
Oxfam is kicking off its month-long festival of music, Oxjam, with four fantastic nights of live music. Blur’s lead guitarist Graham Coxon will open proceedings Monday 24 September, as well as an acoustic set from Theme Park.
From Monday-Thursday this week, Oxfam’s Dalston store will be transformed into a gig venue in the evenings, selling second-hand music in the daytime in its new Oxjam guise. Coxon admits to having never played in a charity shop before: ‘It is a small venue so it will be great to be able to give the fans a really intimate and personal show to kick off Oxjam.’
Hot Chip will perform a DJ set at the last of the launch gigs Thursday 27 September and have been given free reign to host their own Oxjam party, inviting friends to join them on stage as well as donate music to the shop. Special ‘recommended by Hot Chip’ racks of vinyl will also be available for fans to browse and buy from.
With 800 venues, 9,000 volunteers, 7,000 musicians and 150,000 audience members, Oxjam is expected to raise the charity at least £350,000. Lasting the whole of October, the highlight of Oxjam this year, after the launch gigs, will be the Oxjam Takeover: a series of mini festivals in 44 UK City locations on the weekend of 20-22 October.
Launch Gig lineup:
Monday 24 September: Graham Coxon, Theme Park (acoustic set)
Tuesday 25 September: (Totally Enormous Extinct Dinosaurs DJ set, Breach (aka Ben Westbeech) and Daniel Avery).
Wednesday 26 September: Lucy Rose, Kyla La Grange
Thursday 27 September: Hot Chip DJs, The 2 Bears, Four Tet DJ set, Simian Mobile Disco DJ
For tickets go to www.wegottickets.co./oxjam
