Dreamboat Records will be hosting our very first Christmas Party at Bristol’s The Croft on Thursday December 20.

The back room is the noise/psych/kraut/math room. There will be a headlining set from Geisha, with support from Yellow6 and the triumphant return of Azalea City Penis Club for one night only — their first gig since 2004!

The front room and bar is the party room, with DJ sets from The Rollercoaster Project and Dreamboat DJs Maximum Fun and Maximum Energy playing tunes from Fleetwood Mac, Slayer, Jackson Browne, Jesu, Ike and Tina Turner, Creedence, En Vogue, and lots of Italo.

There will be a merch desk with copies of the entire Dreamboat catalogue (except Hatefield) and the first ever Dreamboat t-shirt, which will be available in a limited edition of 50.

Entry is £5. We’re still organizing tickets, but we figured you’d want to know the date so you can mark it in your filofax. This event will get raw like sushi, so haters to the left.

Dreamboat Records 2008 is the second annual sampler from Dreamboat Records, featuring new material from Dreamboat artists, collaborators and friends. This full-length album is available to buy on CD for £6 from our shop, or as DRM-free MP3s from Bleep.

From our own acts, we have the increasingly wonderful Rollercoaster Project, Robin Allender’s new full band sound, the lovely new Gala Band, and a solo track from Simon Grant (ex-Azalea City Penis Club). We’ve also included Dreamboat collaborations (Yellow6, Kiska) and new stuff we just think is rad (Tom Wilson).

The first three tracks are available as free MP3 downloads here, and you can stream the entire album at Bleep.

Watch out for news of the launch/Christmas party for this record, which will take place on Thursday 20th December and will blow your mind. Details to follow.

Several websites have been kind enough to write about Robin Allender’s debut album The Bird and the Word:

• Stylus have pubished a thoughtful review of The Bird and the Word and Azalea City Penis Club’s The Coffin Years
• Said the Gramophone wrote beautifully about the album
• Shake Your Fist gave it a very favourable mention
• Amelia’s Magazine published a lovely review
• Update: And so did Subba Cultcha

If you know of any more mentions of Robin in the press then please do let us know.

The upshot of all this embarrassingly effusive praise is: the album is great and you should buy it in our shop (or from HMV, Picadilly, Norman Records, Bleep or iTunes).

Don’t forget you can see Robin and his new band play live in London (10 August), Oxford (14 August) or Bristol (18 August and album launch on 7 September).

The Bird and the Word will be released on Monday 9 July. Order before then from the shop for the reduced price of £6 (usually £8). Amelia’s Magazine has the first review.

Robin has lots of gigs coming up: Ashton Court in Bristol on Saturday 14 July, and then London (Friday 10 August), Oxford (Tuesday 14 August) and Bristol (Saturday 18 August). See the live page for details.

Finally, the album launch, which has been delayed by Robin’s Gravenhurst commitments (Glastonbury last month and Paris with Animal Collective this month) will be at the Folk House in Bristol on Friday 7 September.

Robin Allender’s debut album The Bird and the Word is available to pre-order now at the reduced price of £6.

Sam Wilkins has produced a beautiful video to go with the song “Green Wound”.

Robin is also a member of Gravenhurst, and he will be appearing with them at Glastonbury Festival in June and supporting Animal Collective in France in July.