So here it is (Apologies for the delay – mental weekend) – the winner of our third and final draw to win three complimentary tickets to this year’s Soul-Identity Summer Shakedown Boat Party with DJ Format and Wah Wah 45s‘ Dom Servini (and us of course!) is… JOSH SMITH (Well done Sir), who correctly named Simon James as the other member of The Simonsound alongside DJ Format. All that’s left is to  extend a big thank you to all that entered the three prize draws (especially those of you who entered all three) and a offer a big congratulations to all three winners.

So now with all the free passes out of the way, the best way to pick up the last remaining tickets for Saturday (if you haven’t already) is via WeGotTickets or Ticketweb.

In the meantime, a little guest mix from our friend Steve KIW dropped into our inbox this morning and we thought it best to share the love. Ever the understated, the mix in the man’s own words “Pulled this together last night… includes Stevie, Ramsey Lewis, Guilty Simpson, T-Coy, Michael Vogel, Escape from NY, Woody Herman, Q-Tip, Blvd Mosse, Harold Melvin, Buddy Rich…”. You can give it a listen below.

While DJ Format and Mr Servini take care of proceedings upstairs, Steve will be joining myself, the Cigarettes and Sunshine boys and Rad Dad (Beatfix) on the lower deck on Saturday for a mixed bag of disco, soul, house, boogie and anything else we fancy playing.

We’ve now also confirmed the after party literally five minutes from the boat in the heart of Blackfriars (sadly a different venue than last year but will still get the job done), which will be running from 6.30pm till 1am, and will be free to all boatgoers. More news on that nearer the time. All we need now is the weather to sort itself out for Saturday and I reckon we’re all onto a winner!

So we’ve drawn the winner of our second prize draw for this year’s Soul-Identity Summer Shakedown Boat Party. Congratulations Mikey High Jinks, you’ve won three complimentary tickets to the event on the Saturday 28th August. Now all you need do is get in touch with those two people you’re giving the other tickets too!

And now for our last chance to win. Our third and FINAL prize draw which will be drawn this Friday at 6pm GMT*. To enter and stand the chance to win three complimentary tickets to this year’s boat party (worth, um £52.50!)simply send us an email to summershakedown2010@soul-identity.com and answer the following question.

The Simonsound ‘Reverse Engineering’ album is a collaboration between two individuals, one of which is DJ Format. Can you provide us with the full name of the second person in the group?

That’s it, simply get your response in before 6pm on Friday 20th to go into the final draw.

Good luck and have a great rest of week.

* Only one entry per valid email address. To be entered into the prize draw, your message must be received before 3pm GMT on Tuesday 17th August 2010. Entrants must be 18 years old or over.

Just a very quick (and very late heads up) to let you know that I’ll be donning my jazz hat tonight and guesting at the Favourite Things Jazz Jam. If you’ve never been before then its well worth a look if you’re into live music, even more so now that its found a permanent home at one of our favourite East London venues, Favela Chic London. Each month, the core Favourite Things Quartet, consisting of Jessica Lauren (keys), Jake Telford (sax), Graham Silbiger (bass) and Francesco Mendolia (drums) are joined by a rotating ensmeble of London’s brightest musicians, as they hold court and improvise their own versions of jazz standards and beyond.

For a taster of what it’s all about band wise, check out the videos over at the Youtube site. Tonight I’ll be joining everyone’s favourite importer of Japanese vinyl and label boss of Mukatsuku Records, Nik Weston, behind the decks as we aim to keep the crowd entertained behind live sessions. The fun starts at 8pm. Hope to see you down there!

Just in case you’re nowhere near our capital this fine evening, I’ll attempt to capture some of the magic so you can catch it on demand, but in the meantime you can still enjoy the sounds of Favourite Things as Nik dropped a tasty little jazz and Brazilian inspired mix yesterday to get you in the mood.  It’s available to stream below via Mixcloud.

Thanks to everyone who entered our first prize draw to win tickets to this year’s Soul-Identity Summer Shakedown Boat Party. And a massive big up to James Rodgers who is our first winner. Well done James, you got yourself three complimentary tickets to the event on the Saturday 28th August. See you on the boat. We’ll be in touch soon.

For all those that weren’t so lucky this time around, feel free to enter the second prize draw which will be drawn next Tuesday at 3pm GMT*. All you need do is send an email to summershakedown2010@soul-identity.com and answer the following question.

Name three artists currently recording on the Wah Wah 45s record label

Should be fairly easy if you do a bit of a quick search (Two of them are mentioned fairly heavily on the site). Don’t forget to get your answers into us before 3pm on Tuesday to go into the draw.

Good luck and have a great weekend. We’re off to do some digging.

* Only one entry per valid email address. To be entered into the prize draw, your message must be received before 3pm GMT on Tuesday 17th August 2010. Entrants must be 18 years old or over.

If you’re on this blog, we would hope by now that you should be well aware of this year’s Summer Shakedown Boat Party, and if not, well I guess you do now, right? There’s just under three weeks to go now until Soul-Identity’s flagship Summer event and the signs are looking more than good that this is going to be as great, if not better, than 2009′s event.

It’s been almost ten years since I moved down to London and just under seven, since I attended my first boat party on the Thames. As anyone I’ve ever waxed lyrical to will attest, the London boat parties ran by the Whistlebump crew in the early noughties left a lasting impression on me, being as they were some of the best days out in London I’ve ever experienced, coupled with the fact they offered the opportunity to catch the likes of Francois K, Danny Krivit and DJ Spinna play awesome sets on the river (and that was just the main room, you had a young Benji B, Yam Who? and Ross Allen dropping tuneage in the back!). Since then Whistlebump (AKA Simon Haggis and Andy Crowther) have sadly gone their separate ways, the boat (The Silver Sturgeon) has been refurbished (and is now priced way beyond our means) and we’ve caught that same list of DJs live several times over.

After the fate of the Whistleboat parties was pretty much sealed, we sought out a few more boat parties, namely Sancho Panza and SoulBrew (at this point, I should probably just print “I Love Boats”), before getting the opportunity to put up the cash to throw one of our own last summer  on The Golden Jubilee with legendary Manchester DJ Greg Wilson, Fast forward twelve months (well it’s actually just over thirteen) and on Saturday 28th August 2010, we’re right back in the thick of it for a Pre-Notting Hill Carnival party with a difference. For this one, we’ve called upon the combined talents of Brighton’s own legendary DJ  Format and one of London’s finest selectors on the circuit, Dom Servini from Wah Wah 45s to rock the upper deck, whilst down below, I’ll again be joined by good friends Cigarettes and Sunshine, Steve KIW (Balearicv Assassins of Love) and Rob Wilkes (Beatfix). Musically, I think it’s fair too say this will stretch far beyond what we try and promote through this site, but equally with the quality of clientele on board, it will no doubt be a bit special. For all the info, make sure to check the boat party page on this here site or the Facebook Event page, over at eh… Facebook.

Anyways, now you’re up to speed, let’s get to the point of this post…

We like a bit of a giveaway on this site, so over the next three weeks, we’ve got three batches of three tickets to literally give away. To be in with a chance of winning the first 3 this Friday all you need do is hit us up on summershakedown2010@soul-identity.com before 12pm GMT* on Friday and request to be included in the draw. I’ll then pull a name out the hat at random and that person will receive a complimentary ticket for this year’s boat party plus two further free tickets for his or her friends.

That’s it. Simple. No question this time around, just drop us an email for your chance to win.

Should you prefer to just guarantee your tickets right now, you can purchase them from Ticketweb and WeGotTickets.

Good luck

* Only one entry per valid email address. To be entered into the prize draw, your message must be received before 12pm GMT on Friday 13th August 2010. Entrants must be 18 years old or over.