False Heads - It’s All There But You’re Dreaming

London trio False Heads have unveiled their debut album after coverage from the big hitters at Radio 1, 6 Music and Radio X, alongside slots playing with Queens Of The Stone Age, The Libertines, David Byrne, Band Of Skulls and Frank Turner.

Most impressively of all, patronage has come from no less a source than the great Iggy Pop, who’s reported to have said: “They are young and talented and going places. If they came to my town I’d show up for that, if they come to your town you might wanna show up.”

Of course, at present that’s easier said than done, but who are we to argue with the great man? Fortunately, he’s right on the money. It’s All There But You’re Dreaming is a beast of a debut, timeless Britrock at its best.

‘Whatever You Please’ starts with the gentle strum of an electric before exploding into a gargantuan statement of intent with chilling, OK Computer-style guitar lines, ‘Fall Around’ has a gripping bass with the call and response vocal style of mid-1990s Blur. ‘Twenty Nothing’ is one of several tracks to channel the insolent sneer of Green Day, but with an English accent that recalls The Subways’ early output whilst raging at the ‘gutter press’.

The riff-tastic ‘Ink’ is a moody, fast-paced thing which puts the bass pedal through its manoeuvres, while ‘Slew’ is a bit less refined and features a big, typical rock-out coda that has the stodgy sound of grunge, demonstrating a shrewd production technique that keeps things just dirty enough.

As ever with these reviews, ‘punk’ and ‘grunge’ will come up as touchpoints but, whilst being hard to avoid, they don’t really tell the tale. ‘Comfort Consumption’ is something of a warped ballad, rattling along comparatively softly and melodically, while the punchy ‘Slease’ is an odyssey that goes in several different directions, but all with a sustained and raucous tempo. In similar fashion, closing track ‘Rabbit Hole’ is a doom laden mini-epic, as the protagonists wail whilst slipping down said hole.

Although featuring a plethora of riffs, the album isn’t all about the guitar: ‘Steady On Your Knees’ puts a brooding bassline front and centre as singer Luke Griffiths stretches his vocal to its limits, and it’s hard to select just one drumming highlight as the entire album is rabid on that score.

It has to be said that Royal Blood are also an inevitable but unavoidable comparison, yet False Heads don’t rely on the wizardry of an effects pedal; theirs is a purer sound. The album is one or two tracks too long and a reliance on repetitive (and shouted) choruses does point to their inexperience. But ultimately, in a year already becoming crowded with strong debuts, False Heads have laid their marker down in impressive fashion.

Opinion - COVID-19 - Music Will Save

A lot of words are flying around at the moment, the main one being ‘unprecedented’.

Whilst being apposite, it also fails to do justice to the situation the world finds itself in. In the UK, despite the depressing outcome for much of us, the general election and then Brexit at least brought a certain amount of clarity and near-relief after three-and-a-half torturous years. Things were just starting to normalise, in as much as they could.

Now this. Now it turns out all that instability was just a starter to COVID-19. You’re all reading the news, changing every day, but to focus on all things music: one of the first warning shots was the postponement of Coachella, more serious the cancellation of SXSW. This in itself was a devastating blow: the festival is a showcase for newer artists and bands, many of whom rely heavily on the exposure and promotional opportunities it brings. But again, these were naught but teaser trailers.

It snowballed: Record Store Day, a key event in the music calendar and a day in which all music fans can attend events and support the art as a whole, pushed back for three months. Gigs started being cancelled and then, as news of the infections and deaths kept coming, it went to the next stage, with tours postponed indiscriminately – Stormzy, The Who, Idles, Ash, Foo Fighters, Madonna, Blossoms among those whose tours fells like dominoes. Live Nation and AEG cancelled their shows. Then, with grim inevitability, the mother of all festivals had to break the news no-one wanted to hear: despite being over three months away, the lengthy preparation time involved meant that the Eavis family had little choice but to cancel Glastonbury’s 50th anniversary bash, a week after announcing what was generally agreed to be the strongest line-up for some time.

The government’s press conference on Monday, 16th March was an attempt to allay fears but fell short; there was ambiguity as to whether venues, pubs and clubs would be required to close, putting their existences as risk. Some steps have been taken to help the hospitality industry since, but it already looks like it won’t be enough. Grassroots venues such as The Exchange in Bristol took the decision on themselves to close. Many others will be following suit, but even more established names such as The Joiners in Southampton are already asking for crowd-funding assistance.

There’s no doubt about it, this is bleak. Bleaker than anyone could have anticipated a few short weeks ago. In less than three months, the 2020s have already been defined. Everything seems to be falling, like in a film. But this is real life.

In music, the bigger acts will be OK. As an example, The Who have already rescheduled their arena tour to 2021. The Academy venues, all owned by o2, will surely be fine. The major record labels have vested interests elsewhere and are undoubtedly insured up to their eyeballs. But some small labels will probably fold. The homes of innovation and creativity that major labels don’t cater for will disappear in the process. Independent record stores, who have done so much to carve a niche over the last few years, will find themselves on the front line when the inevitable recession hits. The damage this thing is going to do, to all walks of life, seems incomprehensible right now.

And yet. And yet. Music will save, like it always does. We music fans are a passionate and resourceful lot, and glimmers of hope and innovation are popping up. Yungblud and Rufus Wainwright are among many acts now streaming gigs, and countless others will undoubtedly follow suit. Chris Martin, Bono and Robert Harvey have performed songs on Instagram (whatever you may think of the first two, their hearts are in the right place). Crowdfunding will no longer be a platform for obsessive folk, but a true platform to help our fellow man.

Twenty years ago, the major labels bought up the independents as a result of the success of Britpop, but back the independent labels came. Vinyl was an outdated concept fifteen years ago, now we have specific days of celebration. Record shops, independent or not, are social gatherings themselves.

As music fans, we’ve always been a community. In this mainstream, commercialised, faceless world of bland high streets and chain pubs, we’ve always been proud to be different. We have to lead from the front with that attitude now. As well as our belief in the redeeming power of the universal language that is music, our innovation and compassion has never been more vital, not only for music but for wider society. For now, support your local venues in any way you can, visit independent shops (not just record stores), show love and support for artists, whether you like them or not. More importantly, support your fellow man and yes, be grateful for our wonderful NHS.

It’s going to get worse before it gets better. This is it. The darkest day. The blackest hour. Chin up, shoulders back. We’ve got work to do.

“So when you see your neighbour carryin’ somethin’,
 help him with his load. And don’t go mistaking paradise,
 for that home across the road.”- Bob Dylan

Morrissey - I Am Not A Dog On A Chain

The fallen hero is back, whether you like it or not.

Whilst criticisms of Morrissey suddenly seem very churlish in these increasingly uncertain days, they still aren’t unfounded. His comments about Harvey Weinstein and his support for Britain First were the most deplorable to some his most ardent fans, yet it’s important to remember ‘twas ever thus: he doesn’t care what you think.

Morrissey has always been an outsider, throughout his thirty-five years in the spotlight always railing against the establishment. However, to quote Spinal Tap, it has resulted in his fanbase becoming ‘more selective’. His comments have also reignited the argument about separating a creative from their art. Unfortunately, he’s just made the debate even more complex.

His last release, 2019’s California Son, was a covers album, lending weight to the idea that he’d creatively run out of steam and as such was sliding into irrelevance, making the case for the prosecution easier. In classic contrary fashion, and as is his wont, Morrissey has in response come up with the most subversive album of his entire career.

He’s never been known for being especially experimental, although that’s a slightly disingenuous perception, each album containing splashes of colour (the mariachi on 2014’s World Peace Is None Of Your Business being a good example). But, I Am Not A Dog On A Chain is almost a complete overhaul of sound.

At first it’s disconcerting on opener ‘Jim Jim Falls’ to hear his sullen tones over electronic hip-hop accompanied by more familiar use of pianos (this time much higher in the mix) and strangled guitar. Meanwhile, a synthetic orchestra adorns ‘Love Is On Its Way Out’, cheap Casio-esque keys and all, and the staggered electronic twinkle of ‘Darling, I Hug A Pillow’ almost clashes against the typical subject matter (‘why can’t you give me some physical love?’), although the vocals are infrequent.

In fact, in another volte-face, the album is surprisingly lyrically-light. One doesn’t choose to listen to a Morrissey album for the instrumentation, but it’s clear a lot of effort has been put into the record, with a lot simmering beneath the surface: ‘Once I Saw The River Clean’ has house music beats, keys and strings combining, and at points Stephen is nowhere to be seen. Similarly, on the frankly bizarre ‘The Secret Of Music’, it seems that the singer is accompanying breakbeats rather than the other way round. The song itself is a dirge, little more than him reeling off a list of instruments (including, hilariously, the bassoon) followed by a little solo of said instruments. It’s nearly eight minutes long, six minutes too much, although it does contain one pearler of an insightful lyric: ‘I delight to cause a fuss’.

On the lyrics, all usual bases are covered – contempt (‘If you’re going to kill yourself to save face, get on with it’); compassion (‘be careful in this knockabout world’) and self-absorption (‘maybe I’ll be skinned alive like Canada Goose because of my views’). Other familiar tropes occur, such as his annoying habit of the first line being the song’s title, while closer ‘My Hurling Days Are Done’ is one of those farewell numbers that frequent every one of his latter-period albums.'

It’s an album of peaks and troughs, featuring both highlights such as the single ‘Bobby Don’t You Think They Know?’, all chiming fuzz with Thelma Houston supplying attitude, glamour and bite, and the slinky, kind ‘Knockabout World’, but also rudderless tracks such as ‘The Truth About Ruth’, which tries to push itself in various directions but always ends up in a cul-de-sac.

So is Morrissey on a rich vein of form, with three albums in 30 months, or does he perhaps feel the hand of time upon his shoulder? Either way, it’s a prolific period that puts younger bands to shame (although given past form we can probably now expect a lengthy hiatus). In light of his reluctance to engage with the media, we won’t ever know for sure. One thing that is safe to presume is that he heeds the advice of this heroes more than ever:

‘There is only one thing in life worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about.’ – Oscar Wilde.

Tricky one.

The Lottery Winners - The Lottery Winners

There’s no doubt about it, things are pretty rubbish right at the moment. The partisan nature of politics is bad enough, but recently parts of the UK have been battered by floods, and now we have a pandemic to deal with. Floods and plague so far in 2020, and the clocks haven’t even gone forward yet.

Even worse for us music fans, the industry is taking consecutive body blows. South By Southwest was the first event to cancel, then Record Store Day followed, postponing until June. Gigs are being cancelled left, right and centre, and if things carry on as they are there could be no festivals this summer at all. We’re already at the point where the Stereophonics are being berated for allowing their gig last weekend to go ahead.

And yet, paradoxically but as it always does, music will save. The Lottery Winners, a four-piece from Leigh, Lancashire are believers and opt for the fun approach. Bonding over a love of The Smiths, they cut their teeth performing in pubs and working men’s clubs, covering tracks by Oasis, The Verve and Radiohead before eventually finding their own sound which has eventually lead to the release of this, their self-titled debut.

In truth, you’d be hard pressed to find a lineage from the bands mentioned above to here, aside from some very generic Britpop echoes. The album is generally more in line with the American pop-punk bands of the early part of the century, albeit not entirely. ‘21’ is held together by Madchester guitars (and, in fairness, a Jagwar Ma vibe), and ‘That’s Not Entertainment’ contains some modern-day wry observations (‘I don’t want to come to your love island and I don’t want to come dine with you’), while ‘I Don’t Love You’ sounds like contemporary Mock Turtles. Not necessarily a bad thing. Elsewhere, ‘Headlock’ has a gnarly Muse riff.

Other than that, it’s pop rock all the way. ‘The Meaning Of Life’ struts with the sound of a mob as backing vocals and ‘Little Things’ is joyfully uplifting, held up by a strong rhythm. ‘18-30s’ is an unashamed youth anthem (‘They never taught us how to live at school’), and ‘My Only Friend’ is one of those heart-on-sleeve, earnest rock tracks that bands like Blink 182 excel at.

It’s all good fun, but there’s not a huge amount of variation; singer Thom Rylance seems to have only one key (not quite screechy), and seems to be primarily concerned with carnal matters which are a little dated. Also, as good as the rhythm section is, on guitar it’s power chords and not much more.

But, and this is key, they don’t take themselves too seriously. Something which, in these troubled times, can be enough.

Porridge Radio - Every Bad

You could be forgiven for thinking that Every Bad is Porridge Radio’s debut offering, such is the hype they’ve been generating.

In fact their debut album Rice, Pasta And Other Fillers was released four years ago. It was a low-key, low-fi offering that will be regarded in years to come as the sound of the band finding their feet. And you can be confident that such discussions will be had in the future, for Porridge Radio are in this for the long haul, whether they like it or not. At the very least, expect Every Bad to pop up when the lists are collated at the end of the year.

It’s one of those albums that instantly sounds familiar and unique, right from the off. Lyricist and singer Dana Margolin grabs attention with the album’s opening line: ‘I’m bored to death, let’s argue’, as ‘Born Confused’ swells with gentle acoustic strumming giving way to a background organ while the rest of the band slowly make their presence felt. The song finishes with a coda of, ‘Thank you for leaving me, thank you for making me happy’. As becomes apparent, Porridge Radio refuse to conform.

‘Sweet’ takes things up a notch, devastating with tornado guitars as Margolin goes up and down the vocal scales whilst the music displays the time-honoured technique of quiet then LOUD. It’s an oldie but it never fails. ‘Don’t Ask Me Twice’ takes another left turn, all tom-toms and cowbells before a life-affirming chorus with angelic backing vocals. Like much of the album, it feels like it’s barely held together. ‘Give Take’ opts for a different approach, always on the cusp of exploding but opting not to do so, and is no worse for it.

Everything feels rickety. Recent single ‘Lilac’ is fragile with laconic guitar and brittle violin. It has the feel of This Is Hardcore era Pulp, without the melodrama. Album centre-piece ‘Pop Song’ also features languid guitar, but has a wooziness that feels like insecurity as music (‘please make me feel safe’). Anything but a pop song, it merits multiple listens with so many different layers hidden within.

Broadly speaking, the album is grandiose in scale, perfectly exemplified by Margolin’s titanic vocals. Lyrically, her nearest touchpoint is Karen O, but on the ever-so-slightly ponderous ‘Nephews’ she performs some vocal gymnastics that only Florence Welch would try, while on the eerie ‘(Something)’ her voice is auto-tuned to chilling effect. The rest of the band play their part too, specifically on the sublime ‘Long’, which again builds slowly, each instrument introducing itself as if part of an orchestra, a special mention reserved for the excellent drumming. The strung-out, fuzzy bass on ‘Homecoming Song’ works well in conjunction with the clattering drums as the song bursts and pops along to bring the album to a close.

It’s not perfect; the price to pay for warranted repeated listens means the lyrics, already repetitive, become wearing. Margolin is a fan of the mantra, repeating simplistic messages (‘there’s nothing inside’, ‘I don’t know what I want, but I know what I want’) which grate, although many are impactful by virtue of her delivery. Otherwise, prepare to immerse yourself in this collection of compassionate war cries.

Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds - Blue Moon Rising EP

Will this please Oasis fans? Noel Gallagher, once their darling, has seen his stock fall over the last few years, primarily down to two things: the partisanship of social media meaning apparently everyone has to take a side and, in correlation, the rebirth of his younger brother.

Despite that fanbase now having the luxury of Oasis-esque material from Liam and more experimental work from Noel, it seems some still aren’t happy. Not that Noel seems to care.

The animosity started following the release of 2017’s Who Built The Moon?, and subsequent releases have only stoked their ire. Despite this, it is his prerogative to experiment (after 25 years of writing songs in a broadly similar style, one can understand his need to do so), but some people refuse to allow it.

By rights this EP (the last of three during the past six months) should go some way towards redemption. The first reveal, Christmas-time single ‘Wandering Star’, could only be him; the wistful romanticism and half-paced chord structure putting his trademarks front and centre. As per, Gallagher rips off one of his heroes (the ‘my oh my’ cribbed from U2’s ‘Stuck In A Moment You Can’t Get Out Of’) on a song that is broadly about his personal life and loves. Kudos to the man, he really loves his wife. The sleigh bells, added at the last minute for that Christmas market, are a bit gratuitous and sound incongruous here in March, but other than that it’s a welcome addition to his many songs of this oeuvre.

‘Come On Outside’ was originally earmarked for his former band, and has been remarkably unaltered in the ten years since being written, this version having been mixed by his old confidante Dave Sardy. The demo has been given a polish, with spooky piano and choirs added, and is an absolute brute of a song with a rollicking vocal performance that hits that Oasis sweet spot. Without wishing to be obvious, it would though be interesting to hear Liam’s take on it.

The title-track is more in line with his new, modern sound, aping 1980s atmospherics as he’s been doing for some time. His vocals are stark against a toe-tapping beat and good melody. The chorus seems underwhelming at first but gets under the skin while the lyrics, once again concerning matters of the heart, are also a cut above.

The Reflex Revision version focuses on the effects, emphasising the ‘Running Up That Hill’-esque noise and other sounds for over seven minutes. Inessential, but a good listen. The 7” mix on the other hand, such as it is, offers little.

With a 66% hit rate this EP should then please the Oasis fandom, a parting gift before his next album.

Interview - Andy Crofts

Photo by Rob Connor

Andy Crofts needs some tips on self-promotion: “It’s by no means anything to do with what my actual album will be. I kind of wish I hadn’t done it! You know when you’re trying to be spontaneous? You can’t be spontaneous when you’re putting something out, it just doesn’t work like that. I had to tell people about it a bit. It’s just a collection of songs that I did on my radio show. No frills, quite rough. The recordings are really raw and some of the levels are up and down.”

The songwriter is speaking to me before his acoustic show at The Louisiana in Bristol, the second night of a mini-tour he’s doing for fun, certainly not to showcase his ‘new album’. As the frontman of The Moons has explained, he’s recently released a covers album just for the hell of it, comprising a number of songs he’s performed on his regular Boogaloo Radio show. “There’s a charm to them, so I just put them together for an album,” he tells us.

“Just for the hell of it, because I didn’t like the thought of those things being wasted. They’re all covers: ‘Wings Of Speed’ by Paul Weller, ‘Ghosts’ by The Jam, ‘Don’t Let Me Down’, ‘Waterloo Sunset’, ‘I Love You’ by The Bees. I asked the listeners to pick a song every week, then I’d cover it. Then I just put them all into one space. It’s just digital. It’s not going to stay up for long. I’m having a very limited run of CDs put together, but that’s it.”

Get it while you can, as Crofts has already moved on. Reason being that he has a lot of irons in the fire at the moment, including a new Moons album. The band have been on ice for a few years, but Crofts has a pragmatic attitude which is generally overcome by his simple and pure love for music: “We’ve been quiet for a while. We did the last album, Mindwaves, in 2014. I’ve got two kids as well, and they are a handful! So I don’t really have loads of time, so to juggle that with the rest of the lads, who live up and down the country…We can’t just hang out and have a ‘praccy’, it has to be properly organised.”

Such is his dilemma that Crofts seems to be debating the band’s future over the course of our conversation: “It’s not fair on everybody else to waste their time and I can’t expect them to just to turn up when I say,” he says.

It sounds like The Moons are succumbing to geography and sadly fading away, before Crofts hits us with a plot twist: “But then other times I’ve thought, ‘What is the point of knocking it on the head? We’re certainly not in it for fame and fortune!’. We’ve recorded a new album in Abbey Road and it’s sounding great. In the last two weeks I’ve mixed it and it’s pretty much done now. Success for The Moons is our own success; we got to record in Abbey Road, with my original music. That’s success.”

Crofts also has a large chunk of a solo album ready to go: “I’ve got a bunch of demos that have been laying around and I’m slowly building them up over time. I’ve got about fourteen songs that I want to be the album. It’s more musical, not indie-schmindie rock and roll, with songs like ‘Jennifer’ or ‘English Summer’. Not jangly indie.”

As to when the album will see the light of day, it’s equally as fluid as the Moons album: “Between Weller work, I guess.”

For the uninitiated, Crofts is a member of Paul Weller’s band, and has been for the last twelve years. He gives us a bit of backstory to their relationship: “I was in a band called the On-Offs which was a power-pop, punky thing. We got support with him, he and Steve Cradock watched us soundcheck and they were loving it. Afterwards I messaged them to say thanks for having us, then Paul rang me and said it was wicked, blah blah blah, send me some demos. So I sent him some of what ended up being The Moons. We stayed in touch via text and then he rang me to tell me he was looking for a keyboard player, was I interested? Obviously I said yes.”

Sometimes dreams do come true. Crofts has contributed in a variety of different ways to the last five studio albums made by The Jam legend, with the next one due for release in the summer. Having been on a rich and prolific vein of form for the last decade, how is Paul Weller’s fifteenth solo album comparing? “It’s sounding amazing,” Crofts tells me. “It’s not a million miles away from what he’s been doing for the last few years. It’s just good songs. I think I know how he’s so prolific: because he’s found freedom in himself. It sounds like a hippy thing to say, but you learn how to knock down all those walls that you margin yourself in with. If you can get rid of that then you’re free to not care and that makes you more prolific.”

Not only that, but Weller also adopts a collaborative approach in the studio: “He’s always been very free, and that’s what I admire about him. We’ll all be sitting round and put together ideas, he’s very good at inspiring us. If, for example, I hear a string section on a song, the string quartet come in they will add it.”

With a new album comes a worldwide tour, and with much of 2020 already taken up, it’s a testament to Croft’s attitude that he’s optimising his downtime by opting to tour himself. After two dates, in his hometown of Northampton and then Bristol, there’s a two-week break before shows towards the end of March. Crofts continually makes the point to me that the gigs are just a man and a guitar (“it’s me and my songs before all the stuff goes on in the studio”), but that’s doing himself an injustice. He keeps the crowd entertained throughout the Bristol show, a special Department S night in conjunction with their regular Saturday night events.

He’s an old-school raconteur, equally entertaining when not playing, giving the crowd insights into the songs he’s written, thanking us in a heartfelt way. He regales us with the strongest songs in The Moons’ catalogue (‘Something Soon’, ‘Jennifer’) whilst also throwing in an adhoc cover of The Beatles’ ‘I’m A Loser’ in addition to a splendid version of ‘I’ve Just Seen A Face’ earlier in the set. As well as that, we get a couple of glimpses of The Moons’ next album. It may be just a man and his guitar but sometimes, when the music is of such purity and honesty, that’s all you need.

“Paul Weller will always be priority, and I can work my music around that,” he tells us. “I’ve become close with him so I don’t ever want to mess around with that. I’m in the band and blessed, so I’ll just make my music work round that.” As for the Moons? “Why can’t we just be one of those bands that just records? There’s all these pressures when you’re in a band, does it really matter? Why can’t you just make music and put it out?’

Why not indeed. Regardless, with so many different plates spinning Andy Crofts, and all of his fans, have much to look forward to.

Dry Cleaning - Live at The Louisiana

There may have been a storm battering the UK for the third weekend in a row, but inside the small Bristol Louisiana (Feb 29th) there’s sweat dripping from every attendee’s pores.

Dry Cleaning are slowly but surely building up a dedicated fanbase having recently taken up a mini-residency on BBC 6Music, and it’s not hard to ascertain why: there’s nothing else like them at this point in time. The musicianship isn’t especially original (consisting as it does of guitar, bass and drums) nor are Florence Shaw’s insights about the mundanity of life, but the delivery is unique.

It’s hopefully not doing Shaw a disservice to say that she isn’t really a singer, more a quasi-poet raging against elements of 21st century life, albeit in tone rather than volume or animation. The frontwoman is zen-like in her performance, at various points either staring blankly into the middle distance or looking quizzically at the audience, perhaps surprised that we are so entranced. Like Liam Gallagher, she has made a lack of movement beguiling.

Her bandmates, in contrast, are a bit more recognisable. Tom Dowse on guitar, who has the determination to wrench as many sounds as he can from his instrument with vigour, is a more traditional indie rocker (beard, long hair), whilst Nick Buxton on drums is clean cut. Threatening to upstage Shaw (and nearly coming close) is bassist Lewis Maynard, who’s full Spinal Tap, gurning at the audience and rocking out like he’s playing Wembley. All in all, they are a motley looking crew, with the instrumentalists unbridled in their joy at being able to live their dreams.

With two EPs under their belt, Dry Cleaning have enough material to deliver a strong set. They roar into life on ‘Spoils’ as Dowse’s guitar goes from gnarly to spiky. Musically the band have a variety of influences; ‘Dog Proposal’ sounds like a lost Cure track, ‘Viking Hair’ has a sheen reminiscent of The Cars, while in a more general way the sound is reminiscent of Sonic Youth’s lo-fi moments. An exception is ‘New Job’, which is lo-fi on record but live carries itself like a muscular Television. At points the supporting music to Shaw’s diatribes is repetitive, but only when necessary, i.e. when the song is focused on what she’s saying.

And she has a lot to say: sometimes it seems like random meanderings, such as on ‘Traditional Fish’ which, at first, appears to be little more than a list of things she’s read when out and about (‘chicken burger pizza’). However, even when doing so it’s compelling, her delivery streams of consciousness for her own sake, which is what art ultimately is (although the presence of a music stand in front of her with lyric sheets shatters that illusion somewhat).  On occasion, the subject matter is more apparent, such as the tragic heroine of ‘Viking Hair’, and ‘Magic Of Meghan’, a presumed ode to the former princess.

Rarely less than acidic, sometimes she opts to sing, as on ‘Sit Down Meal’ and generally sounds flat, but one suspects that’s the intention: despite their name and subject matter, Dry Cleaning are anything but dull.

Interview - Deja Vega

Deja Vega are the latest in a fine tradition of great bands from the north west of England; a power trio in the most literal sense, they combine the adrenaline of Oasis, the grandeur of The Verve and the widescreen soundscapes of the much-missed Exit Calm. Yet such musical ambition and dexterity belies the trials and travails that they, like many of their peers, have gone through.

When I met frontman Jack Fearon in Bristol prior to the second show of a recent five-night UK tour, he told us of the unusual position they were in of having a fully recorded, mixed and mastered album with no label on which to release it: “We had the album recorded and it was sat on the shelf for about a year or two. We were drip-feeding the singles and eventually we were going to take songs off the album and make a five-track EP with songs people had already heard and scrap the others.”

It was desperate times calling for desperate measures. They were eventually able to release their self-titled debut album last October, but unfortunately the label which had first given the band an opportunity had by then fallen by the wayside. “It was really sad,” Jack explained. “We signed to an independent label called Runway Records, as it was coming up to the releasing the album the owner emailed us and said, ‘We haven’t got the funds to press the album’, it wasn’t just us, they did it to three or four other bands. It was a bit gutting, and we felt sorry for the guy because we could tell how gutted he was.”

This early setback left the band in a quandary, but they were undeterred; “We just said, ‘Sod that, we’ll save some money and press the first single ourselves, with a DIY ethic’. Then another label called Sister 9 came along and they said they wanted to press the album for us.”

“I still listen to it now and I’m quite proud of it. There’s nothing I’d particularly change about it.” Rightly so: it’s a sonic slap in the face, comprising eleven watertight tracks of pacey psychedelia that sound like they’ve been produced by Phil Spector and mixed by Kevin Shields.

It’s fair to say it’s not in-line with British guitar music’s current dalliance with ‘post-punk’, instead the album could be from any point over the last forty years, exemplified by their residency at the Shine On festival. “It’s amazing and we’ve done every year. It’s great to see the progression of fans. The first year we played to about forty people. As we’ve gone on, we’ve gone up the stages and played to loads more people.”

Unusually for music of such widescreen ambition, the subject matter of the songs is generally quite intimate. Fearon is an observational songwriter, following in the footsteps of Damon Albarn and Kelly Jones, broadly writing about the foibles of individuals. “People fascinate me,” he told us. “I get dead inspired by hearing stories about people I know or people from the town that we’re in. Each song is about a person I’ve come across or a story I’ve heard.”

The music itself, however, is a group effort: “We just jam, play for three hours solid and something will pick us up. We like that so we’ll concentrate on it, find the structure and use it. It’s very rare that I go in the studio and say, ‘Lads, I’ve written a song, what do you think of this?’. We tend to jam and it turns out better.”

Their sets at Shine On brought them to the attention of The Wonder Stuff, whom they have supported, and a music legend of the north west, Brian Cannon, whose Microdot company designed the iconic early Oasis sleeves, and in the 90s also worked with The Verve and Ash. Cannon now works on all the artwork for Deja Vega.

“We met Brian years ago as our old band and we were saying, ‘Listen to our tunes’,” Jack recalled. “He never got back to us, so we thought it probably wasn’t for him. Then we did Shine On in 2015 and we saw him there. We said, ‘Come and see our band’, and obviously he couldn’t remember who we were. Then he happened to be walking through as we were playing and pricked his ears up. As soon as we finished he ran into the dressing room and said that was the best thing he’d heard in the last ten years. Then he kept asking when he was going to do some artwork for us, and we told him we had no money. He said, ‘I don’t care, I like you that much that I want to do the artwork’. Brilliant, a legend of a guy that’s sorted us out. We’re working with him now.’

The short tour, meanwhile, which covered London, Bristol, Nottingham, Birmingham and Manchester and sadly will have finished by the time you read this, was in conjunction with not only the album, but also a new single entitled ‘Who We Are’, the first salvo from their forthcoming second long-player, inspired by their experiences of the music industry thus far: “It’s a song about not giving up and having self-belief. There’s been loads of times we’ve been promised stuff and it’s been dropped, like the stuff with the album. We had to pull ourselves back up and get on with it.”

Tour details are being finalised, as well as some support slots, although the band have no preference on who they tour with; “I don’t think you can be picky,” Jack said. “If someone turns round and says to me, ‘Do you want to support Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs Pigs or the Spice Girls?’, I’d say I’m not bothered as it’s a gig at the end of the day. And it’d be a good gig.”

Based on their showing at the Louisiana, ‘good’ is underselling it. The three young men filled the room with a glorious cacophony: ‘Eyes Of Steel’ packed a punch like Kasabian on speed, ‘Chasing’ bounced along with drummer Tom taking a break from his usual relentless pounding to throw everything at the song, filling every space, and the closing wigout of ‘The Test’ was, like much of the set, held together by Mike’s titanic bassline.

The trio managed to create a vibe that was both intensely epic and spacious. When asked earlier to describe Deja Vega’s sound, Jack had said ‘fast and bulbous’, which is incredibly self-deprecating. Volcanic would be far more fitting.

Interview - HMLTD

HMLTD have taken the long way round.

Active for five years, the six-piece have learnt the rigours of the music industry and manipulated them to their benefit. Initially signed to a major label after generating a huge amount of buzz back in 2015, things didn’t pan out and the band sought pastures new.

Yet the extra spent time formulating a strategy enabled new ideas and sounds to formulate. Their debut album, West Of Eden, was released in February, one of the most eclectic and ambitious you’re likely to hear all year: synth pop, Madchester house, euro pop, western…it’s all contained within.

“That’s really intentional,” frontman and lyricist Henry Spychalski told me before their recent gig at the Exchange in Bristol. “One thing that we really hate in a lot of bands is that there’s not really much to distinguish any one song from another. It quite often just collapses into itself. The intention with the band has always been to never write two songs that are the same. That’s why we try and explore so many different genres.”

HMLTD are based in flourishing south London, but Spychalski is keen to clarify that the area isn’t the home of a specific movement, more of a mindset: “I don’t see it as a scene but more of a community. Within the community you’ve got lots of different artists who actually respect each other and know each other on a personal level. We all play different genres: Shame make 1970s punk, we make this electro art-punk or whatever you want to call it, black midi make prog or math rock. There’s always artists that are doing really different stuff. I have a lot of respect for those other artists and I believe that’s mutual. It’s like a petri dish of ideas.”

West Of Eden has ideas in spades. Its lengthy gestation, due to circumstances beyond the band’s control, brought about the opportunity to throw many genres into the pot. “The album is so much richer for having had an inordinate amount of time spent on it,” Spychalski said. “It’s the best part of three or four years work. Most of that work hasn’t made it onto the album. Some have been discarded, thrown to the wayside in their dozens. Not necessarily because they were bad, just because they didn’t fit this narrative we were trying to build.”

The broad scope extends to the narrative as well as the soundscapes; opening track ‘The West Is Dead’ should give you some idea. “The last year was just this real tough process of crystallising the concept and the themes, and then creating this narrative thread that runs through the album,’ Spychalski elaborated. “The album is about the death of the West, and the spiritual crisis that has occurred in the wake of the collapse of religion. About trying to rediscover meaning in this really meaningless landscape against the backdrop of ecological crisis, and economical and political catastrophe.”

Whichever way you look, mankind is in trouble. Yet much has been made of the younger generation having to make sense of the mess that’s been created by their forebears. “When you look at what’s happening in the world politically at the moment, the rise of the far right, populism, the massive inequalities being created by neo-liberalism…all these things may be a necessary stage we have to pass through in the historical dialectic, in order to move on to something better,” Spychalski said. “Our generation is probably going to have to bear the burden of a lot of that transition and the pains that it will produce. I think our generation’s lives are going to be filled with a lot of pain and difficulty. The album’s about having to still find joy in life against this backdrop.”

Depressing stuff, but there is hope in defiance. HMLTD don’t claim to have the answers, but refuse to get dragged down to the quagmire: “We want to show rather than tell. We don’t want to be pedagogical. But we also want to be very explicit about what we’re showing, and to try and show it in the clearest light possible. The album is short term pessimist, long-term optimist. It’s celebrating the darkness before the dawn and trying to find a space to dance within it.”

So broad is HMLTD’s sound that it’s no surprise they are building up a following on the continent as well as in the UK: ‘Next week we head into Europe,” Spychalski told us. “This (Bristol) is our last British date and then we’re going across to Europe which should be fun. Just a week, not a big tour, a whirlwind trip.”

Indeed, their plan for the rest of the year is to spend some significant time building up a fanbase in foreign fields. Gruelling experiences of the UK festival circuit apparently requires a fresh approach for 2020: “We’re trying to avoid English festivals and focus on eastern Europe. People don’t really appreciate you at English festivals, and nor do the promoters. You just get treated like shit, then you go to Europe and the hospitality is incredible. They really look after the artists and it’s just a far more enjoyable experience.”

Europe’s gain is Britain’s loss, as the album translates well live: the acid infused beast that is Loaded, with a thumping bass that brings to mind the super clubs of old, is mind-blowing, but then twenty minutes later Spychalski is facing the Exchange crowd, arms aloft to the full-on Euro trance of Blank Slate. It causes no end of frustration to a writer, that they are indefinable, but epic synth-pop is the broadest term that could be tenuously applied.

Singer Tallulah Eden, who features on several tracks, provided a sensual breathlessness to the fray, working well in contrast to Spychalski’s extravagance and high-octane sincerity. It’s a powerhouse of a performance from a band fully aware of the society in which they operate.

“We live in a generation where attention spans are shrinking and shrinking,” Spychalski had concluded. “To an extent you need to just celebrate what you have before going on to the next thing. That applies to music and to anything else.”

Psycho Comedy - Performance Space Number One

Sometimes albums just come from nowhere, existing in a world of its own, one only its creators fully understand.

Usually debut efforts, those creators have had the luxury of time to create aural versions of their headspaces. In the case of Psycho Comedy, they’ve been operating as a band for five years with limited releases, presumably beavering away to make their debut as close a reflection of their particular headspace as possible.

Immediately attention is grabbed by the opening track, a statement of intent as you’d expect from a song named after the band; a vaudevillian warped offering (think early Horrors) that pulls open the curtain to reveal the eerie realm that we are to inhabit. If you weren’t already aware that Psycho Comedy hailed from Liverpool, you will be as soon as lyricist and frontman Shaun Powell utters his first distinctive sounds. Like their spiritual forebears The Coral, they bury the tunes as much as possible, but they still make the way to the top.

Likewise on ‘First Cousin Once Removed’, Powell channels Miles Kane against chiming guitar and garage rock that sounds fifty years out of date but wonderful for it, with a hint of Northern Soul for good measure. ‘Performance Space Number One’ could be sampling the Troggs’ classic ‘Wild Thing’ on first listen, while the galloping, sleigh bell-drenched ‘Pick Me Up’ (a recent single) has the feel and confidence of a classic, albeit one pulled from the Nuggets series.

The influences keep coming; ‘I’m Numb’ cribs the rollicking sounds of ‘Lust For Life’ but throws a surf rock guitar riff in for good measure. ‘The Hangman’ evokes ‘Peter Gunn’ with guitars clashing before giving way to a stream of consciousness from Powell. In contrast, the bass sounds like it’s operating in another realm.

Melodrama is king; the swaggering ‘We Adore You’ confrontational yet vulnerable, and ‘Sleepwalking’ advises us to ‘jettison that sunshine’. It may sound depressing, but the righteousness with which it’s delivered outweighs anything else. In contrast, the jaunty ‘Standin’’ has the melody of a bubble-gum pop track, but once again hidden beneath jangling metallic guitars. The album is broken up by short spoken word pieces (‘Island’, ‘The Theatre Came Crashing Down’) that act as brief interludes, opportunities to catch breath and escape the maelstrom of glorious noise before going again.

Psycho Comedy have taken elements from a variety of inspirations that either should have or should be more well-known: Echo & The Bunnymen, The Velvet Underground, The Cramps and The Blinders can all claim to have their fingerprints on Performance Space Number One, but the quintet have the gumption and vision to meld their influences together to create a piece of work that stands apart.

Like those influences, they are unlikely to attain mainstream success, but that’s Joe Public’s loss – these are a special secret who should only be shared with a chosen few.

Following in a fine tradition, Psycho Comedy should be Merseyside’s next great band.

The Murder Capital - Live at SWX, Bristol

There’s nothing more gratifying than following a band on a journey of incremental steps.

Last year, The Murder Capital slowly crept into our lives via word of mouth and a gradual flow of radio sessions before their fine debut album, When I Have Fears, found itself on numerous end-of-year lists. Justly so, as it’s one that rewards repeated listens, featuring a new slice of hidden drama or lyrical gem at every turn.

Their brooding intensity is now appearing at bigger venues; in autumn last year they were playing the 500 capacity Exchange in Bristol – less than six months on they are able to fill the SWX with over twice as many punters. Yet their power hasn’t diminished on a bigger stage, and nor have the theatrics. The musicians walk on stage first, bassist Gabriel Paschal Blake still leering at the crowd, its increase in number of little importance to him, while vocalist James McGovern makes his presence felt immediately as he dives into the crowd before powerful opener ‘More Is Less’ has even finished.

Although pigeon-holed as gloom merchants in the vein of Joy Division, the quintet actually borrow most liberally from the Pixies, a famine and feast, quiet-then-explosive approach which serves them well. There’s a real maturity in the work too, songs are given the chance to breathe; ‘Slowdance (I &II)’ is primarily powered with bass and drums, Damien Tuit and Cathal Roper on guitars dipping their toes into Pink Floydian grandeur but restraining themselves for the good of the song.

One thing that has changed is the lighting, now much more befitting a band with a measured depth of sound. When the more explosive tracks kick in the band can only be seen as silhouettes, all moving in time to their own bursts of life. In contrast, during the heartbreaking ‘On Twisted Ground’, McGovern stands alone in a spotlight. Excuse the cliché, but with the crowd silent, listening to his desperation, a lone pin falling to the floor would be heard. Aside from the low bass and McGovern’s distant vocals, the only sound that can be heard in the SWX is that of the bar staff.

Before the track, McGovern issues a message of solidarity to hold on to our friends. The song itself is a paean to a friend of the singer’s who took his own life, and it’s emotionally draining to watch, let alone play. The silence at the end, broken only by McGovern’s breathing into the mic, is both uncomfortable and spellbinding.

Following track ‘Green & Blue’, all tom-toms and Gang Of Four guitars, moves proceedings back to more familiar, anxious territory, and is a good bridge to the snarling guitar of Love, Love, Love. The twin hurricanes of ‘Don’t Cling To Life’ and ‘Feeling Fades’ bring urgency back too and close the set with a flourish.

As with the album, watching The Murder Capital live is an experience logically sequenced to target the hearts, heads and souls. Making small gigs feel intimate is easy but to be doing it now on a larger scale is a sign of real power.

Don’t bet against them bringing their majesty to festival tents, for this is surely the next step in their progression.

Interview - The Ks

The K’s seem destined for big things. Without releasing an album the band are already becoming a must-see on the live circuit and have a fanbase on social media that’s growing by the day. Only a handful of singles, the latest of which was released on Creation23 last year, are all singalong anthems. Judging by the crowd reaction for the new songs performed recently at the long-running Department S club night in Bristol, many more are to follow.

Jamie (singer, guitars), Dexter (bass) and Ryan (guitar) all live in Earlestown, with drummer Jordan making the effort to travel in for rehearsals from Blackpool. I caught up with the band a week after their biggest gig yet, a sold-out show at the Ritz in Manchester…

How did you meet?

Jamie: Me and Dexter had been in the same class since reception. We all went to the same school. Jordan lives in Blackpool and we got him in.

Dexter: Ryan lives down the road and we used to play football as kids. Me and Jamie have been in a band since we were dead young. Then we split up for about two years. Jamie and Ryan met at a house party and Ryan said he could play guitar.

Jamie: We’ve known each for years, we didn’t meet at a house party! It had been about five years by this point!

Ryan: I was playing in another band and these boys were playing elsewhere. Then we got Jordan in and it kicked off.

What are the main musical influences on the band?

Ryan: Loads of different bands. It’s hard to say when people ask that because there’s loads.

Dexter: The Clash, The Jam, Stiff Little Fingers.

There’s been a handful of sporadic singles up this point, what does the next year look like in terms of new music?

Jamie: We’ve recorded (the next single) and we’re looking at producers now because we want to change bits of it. We recorded it at the same time as ‘Glass Towns’. It was recorded quite a while ago and we’ve done different bits so we want to get it re-recorded. Not fully, we just want to add some bits.

Dexter: It was a long time ago and we’ve recorded a lot more demos since then. Because there’s a back catalogue that’s still our next single. We’ve got singles for the next two or three years! But if we miss this one out then it’ll get missed.

Ryan: We’re just strategically planning out songs in line with tours the agent’s planning at the minute, so it’s hard to say. We know there’s one coming out in March. We’ve got lots of songs to release, it’s just planning it around when’s best to do it.

What about an album?

Ryan: We’ve got the songs.

Jordan: The demand is there. Whenever we put a post up saying, ‘news coming soon’ everyone always says, ‘album?’. They’re ready for it. We’ve started to put some new songs in the set, ones that no-one has heard before. We’re just testing them out, see how the crowd reacts then we work out where to put them in the set.

Obviously playing live is important to the band…

Jamie: It’s at the stage now were we just get in a van and go where we’re told. We’ll play anywhere. Half the time we don’t even know where we’re going.

So what’s on the agenda on that front?

Jamie: A mini-tour and then straight to festivals. The first festival is in April. We’ve got a tour in March and then we’ll be doing festivals until October, and then back on tour in October. We’ve got loads in the diary.

Presumably the Ritz show was the best yet?

Jamie: The Ritz was the best one we’ve done, but Kendal Calling (last year) was mega.

Ryan: We didn’t expect anyone, and it was mobbed. It was good because it wasn’t our crowd.

When I caught The K’s live it was all tub-thumping rock songs delivered by a gang of young men with an absolute belief in where they are going. It rarely failed. Tight without being too slick, their debut single ‘Sarajevo’ now has all the hallmarks of an indie disco staple, while ‘Glass Towns’ filled the venue. Onstage, the band looked like what they are; a bunch of friends who happen to be creating music that resonates. Many more venues will feel their force in 2020.

Liam Gallagher - Acoustic Sessions

Well, this was a pleasant surprise.

Released in conjunction with the video for ‘Once’ (featuring Eric Cantona), it ostensibly works as an EP for the same track: two versions adorn this short collection; a demo devoid of added effects or instrumentation, ably demonstrating that a good song is a good song regardless of production (featuring, as it does, only guitar with Gallagher harmonising) and an acoustic offering which strips the Lennon vibes of the original whilst retaining the strings, the earnestness of the song suiting the stripped down model equally as well as the parent track.

There are three other tracks lifted from Liam Gallagher’s successful second solo album Why Me. Why Not?, none of which add anything of substance. ‘Alright Now’ remains chippy and jovial and not markedly different while ‘Meadow’, as the name suggests, was a gentle track anyway but here has keys strangely low in the mix, almost non-existent. One of the stronger tracks from the album, ‘Now That I’ve Found You’, sounds less FM rock than it once did, still unashamedly sentimental but with a strong vocal.

All three tracks are less than six months old so none are wildly different from the originals because let’s face it, most fans are basically here for new spins on Oasis, of which there are three, each one over twenty years old.

Liam’s voice has understandably changed during that time, his voice now containing more nasal sneer than before. He bends the notes to fit the new singing style, which in the case of' ‘Cast No Shadow’ feels like a loss. The passing of the years has shaved away some of the naïve charm that his voice once had on the most faithful cover included, and with the more direct (and simpler) drumming and melodramatic piano, it feels much more professional. The female backing vocalists add some emotion in lieu of brother Noel, but on the whole, it seems an odd choice.

‘Stand By Me’ is much better, the acoustic sound more in line with the emotion of the song than the bombastic, full band version from Be Here Now (although it has to be said even that can’t hide from the song’s unnecessary repetition, with each chorus being the same line three times). Wisely, the track is truncated at the end but that’s probably the wrong choice; it would seem more suitable to trim the choruses elsewhere as it ends suddenly, with that gorgeous middle eight (working very effectively sans electric) acting as the crescendo.

The real jewel in the crown is the new version of ‘Sad Song’. Since the release of the Supersonic documentary back in 2016, Oasis fans have longed to hear a full Liam take on the Noel-sung lost classic. In his usual way, the younger Gallagher wrenches the emotion out of every note, obviously in a more confrontational style, but no less effectively. Now with added subtle strings which rise elegantly, it’s a welcome addition that compliments the original.

This collection contains some odd choices then, and it would have been nice to acknowledge his first solo album (having recently reimagined the song live, a stripped-down version of ‘Greedy Soul’ would have seemed an obvious inclusion), but that’s nit-picking and missing the point of what this is: a nice little treat for the faithful.

Interview - The Subways

Back when they first broke through in the mid-2000s, The Subways always held an advantage over their contemporaries.

Not just because of their youth (the band were in their late teens when they won an ‘unsigned’ competition to play Glastonbury in 2004), but because of their style too: not for them the art-rock that was prevalent at the time, their approach was more visceral, timeless, geared simply around the pure joy of rock music.

“We grew up on rock ‘n’ roll music and, for me, getting on stage and playing was about letting go of all the shackles of everyday society,” frontman Billy Lunn tells me. “The notion that we have to get up for work, serve other people and make money, all that bollocks…for me, rock ‘n’ roll is about tapping into that primal impulse that harks back to dancing round a campfire, looking up to the gods and praying for rain. It’s something that we need to do.”

It’s the reason their fine debut album Young for Eternity has stood the test of time and is now, along with sophomore effort All Or Nothing, being reissued to mark its fifteenth anniversary.

Their debut’s title, at the time a rallying call for all generations, now seems even more fitting. It sounds vital and urgent in the way that all bands’ debut albums should do, blistering and unrestrained by cynicism. A decade and a half later, does its co-creator (the band shared credit for all 13 tracks) look back on it, as we all do at the past, with a squirm? “For years afterwards I would listen back to it and wish I did things differently,” Lunn says. “I couldn’t listen to it.”

“But now I can really listen to it and enjoy it because I know what it is. It’s a snapshot in time of our lives suddenly going really, really wild. All our dreams coming true and all that stuff. I think of it now as a diary entry, an encapsulation of that whole circus, and I love it for it. Even the sad memories of the tension in the band or shows where everything went wrong.”

The rigours of life on the road are well reported; touring, the pressure-cooker environment, the distractions available all clichés for a reason. Throw in your bandmates being your ex-girlfriend and your brother, and there’s bound to be tension. It’s testament to the strong bond the trio have that they are able to celebrate this anniversary in one piece. “If you can get through those periods of difficulty and tension, and a lot of the time it involves compromise, coming to terms with your own characteristics and getting to know things about your personality that you really need to get over, it totally strengthened us,” Lunn believes.

“One of the binding things about this band is that Josh and I are brothers. Charlotte and I were previously engaged to be married and then broke up. Getting through all that stuff was facilitated by music. Music is what got us through those periods and I’m so glad for it. I’m so thankful that we’re all so close and that kept us together, but more than that I’m so glad that we kept making music together. It’s allowed us to come back, fifteen years after Young for Eternity was released, and celebrate that.”

It’s not just their timeless debut that’s getting the reissue treatment; its 2008 follow-up, All Or Nothing, is finally getting a vinyl release too – Lunn gives us a bit more insight into why it’s taken so long: “We’re doing this anniversary tour for Young For Eternity, but we’re also using this as an excuse to issue a vinyl format for the second record. People have been talking about that since its release. It’s one of those things where you can’t just go, ‘Send it to press and get a big batch ready for the next tour’. You need a campaign to do it, and we thought this would be the campaign. We’re really proud of that record. A lot of bands coming out in the 2000s had hit first records and really struggled with the second. We really knuckled down for our second album. It’s easily one of our best, so it’ll be nice hear it on vinyl format.”

For their first album, The Subways were able to rattle through the recording quickly, capturing the energy of their live shows having been working on the songs for some time. They opted to take a different approach for its follow-up. “We talked to several producers and I said, ‘What about Butch Vig?’,” Lunn recalls. “I loved Nevermind and Garbage, Sonic Youth, Smashing Pumpkins. It was such a long shot, but he really liked the demo.”

“It involved going over to America and recording in Los Angeles. Around that time we’d been touring the US quite a lot and I was listening to a lot of the rock that was being played on US radio. I thought, ‘That sounds massive. How can we achieve that?’. It was really by going over and using American ears and American desks. Pre-amps and compressors, all that jazz. We came back with a really transatlantic record, rather than Young for Eternity which is Britrock.”

Both albums will get a fair airing on the forthcoming anniversary tours, which take up a large chunk of the year: “We’re doing a good couple of weeks in the UK. We really want to work hard in the UK because we’re quite aware of just how hard we‘ve worked outside of the UK. We’ve done really well over in Europe and America, and in Russia as well. We want to really work hard, get these shows totally nailed in the UK. That’s the first couple of weeks of the tour and then we’re off to the continent and playing a massive tour.”

There are plans afoot longer term too. A fifth album is in the works, as Lunn tells us: “The first single back is going to be in the summer, but no new record until at least probably the end of this year, maybe the beginning of next year. Just because we’ve got a couple of other projects that we want to finish. The anniversary tour we want to just sit back and enjoy. We were so young when we first released that record and went out and toured it. It was so over-whelming so it’s going to be so nice to be back on stage and in kind of a better place. A bit more world-weary and a bit more experienced so we can just relish it. We won’t want to rush the album during that experience.”

Time away from the band has given them fresh impetus. It’s now five years since the release of their self-titled fourth album, and the trio took the opportunity to live a little, in varying ways: “I took three years out to go to university. I’ve been hanging backstage and reading books for a good five years! In 2015 I told the guys that I wanted to go to uni and take three years out. I thought they were going to be really angry with me, but it turns out they were well up for it! Charlotte went off, had her baby and did some work with other people. Josh went to France, where he lives with his girlfriend and his daughter, and had three years of bliss. I studied for three years which was good fun, but during that time I was also writing material.”

Time well spent on all fronts, but enough is enough. Rock fans need bands like The Subways in their lives, and it’s not just the old lags who are looking on with keen interest. Their time away has also enabled a new generation, brought up on their visceral rock, to make themselves known. “I feel privileged in that respect, that we’re still relatively young in comparison to our contemporaries,” Lunn concludes. “It’s really nice to be playing alongside bands who’ve said, ‘We covered ‘Rock ‘n’ Roll Queen’ when we started’. I feel the solidarity with bands that are coming out now much more than when we first came about in 2004/5.”

“It’s a great feeling because we never really had any of that. Bands are playing to get up there and make people feel something true and express themselves.” The wheel of rock keeps turning, but bands like The Subways, with a clarity of message that resonates to all, will always be relevant.

Young for eternity indeed.

Wire - Mind Hive

Post punk.

Briefly scan through any article about a politically or socially charged band with guitars and the likelihood is this description will be there somewhere.

Wikipedia describes it as being ‘inspired by punk’s energy and DIY ethic but determined to break from rock clichés, artists experimented with sources including electronic music and styles like dub, funk and disco’. By definition therefore it’s meaningless, in that presumably anything recorded after 1976 can fit into that category (although it’s hard to imagine Coldplay ever choosing the term to describe themselves).

Yet most who choose the moniker would cite Wire as a key influence. Often labelled as the first post-punk band, the presently four-piece are a testament to longevity not stifling creativity. Despite having had several sabbaticals, Mind Hive is their seventeenth studio album and is as beguiling as the first.

Better than that, it’s an album that evolves without alienating the listener. It’s a struggle to imagine the mighty, menacing distorted guitar of opener ‘Be Like Them’, swinging as it does and held together by Robert Grey’s solid clatter of drums, being part of the same recording sessions as last track ‘Humming’, a state of the world address (‘I can’t remember when it went wrong, someone was humming a popular song’) atop a funereal church organ.

The first few tracks are primarily styled in Wire’s more recognisable timbre: ‘Primed And Ready’ once again features great cracks of the snare and crunchy, suffocating guitars while ‘Cactused’ goes one further, all stop-start, effect-heavy walls of noise that are almost shoegazey. Meanwhile, Colin Newman’s vocal delivery is quintessentially English, bringing to mind a dreamy Bryan Ferry. The track recalls present-day Ride and is an album highlight.

Yet around the halfway point the album regenerates itself. ‘Off The Beach’ is as breezy and deft (with acoustic guitars, for shame!) as all songs about the seaside should be. The band then go full Pink Floyd; ‘Unrepentant’ is spaced out and swirling (Newman now uncannily channelling Roger Waters) and ‘Shadows’ is similarly hazy but with a sinister undercurrent. Of course, when the subject matter is outlining mankind’s atrocities a smattering of dread is to be expected.

After providing ten consecutive minutes of laconic bliss, ‘Oklahoma’ purports to do something similar but lulls the listener into a false sense of security, the wall of guitar slapping us back into the here and now before the bass oozes out of the speakers. Held together by the repeated message ‘I admire your sexy hearse’ (nope, me neither), the track demands full attention in preparation for the final furlong. The seven-minute ‘Hung’ can only be described as a noise symphony in several parts, atmospheric noise rock at its finest. Vocals are kept to a minimum but once again a simple mantra is all that’s required (‘In a moment of doubt the damage was done’). Lyrically, ‘Humming’ goes one step further, decrying the ‘oligarchs’ and ‘empire vacuums’ that bedraggle 21st century western society.

If you’re looking to escape the doom of the modern world you won’t find such relief here (although with Wire, you probably shouldn’t have pressed play in the first place), but to avoid Mind Hive would be to deny one’s self.

As fresh and as vital as anything produced by the younger generation, the ‘first post-punk band’ are showing no signs of slowing down.

Field Music - Making A New World

Never ones to take the easy option, Field Music have always made a habit of standing apart from their peers.

Formed during the indie revival of the mid 2000s, brothers David and Peter Brewlis had close links with other inhabitants of Tyne and Wear (members of both The Futureheads and Maximo Park have featured in their ever-evolving line-up). And while mainstream success eluded them until a Mercury nomination in 2012 (for fourth album Plumb), they always seemed content to plough their own furrow.

Indeed, after second album Tones Of Town in 2007 the pair went on hiatus before it was fashionable. Over the last decade and a half since they’ve worked on numerous other projects but the mothership of Field Music was never far from either’s orbit, keeping relatively prolific since being endorsed by none other than Prince back in 2015.

Making A New World is their third album in four years and stems from a project the band undertook early last year for the Imperial War Museum. It’s quite convoluted, but the central theme comes down to imagining the long-lasting effects of the First World War and how they have shaped the world we live in today.

The album starts as two tracks representing the sounds at the minute leading up to 11am on 11th November 1918 and the silence thereafter. ‘Sound Raging’ is a subtle opener, with shimmering effects over acoustic strum, and as such it’s hard to imagine how it represents what was surely a cacophony of unimaginable noise, but you get the idea.

The album continues in chronological order. The ever so-slightly honky-tonk of ‘Coffee Or Wine’ outlines the journey home from war, ‘A Shot To The Arm’ covers how the horrors of war lead to the Dada movement, which in turn lead to the extreme performance art of the late 1960s, and so on. Eventually we are brought relatively up to date, with ‘Money Is A Memory’ detailing the final payments made by the German Treasury in 2010 as agreed within the Treaty Of Versailles.

So as a concept (for a concept album is what it is), it’s fascinating. As a piece of music, sadly less so. Structured over 19 short songs, there is very little substance, the eclecticism over-cooked. Several tracks are dominated by one instrument; ‘Between Nations’ a nagging synth, ‘Do You Read Me?’ held together by rattling drums and ‘Beyond That Of Courtesy’ little more than a simple guitar chord. The simplicity of the instrumentation doesn’t feel like it represents the subject matter with enough gravitas.

And yet the highlights are high indeed. ‘Only In A Man’s World’ is deliciously filthy shimmering funk and segues well into ‘Money Is A Memory’, a spiritual son of Bowie and Lennon’s ‘Fame’. Elsewhere, the wonky ‘Best Kept Garden’ sounds like a stoned, less frantic Vampire Weekend, and ‘A Change Of Heir’ features guitars akin to Paul McCartney’s (good) 70s output. Taken on their own these tracks sit comfortably alongside Field Music’s finest offerings. There’s just not enough of them.

Full marks for effort and conceptual imagination, but Making A New World sadly falls short sonically.

The Big Moon - Walking Like We Do

We all know, or at least have been told continuously, that genres are becoming a thing of the past.

Having easy access to an incomprehensible amount of music has swept the boundaries and stigmas away. Yet one classification defies the passing of time and technology: pop.

But what is ‘pop’? As a genre in and of itself it means to add a synth sheen, or expanded production, or the heinous crime of being catchy. That’s nonsense of course, in its purest sense it’s popular and therefore more encompassing.

The Big Moon, like Girl Ray before them, have been accused of ‘going pop.’ Their Mercury nominated debut, 2017’s Love In The 4th Dimension, was raucous indie fun, deceptively heavy and one for the indie purists. With a few more years’ experience (and therefore cynicism) under their belts, the four-piece have delivered the first big hitter of this new decade and have quite rightly developed their sound.

It’s true to say the guitars have been rolled back, but this new lightness of touch should not be mistaken for an abandonment of principles, more a willingness to enhance the sound. Introducing synth pads and layered harmonies is not always a red flag.

Opener ‘It’s Easy Then’ is a slow start with dislocated and distant backing vocals breathing life into an initially maudlin song. It’s lightly atmospheric but the foreboding drums are a signpost that everything is not quite what it seems. First single ‘Your Light’ is more (obviously) more accessible, layered and driving Killers-esque FM rock with that bassline that you always hear on this type of song. Juliette Jackson’s defiantly matter of fact English vocals are incongruous against the song and shouldn’t work but do.

Essentially the band have given themselves more room to breathe with instrumentation and arrangements. The chipper, bouncing ‘Take A Piece’ is held together by jaunty piano while the rickety ‘Don’t Think’ brings to mind the hooks of Franz Ferdinand. ‘A Hundred Ways To Die’, meanwhile, is almost music hall in its chirpiness. Arctic Monkeys’ AM is the key touchstone here, in particular ‘Why’, which evokes the swollen hip hop beats of that album, and ‘Barcelona’ which is all sauntering swirling bass. Elsewhere, the stomping ‘Holy Roller’ features the reassuring sounds of a winding guitar outro. The Big Moon have tweaked the winning formula rather than usurped it.

The lead single aside, it’s a slow-paced album which is a side-effect of the style they are taking. There isn’t much to set the pulse racing and the mid-paced songs do blend into one by the time the album reaches its conclusion. But the old-fashioned, simplistic yet satisfying melody of ‘Waves’ makes up for that, while Dog Eat Dog’s subject matter (social inequality and the tragedy of Grenfell Tower) warrants the heavenly voices and eerie keyboard.

Lyrically, Jackson isn’t afraid to confront the world we live in (‘maybe it’s an end cos this don’t feel like a start, but every generation probably thought they were the last’) but she doesn’t condemn and instead encourages empathy.

Rest assured, The Big Moon haven’t ‘gone pop’ in its harshest terms. They’ve simply broadened their palette by growing and, if there’s any justice, stand well placed to reap the rewards.

The Libertines - Live at The O2 Academy, Bristol

Once the UK’s most controversial, and one of its most lauded, acts, in 2019 The Libertines occupy their own orbit, as they always have.

They’ve been reunited for longer than they originally existed (originally the band came together for a reunion in 2010, then once again in 2014) and in that nine-year period have headlined festivals and played their own big shows, as well as offering up a fresh album (Anthems For Doomed Youth back in 2015) to sit comfortably alongside their side-projects.

That album was four years ago with not a new crochet heard since, the hotel/pub in Margate the band has launched seemingly taking up all their time and energy. Yet Peter Doherty has released two solo albums in the meantime, and rumours of a fourth album have been blowing in the wind for a while now. One can hope this winter tour is to get them match-fit for a new campaign; the audience doesn’t get any glimpses of the future though, as tonight (Dec 16th) is primarily about nostalgia. Not wholly, but largely.

Because this band still means a lot to people. The joy on the faces of the audience (largely in their thirties, as to be expected) as the foursome stride on stage and launch into the ramshackle ‘The Delaney’ acts as perfect demonstration. Rarely does the pleasure let up. Band and audience have matured together; Pete’s current look straddles Albert Steptoe in full duffle coat and flat cap before switching to Peaky Blinder once the coat is gone. Carl, meanwhile, is more debonair, his combination of cravat and braces recalling the English gentleman of days of yore.

One has to feel for John and Gary, especially given they are the heartbeat of the band. Great lyricists and unique showmen Pete ’n’ Carl may be, but as guitarists they are both limited and so it’s down to the rhythm section to demonstrate their class (although John may as well give up trying on backing vocals). The dubby ‘Gunga Din’ makes the venue vibrate, while it’s no surprise that Gary has always gone topless such is the shift he puts in. His tinny and powerful rattling on ‘Boys In The Band’ and ‘Can’t Stand Me Now’ make the songs transcendent, and his solo before ‘The Good Old Days’ is a particular highlight.

This aside, there’s very little in the way of improvisation. The Libertines’ precariousness was always their charm but that won’t wash two decades in, so tonight borders on professional and crowd-pleasing with no fat. The four-piece sing in harmony on ‘Dead For Love’ in a show of companionship, while Carl conducts the inevitable singalong for ‘What Katie Did’. It’s heartening that they have faith in the newer material to sit alongside the classics, but there’s no doubting why everyone’s here, as they drown the venue in vocals for closer ‘Don’t Look Back Into The Sun’.

So where does that put The Libertines? Heritage act? Partly. Relevant force in British guitar music? Ish. Crowd-pleasers? Unequivocally. What became of the likely lads? We’re no closer to having an answer. Thank goodness.

IDLES & Beak, Live at The Marble Factory, Bristol

The Give A Sh*t Xmas initiative is only in its second year but it’s already able to attract a heavyweight headliner; after a storming 2019, IDLES topped an emotional night.

Of course, the fact that the movement is fully aligned with IDLES’ core message – unity – helps massively. All proceeds, including profits from ticket sales and the raffle on the night (which included a main prize of Joe Talbot’s car), are distributed towards those who need it most, via a series of Bristol-based and focused homeless charities. This, combined with the political atmosphere (unavoidable in Bristol generally, but inescapable on election night), made for an evening on which to feel righteous.

But not too much. The wonderfully-named Billy Nomates and her DIY aesthetic set the scene; the music, her moves and her hair are all ever so slightly off-kilter, but that’s what makes it work. To be different is to be unique. Then, after a short interval, fellow local heroes Beak give us what can only be described as psychedelic light-entertainment.

Geoff Barrow’s mob (heavily involved in Give A Sh*t Xmas) are all electronic swoon and subtle, pulsing soundscapes, the woozy ‘Life Goes On’ being a highlight. But between tracks their onstage patter is equally as entertaining. It’s a unique night so they have free reign to be even more self-deprecating than normal, reading out negative comments underneath an online video of theirs and facilitating the raffle complete with Martin from Homes Under The Hammer. Hilarious and heart-warming stuff.

IDLES were due to take to the stage at 10pm, so there was anticipation that it would be timed beautifully with the UK General Election’s exit poll and the crowd could lose themselves in either a fit of pique or anger. Alas, they took to the stage early and were in full swing by the time the news many dreaded had filtered through, with no acknowledgement by Joe and the gang.

Not that it mattered. They are riding the crest of a wave at the moment and nothing can pull them off course, especially not when there’s a packed local crowd more than willing to be swept up with it all. They’ve spent much of the autumn recording their third album, and although we only get a brief glimpse tonight, it augurs well. Opening track and newbie ‘War’ suggests that album three is going to follow closely to the manifesto set by last year’s Joy As An Act Of Resistance, a tub-thumping clarion call of a song, watertight rock at its finest which sets the tempo before the slicing guitar of ‘Never Fight A Man With A Perm’ cuts through the wet night.

Having just undergone a short December tour, the band are performing at the optimum; Jon Beavis drums like a beast, Adam is everything a bassist should be, Lee is comparatively understated and the man who has won hearts over the year (Mark Bowen) can surely be allowed the luxury of clothes just this once. It is December after all.

It’s a relatively short set but no-one can feel aggrieved; such is IDLES’ quality now that any grievances can be centred around what they leave out. ‘Mother’ is frantic, ‘1049 Gotho’ is an assault on the eardrums and the message of ‘Danny Nedelko’ immediately becomes even more pertinent than it was a few hours previously.

But that’s a concern for tomorrow, tonight is first and foremost about the worthy cause, and the blistering music.