Musician and promoter Sebastian Reynolds discusses his latest project and the news from Oxfordshire’s music scene — and says one band is well worth investigating

Having come back from a meditation retreat in rural Wales with no phone or Internet access for 11 days, I was slightly out of the loop on the recent comings and goings of the Oxfordshire music scene but, just before I left the shire, I played at Truck Festival down at Steventon with Flights of Helios and had a fantastic time in the few hours I was there.

Apart from our set, the highlight was catching up with old friend and Californian rapper MC Lars, who was also performing on the Veterans stage. Having put him on at his first ever gig outside of the US at the Cellar for my 19th birthday party back in 2002 and played keyboard for him etc. back in the day it was ace to see Andrew still on such fine form. I also had the joy of chancing on an unannounced acoustic set from Stornoway in the Rapture merch tent which was as magical a performance as I’ve seen from them.

Another highlight last month was our (hopefully now to be annual) 6-a-side Oxford Music Scene charity football tournament up at the 4G pitches in Marston. Jointly organised between PinDrop and Audioscope, we raised a few hundred quid for local homeless charity The Gatehouse and national group Shelter and saw teams from groups such as Listing Ships, Flights of Helios, Dallas Don’t, Big Tropics, Maiins, Cooling Pearls, Desert Storm and One Note Forever all slug it out in a good-natured and exhaus-ting competition. Flights of Helios and Maiins get special mentions but this time Listing Ships walked away with the title... shame that the band have split up and won’t be around to defend their title next year!

One musical project I’m really enjoying at the moment is playing with Swedish folk singer Julia Meijer. She stole the show at the Punt and recently supported Americana faves The Epstein. We had a lovely time at Wilderness Festival last weekend performing in the Folk Barn – I’m glad that my ambient drones and vocal sampling didn’t upset any beardy folk purists!

Pop trio Rainbow Reservoir are well worth investigating. Bandleader Angela Space is one of the most creative, original song writers I’ve ever come across and her new EP 400 Imperfect Rhymes is, in short, a work of genius and I strongly recommend grabbing a copy, available from bandcamp or on CD from Truck Store.

Catch Rainbow Reservoir live at The Wheatsheaf on Friday, August 29.

One other gig in August that I’d like to highlight is These Are Our Demands and Octopuses performing for Gappy Tooth Industries at the Wheatsheaf on Saturday, August 30.

Long time Oxford music scene aficionados may remember Octopuses in their previous guise as lo fi electronic pop band Foxes! and These Are Our Demands are the new incarnation of grunge/goth rock band Harry Angel and feature my band mate in Flights of Helios singer Chris Beard.