Formed 2 and a half years ago as an elite unit of the King's Own Oxfordshire Noiseniks, The Blitz Cartel have spent much of their time in the field (well, actually they'e more like cramped little rooms with no natural light than what you would traditionally call a field) honing what little skills they have. Those skills being :

Their first collection of 4 demos ('They Named This For Us') was recorded by ex-Rock of Travolta man Phill Honey in a day at Rotator Studios, Oxford. Of those four tracks, Alex went on to make a video to accompany 'Jojo' (see left), a song which garnered some small praise on BBC Oxford's Download show (a recording of which can be found here).

They then went onto record 'Classically Impaired' with friend Jamil Samad, a collection of four further demos whcih went on to pick up some very favourable notices for the track Ninja Punk, described in Nightshift Magazine as ‘like a lost Fall classic, all bastardised rockabilly and buzzsaw fug’ and named Demo of the Week on BBC Oxford’s show The Download (‘I love it’ – Dave Gilyeat).

They have conquered many places in Oxfordshire, including The Cellar and, a recent highlight, The Carling Academy Oxford, at which they supported Stiff Little Fingers. Other notable gigs have included opening for Meet Me in St Louis, Operahouse and It Hugs Back. They would like to conquer places that are further away. However, rather than getting onto this task, they have instead decided to take a 5 month hiatus while Lewis goes travelling.

But fear not Blitz Cartel fans! Over that time we'll be staggering release of the current batch of demos we've been been feverishly working on, as well as preparing a set for 'A Blitz Cartel', an exciting new Blitz Cartel franchise.