The Velvet Hands to support Liam Gallagher and Paul Weller

Congratulations to The Velvet Hands, a great guitar band featuring ICMP alumni Toby Mitchell and Sam Hilder, who will be supporting music legends Liam Gallagher and Paul Weller this summer. 

Both Toby and Sam studied on our BA Creative Musicianship course and won support from our Careers and Industry Hub team's Accelerator Fund to help progress their career. 

The band is preparing for a busy few months, headlining the This Feeling stage at the Isle of Wight Festival while also playing with Paul Weller on 15th June and Liam Gallagher at the Eden Sessions on 26th June. They also have new music coming in the form of their latest single, 'Don't Be Nice'. 

Commenting on the live shows, Toby said they came about via a combination of "persistence and luck". 

We're doing all this ourselves with no agent (so if you're an agent and reading this, give us a call won't you?) so with Liam Gallagher we managed to get his manager's contact. She loved the tune and passed it on to him. It's the stuff that dreams are made of!" 

Since completing his studies with us last year, Toby and The Velvet Hands have been on the road, promoting their debut album, 'Party's Over'. Now they're gearing up to release new music alongside the run of live gigs. 

Toby said: "We weren't actually going to release any music until November but we got offered a few good gigs and so decided to record a single. '

'Don't Be Nice' is about the youthful frustration of being tied down to unwanted situations such as school, a relationship or a job, and wanting to escape. This single would fit well on the first album so it seemed right to release it first!"

'Don't Be Nice', the new single from The Velvet Hands, will be released on 13th June 2019. 

Visit facebook.com/thevelvethands to find out more and read our previous interview with the band.