An exchange-desk will be opened for some sold-out concerts (recognizable on the website by the exchange-desk logo). The idea is to bring together people looking for tickets and people who have tickets left over. Do you have extra tickets or are you still looking for tickets, then don't buy or sell them on the street, come and check at the desk instead.

The Studio Brussel program DUYSTER will soon have been around for 10 years. Or as the duo Eppo Janssen/Ayco Duyster finely phrase it: '10 years full of extreme melancholy and deafening sweetness. Quiet but restless'. Just as for their 5 year anniversary, AB has enthusiastically started arranging a fine feast. 5 yeas ago we did that with a brilliant concert by Low. For this anniversary we're compiling a fine bill that currently contains amongst aothers The Low Anthem and promising Belgian talent Isbells.

Beards and folk … ramshackle recording equipment in remote wooden huts… it's delivered brilliant music over the past 2 years. Think: Fleet Foxes, Bon Iver, Band Of Horses and Iron & Wine. The latest whelp is American trio The Low Anthem and they're busy playing themselves into the epi-centre of that aforementioned music scene with their album ‘Oh My God, Charlie Darwin’. Ben Knox Miller and Jeff Prystowsky already made debut album ‘What The Crow Brings’ in 2007, it was only later that singer/multi-instrumentalist Jocie Adams came aboard. HUMO wrote of their new album ‘één van de wonderlijkste plaatjes van dit jaar’. Album Of The Month and 4 stars for Uncut (‘A fine mix of hymnal purity and barn-storming rock’) and 4 stars again from MOJO (‘the second best cabin-in-winter indie album ever made, Bon Iver wins the gold). After an ABClub concert in September, which was sold out in no time, they now return to your favourite concert hall at the end of January.
‘Is dit Belgisch?’ That was how De Morgen understandably began its review of Isbells untitled debut. They also threw 4 stars at it in order to really put Gaëtan Vandewoude's project on the map. Those searching for links will quickly arrive at Nick Drake, Bon Iver and Fleet Foxes but – and De Morgen hit the nail on the head there too – it would seem that Vandewoude discovered this warm melting pot of styles all by himself. Apparently half of Belgium was already hanging on Isbells' every word before the album was even released: ‘De Belgische Elliott Smith of Sam Beam (Iron&Wine) is waarlijk opgestaan en gaat harten veroveren' (Eppo Janssen of Pukkelpop and Duyster). ‘Een nieuwe grote Belgische belofte, arcadische folk met dromerige en bezwerende akoestische gitaren’ (HUMO). Promising young Belgian talent which urgently deserves to be discovered and threatens the crown currently borne by The Bony King of Nowhere. Just recently breaking hearts in the ABClub, as support to Mark Eitzel, now in January rightly alighting our stage once more.

The stirring music and the David Byrne indebted vocal sound of the Brits from Fanfarlo immediately enchanted in the offices of AB and Duyster. Well, that 'British' is with a grain of salt as singer Simon Balthazar is from Gothenburg in Sweden. So you've already discovered a first musical connection, as Fanfarlo is undoubtedly stuff for fans of that other Swede Jens Lekman. When Balthazar – together with Cathy Lucas (violin, keys, vocals), Justin Finch (bass), Amos Memon (drums) and Leon Beckenham (trumpet, keys) – gets to work with their strange mix of instruments (singing saw, clarinet, cello, mandolin, ukulele, melodica) then our favourite handyman, Sufjan Stevens, is never far away either. The band will rise up from the blogosphere where they have been adored and debut ‘Reservoirs’ will be released (recorded in the US under the watchful eye of producer Peter Katis (The National, Interpol)).

‘Listening to De Portables is like travelling without a compass or a map’. That's what De Morgen wrote of their album ‘Topless Is More’ from 2007. Successor ‘John Terra’ has just been released and again there is no way of labeling it without tying yourself in descriptive knots. This time the only clearly taken position was the banning of digital loops and and so to completely concentrate themselves upon organic songwriting. Eppo Janssen and Ayco Duyster are big fans and so the band couldn't not be at their party. Especially for the occasion, De Portables will do their thing with a Duyster classic. Seek cover!

To top it all off, Lou Barlow has now confirmed his appearance at the Duyster party. Barlow is of course known to the broader public as bass-player to Dinosaur Jr. but in late 2009 his second solo album was released under the title ‘Goodnight Unknown’, successor to the 5 year old ‘Emoh’. On ‘Goodnight Unknown’, he received musical assistance from Dale Crover (The Melvins) and Lisa Germano and he serves you a series of superb songs.
Furthermore, over the past 20 years Barlow was also the brain behind lo-fi icons Sebadoh and Folk Implosion. He released his almost-solo work under the name Sentridoh, and he also found time in-between to record a split-album with our very own Rudy Trouvé (‘Subsonic 6’). He really is a busy bee, as over the last 2 years he has recorded 2 new Dinosaur Jr. albums and toured the world intensively with them.

The bill for the 10th anniversary of the Studio Brussel program Duyster has been completed by Brown Bird from America. Brown Bird presents a quite classical mix of Americana, folk and roots, and shares a tour bus with The Low Anthem in January.