Andrew Wigglesworth, Coventry, England.

Melodeons, web design, computers and stuff.

Greenman Rising (a band that I play in) has gone through into the second round of the competion to choose a group to open the Green Man Festival on 21st of August.

To get into the second round of the Green Poll we had to finish in the 20 twenty out of over 300 bands. Greenman Rising finished 4th (!)

I'm not sure exactly who's been voting for us, people must have liked our video... yes, that one of us in the tea tent at the Bearded Theory Festival (! again)

Anyhow, to those who have been voting, THANKYOU!

After the second round of voting, the top six bands out of the twenty will go for a "battle of the bands" at the Camden Monarch, London.

The second round finishes at midnight on July 12th and each voter is allowed to vote once every 24 hours.

Journal

It's three weeks now since the BNP gained two seats in the European Parliament. Not something good, but it could have been a lot worse. The actual BNP (numerical) vote stagnated or even fell in many areas, but with the complete collapse of the Labour vote (and other voters staying at home) the fascists were able to claim two seats.

What now? Hope not HATE seem to be going into overdrive with a Not in my name petition (with nearly 80 thousand sign-ups as of today) and questionaires etc. The Folk music world also seems to be coming alive with recognition of what the BNP are up to. "Folk Against Fascism" pages were set up on Facebook and then Myspace with thousands of pledges of support coming in, including impressive numbers of well known folk performers.

"Folk Against Fascism" will be combatting the BNP's attempts to hi-jack folk music in Britain in a similar way to what the Nazis did with German folk music. German folk music has barely recovered from the machinations of the Nazis and "Folk Against Fascism" is giving a loud and clear "hands off" to the BNP.

Apparently there is a website planned and other activities in the pipeline. In the meantime it's up to the rest of us to get behind this campaign.