Category: Band News

At the end of a rather good band rehearsal indie rock wedding band ‘Punch The Air’ decided set up a few cameras to record this Yellow by Coldplay cover. The video and audio had to go on the back burner for a while as we were very busy with weddings, birthdays and corporate event parties. But eventually Andy found some time to mix it all. Everything you see and hear is  played 100% live. This audio wasn’t recorded elsewhere in a studio that the band then mimed to while filming the video, it features fully live audio. This early 2000’s song is a staple in our live set and is very much loved at weddings. You too can hire an indie rock party band for a live event by contacting band leader Andy Starkey now. 

Self produced video and audio of Yellow by Coldplay Cover

Dressed in casual clothing you will see Punch The Air (not in our normal smart wedding band clothing) performing one of the most famous Coldplay singles. Yellow by Coldplay was recorded in March 2020 at Rockfield Studios, Monmouth, South Wales. It was released as a single in June 2020 and was taken from their debut album Parachutes. It reached number 4 in the UK singles chart and even went to number 1 in Iceland.

The original music video features lead singer Chris Martin walking down the sandy beach of Studland Bay in Dorset, UK. The video is one single take and the audio was sped up for Chris Martin to mime along too so that they could slow it back down later. This then gave a slow motion effect to the video. The single sleeve cover to Yellow by Coldplay features a silhouette of a dandelion in front of the sun on an orange/yellow background.

Here is how doing the speed ups/low down effect would look like if we added the live audio over the top of us miming along. Pretty interesting eh?

Yellow by Coldplay chords

Verse – B F# E
Bridge – E G#m F#

The song is actually in E A D G B Eb(D#) tuning but it’s still possible to play it without needing to retune the high E string down to E flat.

The song doesn’t really feature a chorus its just made up of a verse, bridge and another bridge.

Members of Coldplay:

• Chris Martin – Lead vocals / Keyboard / Guitar
• Jonny Buckland – Lead guitar
• Guy Berryman – Bass player
• Will Champion – Drums

B sides of Yellow.

• Help Is Round the Corner
• No More Keeping My Feet on the Ground

Hire a live covers band for a wedding, birthday party or corporate event.

Band leader Andy Starkey from indie rock wedding band ‘Punch The Air’ has come up with a fantastic solution for locating stolen guitars using an Apple AirTag. In Andy’s video below he will quickly and easily demonstrate hiding an Apple AirTag in a Guitar.  You can purchase an Airtag for about £20-25 either directly from Apple or from most online and brick & mortar shops. They’re fantastic not just for relocating guitars but for finding all kinds of lost things like lost keys, inside luggage, your vehicle or even your dog. Buy a bunch of them, put the on anything you want and then use the Find My app on your iPhone to locate them all. It works flawlessly. If you or anyone you know are looking hire a professional wedding band based in the UK contact Andy for more information. Punch The Air perform huge indie hits by Coldplay, Oasis, The Killers, Blink 182, Oasis, Feeder, Kings Of Leon and more. Hire a wedding band now. 

What to do when hiding an Apple AirTag in a Guitar

Nobody likes losing their musical equipment, especially if stolen by thieves. Because until now there has been pretty much little to no way of successfully recovering stolen guitars. Below Andy will show you the best place to hide an Apple AirTag on a guitar so that it can’t be seen by thieves.

To hide an Apple Air Tag inside a guitar you will only need three things:

• AirTag – £/$25
• Screwdriver – From your tool kit
• Blu-Tack (Or another brand of reusable adhesive) £/$1

1. First of all unscrew the screws out of the scratchplate. In Andy’s case he only needed to remove the screws from around the guitars pots and input.
2. Pull off a good blob of Blu-Tack. Roll it in your fingers for a new moments to make it more pliable. This will also warm it up to make it a little more sticky.
3. Stick the Blu-Tack on either side of the AirTag (It doesn’t matter what side you stick it on)
4. Place the AirTag somewhere in the cut out of the wood of the guitar body. Then give it a good firm press down so that the Blu-Tack adheres to the wood. Make sure the AirTag isn’t touching or obscuring any wires, pots, pickups or the input. 
5. Replace the guitar scratch-plate
6. Screw the screws back into the guitar scratch-plate.
7. Done

The chances of a thief thinking or even bothering to unscrew a pickguard to look for an Apple AirTag hidden underneath it are surely very, very low. All you need to do it open up your “Find My’ app on your Apple iPhone, iPad. Or on your iMac, Mac Book etc, click on the “Items” tab at the bottom and this will help you locate your missing guitar. Then using “Precision Finding” you should be able to get very close to your stolen instrument with any  iPhone 11 or iPhone 12 variants. The battery lasts for about one year and easily replaceable, but your iDevice should advise you when it is starting to run out. So then all you have to do is repeat the process above again.

Further thoughts on placing an Apple AirTag inside a guitar.

You may need to remove more of the scratchplate or completely remove it to find an area to secure your AirTag to. In some cases you may even need to bore out a slightly larger space/hole. Do this under your scratch plate to hold the Airtag. You could even drill the exact diameter and depth of the Air Tag. Which is 32mm x 8mm and have it fit perfectly under your pick guitar without the need to add Blu-Tack. Having fitted this over two years ago now Andy has experienced no interference at all from the AirTag in its current location by the input and pots of the guitar.

Contact Andy to book a professional indie rock wedding band across the UK and beyond. 

We’ll assume you’ve been searching through lots of wedding bands looking to hire musicians for a wedding reception? Well, finally you’re in exactly the right place. Established in 2013 (Yes, thats over a decade ago now) ‘Punch The Air‘ professional live function band have the uptempo high energy show you’ve been searching for. We’ll give you two live performances (or one long one if you prefer) of indie rock classics (Coldplay, Oasis, Killers, Blink 182, Kings Of Leon, Stereophonics) and chart pop tunes coupled with a massive crowd pleasing show you’ll never forget. Crowd surfing, feet stomping and going totally insane is what you and all your guests will get up to when you hire a live party band. Contact band leader Andy Starkey to check on price and availability to hire wedding bands in the UK.

Hire wedding bands for your evening reception.

When you book a live wedding band for an evening reception ‘Punch The Air‘ will handle all of your live entertainment and so much more too. As well as two live performances tailor made to your requirements we’ll also provide DJ services throughout the evening too. This will save you lots of money (That you can then spend elsewhere). As you won’t need to hire in a separate DJ and all of his sound equipment. Which incidentally will also take up more room on the dance-floor of your chosen wedding venue. ‘Punch The Air‘ are a completely self contained party band coming supplied with our state of the art digital sound system and lighting rigs. Our wedding function band will light the stage area AND dance-floor too. Again you wont need to hire extra equipment when you hire our professional live wedding band. With over 100 five star positive reviews you can be assured we’re the party band for your wedding reception. 

Hire live musicians throughout the UK

It doesn’t matter where you’re based in the UK, we’ll bring the live music to you. Massive hits from The Killers, Blink 182, Oasis and Kings Of Leon. Also huge hits from Stereophonics, Blur, Reef  and The Cure. Couple that together with artists like Queen, The Beatles, Neil Diamond, Elvis, Van Morrison and The Undertones and thats one heck of fun evening for everyone. We’re the wedding reception band you’ve always dreamed of booking. Nothing is too much hassle for us on your special day. We’ll always chip in and try to help keep your party running as smoothly as possible. Book a live wedding band in Staffordshire, Derbyshire, Leicestershire and book a wedding band in Shropshire. Also hire a live party band in Northants, Nottinghamshire, Lancashire, West Midlands & East Midlands. 

If you need to rent a Wedding Band in Buckinghamshire then South East England indie cover band ‘Punch The Air‘ are the professional musicians for your Bucks reception party. With a huge array of massive indie rock cover band classics both old & new from Muse, Kaiser Chiefs, Feeder, Foo Fighters, The Lemonheads, Coldplay, The Killers, Oasis. You know for sure that all your guests will have sore feet and raspy throats come the end of the night. We’ll inject that much needed energy back into the room after the lull of a post wedding breakfast. As well as big indie tunes we’ll also play some popular music old and new. Your other guests will love our songs by Lynyrd Skynyrd, Queen, Chesney Hawkes, Walk The Moon, Bryan Adams, George Ezra, Neil Diamond, Chuck Berry, The Beatles and more.

Contact band leader Andy Starkey to book a Buckinghamshire Wedding Band to make sure we’re still available for your wedding reception. Ask us anything you like when you hire a wedding band in Buckinghamshire. We’re very friendly professional musicians who will help you organise your wedding reception with ideas and tips about timings and schedules if you like.

What we’ll bring along with us when you hire a Wedding Band in Buckinghamshire 

Indie band ‘Punch The Air‘ are completely self contained. We will bring along absolutely everything needed to your wedding reception to produce sound and lighting. Making sure you don’t need to hire anything else in separately (At parties with approx less than 150 guests).  Thats the PA system speakers, mixing desk and the bands entire backline. How about we also throw in DJ services from the moment we’ve finished setting up until midnight. Also our covers band will handle the dance-floor and on stage lighting too. No extra charges? Crikey, what a relief eh. 

Hire a South East England function band

As professional musicians we will provide you with live entertainment throughout your county and beyond. Hire us for your wedding party in:

• Amersham
• Aylesbury Vale
• Beaconsfield
• Burnham
• Buckingham
• Chesham
• Chiltern
• High Wycombe
• Marlow
• Milton Keynes
• Newport Pagnell
• South Bucks
• Wycombe

Book a party band with lots of optional extras like evening photography services, acoustic daytime wedding performances. Also microphone and speaker hire for speeches, wedding projector hire to show all your treasured photos, custom gobo lighting to watermark your special day. Furthermore late night DJ services past midnight as your wedding party band.

With so many high end wedding venues to chose from….

It can’t have been an easy decision on where to have your special day. Did you choose any of our favourites?

• De Vere Latimer Estate, Latimer
• Chicheley Hall, Newport Pagnell
• Denham Grove, Uxbridge
• The Bull Hotel, Gerrards Cross
• Kings Chapel, The Kings Arms Hotel, Old Amersham
• De Vere Horwood Estate, Little Horwood
• Holiday Inn Milton Keynes, Newport Pagnell
• Stoke Place, Stoke Poges

Even if you didn’t we’d still love to play a part in your special day at whatever wedding venue you chose. We can be your wedding function band and give you a night of live entertainment you’ll never forget.

Book a function wedding band in neighbouring borders.

We’re not just a Buckinghamshire Wedding Band, you can also hire a Greater London wedding band. Then book a Berkshire wedding band or hire an Oxfordshire wedding reception band. Book a Northamptonshire wedding party band, Bedfordshire wedding band, hire a Hertfordshire party band. See how many wedding reception venues recommend us too as their goto wedding entertainment band. We’re also available to book as a party band, birthday party band, corporate event entertainment, Christmas parties and more. Contact now to check on availability and price.

Do you need to hire a UK wedding band near me? Great news because ‘Punch The air‘ are a wedding band near you. We travel all over the UK performing as a Staffordshire wedding band, Derbyshire party band and a Leicestershire group. Also a Shropshire band, Worcestershire wedding reception band and all other areas of England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales. It doesn’t matter where your wedding venue is, we’ll come to you and bring the tunes. If you love artists like The Killers, Kings Of Leon, The Beatles, George Ezra, Amy Winehouse, Neil Diamond, Walk The Moon, Elvis and more then hire a professional group. Contact band leader Andy Starkey ASAP to check on price and availability for your date and wedding venue and don’t forget to include venue name and postcode. Then you can hire a wedding band near me for a wedding reception.

Hire a UK wedding band near me.

When you book a band for a UK wedding near me we’ll provide you absolutely everything needed for live music at a wedding party. All the bands backline equipment which includes guitars, amps, pedals, and leads. Then a state of the art PA system loud enough for any wedding venue. Also we’ll include lighting for both on stage and on the dance-floor. But it doesn’t end there, we’ll also give you DJ services until midnight too. You and your party guests can continue to dance the night away when we’re not rocking out live for you at no extra cost. Having been around a decade now since 2013 we know exactly what kind of performance brides, grooms and guests love. We’ll put on a high energy show guaranteed to get everyone up dancing, just like in the video below. 

Do you want to consider some additional extras too? Then how about:

• Acoustic band performances (Solo/Duo/Trio) throughout the day or in the evening
• Evening Photography Services
• Late Night DJ Services
• Wedding Projector Hire
• Fog machine hire
• Custom projector logo lighting featuring your names, the date and a custom logo
• Microphone & speaker hire for speeches

With over one hundred five star positive reviews you can be sure you’re booking a professional band for you wedding reception party. Put your trust in a group who perform at weddings weekly and can back up their claims through consistent quality video and photos. It doesn’t even matter if your venue has a sound limiter, we can always bring along our electronic drum kit. No matter what might occur we can handle anything that is thrown at us on your special day. Contact a professional party band and make sure your party goes as you deserve, as expected. 

We’ve just created the ‘Friends And Family First Dance’. What on earth is that you may ask? Well, some brides and grooms (And brides and brides or grooms and grooms) don’t really like the idea of doing a first dance in front of all their guests. So ‘Punch The Air‘ band leader Andy Starkey came up with the alternative first dance option…..The ‘Friends And Family First Dance’. Contact bass player Andy Starkey to check on price and availability to book a wedding band for your wedding reception. 

Have Your First Dance With Friends And Family, not a normal 1st Dance.

It’s incredibly simple, rather than just dancing alone together in front of all your guests, you and your other half are joined on the dance-floor by all of your wedding reception guests. This is a superb way to get everyone onto the dance-floor nice and early to make the most of your live entertainment. And guess what? All eyes are NOT on you. There’s no daunting empty dance-floor with everyone watching your every move. There’s no panic build up months, weeks, days and even minutes before the usual first dance performance.

It’s all your guests TOGETHER on mass, having fun with you and your partner. Andy will do his best to make sure all your wedding reception guests join you on the dance-floor for your special first dance….Even those you’ve never see dance before. (Even if it’s for just one song) So come on, let’s do it, let’s all dance together en masse. 

Check out Cheryl and Clare’s Friends And Family First Dance video below. They weren’t really up for a normal First Dance. So Andy Starkey from the band suggested they change it up instead. You will see and hear Indie Rock Wedding Band Punch The Air perform the classic Queen track ‘Crazy Little Thing Called Love‘ from our repertoire to a completely full dance-floor. Doesn’t this look absolutely super different and something you’d enjoy too? Obviously if you can’t view the below video? Then watch on our YouTube channel. 

We’ll make sure you enjoy every single moment of your wedding reception with ‘Punch The Air‘ performing live, Contact as soon as possible to book.

Now is the time to finally book your June wedding band and get your big day back on track. Hire Punch The Air wedding band. 

On 22nd February 2021 in The Houses Of Parliament Prime Minister Boris Johnson revealed his Road Map out of lockdown including the restarting of weddings and wedding receptions. The information was again all restated and expanded on later in the evening at the 7pm briefing. Hire a professional wedding band ‘Punch The Air‘ (Formed way back in 2013) with over a decade of wedding experience together. We have hundreds of reviews from previous wedding clients all happy to tell you exactly how we made their special day even better than they’d ever hoped.

If you’re into your indie rock (Oasis, Coldplay, Blink 182, Kaiser Chiefs, Kings Of Leon) but also want something for everyone else at your wedding (Elvis, Beatles, George Ezra, Kinks, Amy Winehouse) then we are the perfect band so you. Contact now to secure a high energy wedding band guaranteed to get all your guests up dancing. You can book our wedding party band throughout the entire UK.

Currently the Covid Wedding Calendar is:

• Monday 8th March 2021 – Step One – 6 guests in attendance
• 12th April 2021 – Step Two – 15 guests in attendance
• Monday 17th May 2021 – Step Three – 30 guests in attendance
• 21st June 2021 – Step Four – All social contact limits due to end with wedding restrictions subject to review.

Although the caveat of “Subject to review” is in there relating to the four tests. We believe it’s a pretty safe bet to book your wedding band for dates moving forward from 21st June 2021. As by this time most adults will all have been offered the vaccine. Don’t forget we are still honouring our 100% Covid Refund policy on having to be canceled due to Covid for any reason. 

As you will see each steps has at least five weeks between to ease lockdown measures in England. This is because it takes around four weeks for the data to show the impact of easing restrictions. Then the government will provide a further week’s notice to the public and businesses ahead of any further changes.

Hire a 2026 Wedding Band

Don’t delay, book Punch The Air as your wedding band for Summer of 2026 including June 2026, July 2026 and August 2026. Or why not consider an Autumn or Winter 2026 wedding in September 2026, October 2026, November 2026 or even December 2026. You can finally have the big wedding day you always dreamed of. We’ll handle all your live music and will supply all lighting and sound equipment too. With very competitive prices we’ll give you the most amazing wedding experience you’ll ever see. Watch all our videos that we’ve produced over the years. Most of which are filmed live at clients weddings. They show just how much everyone enjoys our high energy performances and get involved with it all too. Contact now before someone else steals your date.

Are you hosting a wedding reception on a farm? Or are you a farmer or a son or daughter of a farmer looking to hire a farm wedding band? Then ‘Punch The Air‘ are the live wedding entertainment professionals you’ve been searching for. We have performed on many, many farms since our inception way back in 2013. We absolutely love a good farm style wedding as they are always so much more relaxed than those hosted in hotels and manors. We’ll perform massive singalong dance-along songs by artists like Coldplay, The Killers, Kings Of Leon, Blink 182, Oasis, Fountains Of Wayne, Wheatus and more for you and your other half. Then for your guests we’ll play tunes from The Beatles, Amy Winehouse, Bryan Adams, Neil Diamond, Elvis and more. You’ve got the best of both worlds with us handling your live entertainment. Contact band leader Andy Starkey now for price and availability for your farmers wedding. 

Hire a Farm Wedding Band

Whether you have a barn for us to perform live in or a marquee, tipi or tent we’ll make sure all your guests are up dancing all night long to our indie rock classics and pop tunes from old to new. Why not decorate your countryside wedding venue with rustic features or go super modern and contemporary in your farmhouse or cottage. Forget about agriculture, crops, mucking out and milking for a day and enjoy your wedding day in style on your home farmyard. We’ll bring along everything needed audio wise and we’ll even throw in free tablet DJ services too. That’s quality Yamaha speakers and subwoofer, LED lighting for us and you too. You don’t need to think about anything else sound or lighting wise when you book a professional wedding band like Punch The Air. 

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First Dance

Check out our live video above at Katie & Stuarts farm wedding. They chose You’ve Got The Love by Florence + The Machine as their first dance. As this classic tune is part of our repertoire we performed it live for them. Whether you’re a young farmer or an older farmer you’ll love our high energy live performances.

Having a wedding on a farm barn

Hosting a wedding on a farm means you’ll always have plenty of space for guests. Also room outdoors for old-school party games, gin horse boxes, street food vendors and much more.

What’s also great is that you can chose to work to your own relaxed schedule. As opposed to having to work to a hotels strict set of timings. You’ll find you’ll have a more much relaxed wedding on a farmyard. Also it means we can crank the volume up of our PA a touch louder so you have more of a festival style wedding. 

Indie rock cover band ‘Punch The Air‘ bass player (And lead singer) Andrew Starkey is a massive fan of The Smiths. Andy Rourke is one of Andy’s favourite bass players ever and one of the reasons Andrew Starkey picked up the bass guitar and plays a Fender Precision. Along with Morrissey, Johnny Marr and Mike Joyce, The Smiths were a huge influence on Andy growing up. So Andrew decided to help others out who want a bass guitar lesson Barbarism Begins At Home to learn a bit of the funkiness of Mr Rourke and so created this instructional video. To book an indie rock cover band contact Andy for price and availability. 

Bass Guitar Lesson Barbarism Begins At Home (The Smiths)

You can download & print out the bass tab to Barbarism Begins At Home to make it easier to play along to the above video.

Right click on each of the below and select ‘Save Link As’ to download the bass mp3 to Bass Guitar Lesson Barbarism Begins At Home to practice against. Each mp3 is repeated multiple times to save you rewinding.

1st – 20% Slower
2nd – 15% Slower
3rd – 10% Slower
4th – 5% Slower
5th – Normal Speed

How to get better at playing this bass line.

This is quite a tricky bass guitar line to master and it’s not one for complete novices. That said though, if you keep at it, start very slowly and over time build it up. You will nail it eventually. It’s as much about building up muscle memory on your bass guitar as much as anything else. Play it multiple times a day, then play it without looking over at your hands at all. When you’re not overly thinking about it anymore, that’s when you know you’ve got it licked. Do you know what bass guitar Andy Rourke from The Smiths is playing in the image below?

In comparison check out the video below of what this song would have sounded like if Andy had just played root notes throughout. What a different vibe and VERY boring eh?…..yawn

Andy Starkey is also available to give bass guitar lessons in and around the Lichfield, Staffordshire area. Find out more about what Andy can teach you on the Lichfield Bass Guitar Teacher page. Andy works on his own unique way of teaching which doesn’t involve learning notes or theory. It’s just about working out how to play your favourite bass lines and enjoying yourself. What could be a better way of learning how to play an instrument than from someone who performs live for a living? Are you a big fan of Andy The Smiths too?