NME described them as “The most far out rock ‘n’ roll joyride to leave the Isle of Wight since August 31st 1970, when Hendrix’s trailer pulled out”

The band grew up on the Isle of Wight and still live and record on the island when they can. Their their name is taken from a long winding path known as ‘the Shute’ which runs down the cliff edge to the shore near their homes.

The band formed about 5 years a go when Mike, Chris and Rob got together for a jam having met through playing in other bands. Within a few months they were playing gigs in London and released their first cd soon after. The band has toured Europe three times, playing in Hamburg, Berlin, Zurich, Vienna to name but a few. They have supported the likes of The Go! Team, The Bees, Alexander Ebert and Peter, Bjorn and John and will be supporting Level 42 at Northwood Park this Jubilee weekend.

The Shutes 'live' at Koko

In recent years The Shutes have headlined at the ‘Barfly’ and ‘Koko’ in London and closer to home have played the Isle of Wight Festival and Bestival for the last 4 years. In 2011/12 The Shutes recorded in London studios their latest release, ’Echo of Love’ which was released earlier this year.

Chris and Mike met through surfing on the Island. Mike grew up surfing around Niton while Chris’s local breaks were Compton and Freshwater Bay. It was a few years before they both realised they both had a passion for music.

When Mike started surfing he was looking up to guys like Raff, Lee Webster and the Wells brothers Tim, Sam and Jobie. Chris started surfing with people like Dougie Richards, Ian Pacey and friends.

Chris at Freshwater Bay

Chris at Freshwater Bay - Image by Jason Swain ©

Wight Surf History are proud to announce that on Saturday 2nd June 2012 ‘The Shutes’ will be playing live at Dimbola Museum and Galleries.

Island band ‘The Shutes’ will be headlining the evening with support acts Black House Crow and Sam Scadgell.

This will be the first time The Shutes have played on the Island for nearly a year. The Shutes are on the Island to support Level 42 at the Northwood Park Jubillee Party, but you have the chance to come and see them perform some of their new material first.

Suggested donation on the door of £4 (that’s not much more than a price of a pint). This is a BYO (bring your own alcohol) event but Dimbola hope to have a licence too.

Please RSVP to Wight Surf History or Dimbola direct to ensure your place as numbers are limited.

The Shutes on Facebook

The Shutes MySpace page

Listen to The Shutes on Soundcloud

The Swim is from Hurst Castle to Colwell, approximately 1.5 miles through one of the busiest shipping lanes in the world and some very strong currents.

West Wight Sports centre is a registered charity and unfortunately thier funding has been cut so they rely on fundraising events like this to keep them going as does the Wight Surf History. The Wight Surf History will get half of anything raised over £250 so please give generously.

To sponsor Paul please clcik the link below;

Paul Blackley’s Solent Swim Fundraising Page

If you wish to sponsor Paul by a different means please give Paul a ring on 07786550862 or email him paulblackley@yahoo.co.uk

Image by Jason Swain ©

A couple of weeks a go I posted a picture of some of the rubbish and asked it anyone would get together with me to help clear some of the rubbish at Compton Farm Beach. It got a fantastic response and then I disapeared off to Wales for a nice long weekend. When I got back Oli Harvey and Matt Harwood from the Isle of Wight Surf Club had done an absolutely fantastic job organising everything. They had got in touch with the SAS (Surfers Against Sewage), Robin Lang at the National Trust and Biffa bins, done advertising, organised bags and gloves. Great work guys and a big thank you from everyone who enjoys Compton Beach to all involved.

The majority of the rubbish was from boats and mainly plastics but also lethal entaglements of fishing line and ropes. It is very concerning for our marine  and bird life along our coast. I am sure you have all seen what can happens to these animals if they get caught up in fishing lines or rope.

Well done, it’s your beach so take ownership of it.

Next Saturday 5th May 2012 first thing in the morning at 9am,we are meeting at Compton Farm Beach Car Park, Compton Bay to clean up the beach.

You are not obliged to spend hours cleaning or if you cant make 9am no problem – just come down when you can.

If every one who surfs/walks/swims at Compton, pops down, and spends half hour to fill a couple of bags we would clear pretty much all the rubbish down there in one go.

Bring BIN BAGS! BLACK & the CLEAR ONES you get given by the council – WE ARE RECYCLING AS MUCH AS POSSIBLE

Please understand this is a voluntary event and the Surf Club takes no responsibility for your actions.

Surfers , walkers and other beach users walk past like it isn’t there. I know the National trust employ a beach warden for the summer months and eventually they will have it all cleared but with the warm spring 1000′s of people have been down on the beach since those lovely weeks in February.

This is the home to the Glanville Fritillary Butterfly amongst many others, foxes, badgers, hares and rabbits all live here, in the cliffs around live Kestrels, Peregrine Falcons, Ravens and Buzzards, and the long grass is often a home for Short Eared Owls, but it looks like a rubbish tip right now.

Most of the waste is from storm/tide/ships but there is also plenty of rubbish every year left on the grass & cliffs by people having bbqs/camp fires etc

Anyone interested helping me get this cleared up please let me know. Provisionally we are looking at Saturday May 5th 2012.

This race took place in the early 80′s. We had a surf club meeting in the Castle Inn in Newport and this peculiar race was mentioned. It got everyone interested and we decided to enter.

I offered to build the cracker and others were happy to do the run.

The rules required a cracker which was 12ft long by 3ft diameter. It had to be decorated and six runners had to complete the course with it in fancy dress. The race was from Botanical gardens in Ventnor to Sandown pier.

Annie and I worked on the cracker, it had a 6 inch x 12ft plastic water pipe as the backbone, courtesy of Southern water, six carrying handles, two telescopic handles front and back for passing through narrow spaces and several hula hoops as the frame. Annie and I covered and decorated it ready for the run.

On the day the surf club ran superbly and won, we also won best decorated cracker. My memory is not so good on the next details but I think we won the following year as well.

In the third year we failed to win as some teams broke the rules and used collapsible crackers which could easily pass through the narrow spaces along the course. Not sure what happened to the race after that.

The runners were Dave Jacobs, Mike Smith, Colin Graham, Dave Downer, Neil Smith and Simon Richardson.

On the Tuesday evening before the opening night Jon Hayward and myself were putting up the board rack when we suddenly realised as we were putting in Archie Trickets board that the ceiling was only just over 9′ high and there were beams above the rack. I didn’t know the size of Roger’s Bilbo so I made a quick phone call to him and it was 9’6″. We quickly decided that the only way to get it in was to mount it on a slant and we’d have to do a bit of guess work.

Rog, Jimi and Paul - photo by Jason Swain

Roger and Sandy arrived at Dimbola on Thursday morning and luckily we had allowed enough room for the board although it was a tight squeeze. Jason took a few pics of us with Rog’s board next to the Jimi Hendrix statue and while chatting Sandy said that her Grandfather painted the amazing painting of the 1970 Pop Festival that was up in Dimbola.

Sandy & Rog next to her Grandfathers painting

Everything else slowly slotted into place in time for the opening night and it was a great night. Thanks again to everyone for all the help and to everyone who came on the opening night.

Opening Night - photo by Gerhardt Potgieter