Another night at the Chelsea Inn found me once again watching a band in awe of how accomplished.
BREATHE/RUST, a four piece from Bristol combining members of The Break Out, The Earth & Me, Nietzsche Trigger Finger and Crazy Arm, are tagged as hardcore on the flyer; the epithet is more than deserved, though I don’t envy whoever has to decide given the array of genres to be found across the four track self-titled debut EP. Continue reading
Thoughts on negative reactions to live music; inspired in particular by Billy Nomates / Tor playing Glastonbury 2023 and The Who in Toronto 2016: Continue reading
To mark the commencement of a 2023 US Summer tour, Etran de L’Aïr—which translates to the Stars of the Aïr—have released two live tracks recorded in Seattle earlier in the year; available for digital download, they’re also NYP (name your price, which includes free if you need it to be).
Seattle is a long way—seven-thousand miles thereabouts—from Etran de L’Aïr’s hometown of Agadez, Niger; a city located in the Sahara desert and the country’s fifth largest.
Etran de L’Aïr’s sound is generally described as desert blues. It’s a genre description in much part originating from the epithet desert rock already being taken in the West by a bunch of stoners who liked recording while out of their trees while out in the deserts of the States—some groovy tunes coming from their endeavours, it should be said—while the sound coming from Africa has a vibe and undercurrent distinctive to musicians in the region. Continue reading
Monday the 12th saw a first visit to the Louisiana, Bristol. Knowing nothing of the headliner, it was another case of a flyer grabbing attention in the timeline and hitting interested on the event from there.
Then came a surprise a couple of days beforehand when finding an article on the BBC website singing the praises of Death Pill’s cause; this I didn’t know about.
Death Pill’s story is phenomenal; so much so, it’s humbling writing now to think I got to witness part of it. Continue reading
I don’t know how POHL’s FREAKSPEED found its way to my ears, but I’m sure glad this ecstasy of crushing sludge rock did.
The overall vibe is a heady mix of Alice in Chains, Jucifer and Weedeater.
And what’s more it comes in poetic form!
Header image (cropped from original) showing the Rolling Stones on stage by Jim Pietryga, 2015, licensing. Continue reading
Girls Like Us (GLU) released Bitter ‘Til The Bitter End the same weekend I caught the band live at the Chelsea Inn, Bristol.
It was a blistering set, part of another top night there (In With the Inn Crowd), during which I was about to turn to a mate and say, ‘killer bass line’ only for him to beat me to it with the exact same words.
The debut album certainly lives up to its name with lyrics plenty raw enough to suggest lived experience fuelling its theme of two-timing, dickhead boyfriends/blokes more often than not from entitled backgrounds. Continue reading
MOOR’s first full length album Viper Kingdom opens strong and solid with track one ‘Lepers Among Us’ and only goes the direction of strength to strength from there.
Track 2 ‘Viper Kingdom’ would be a massive crowd pleaser live for sure and is my pick of the album; coming in at 7.02—the longest track by almost two minutes—it puts all aspects of MOOR’s talents on display, be it a straight-up demonstration of black metal credentials or showcase the unique aspects Halfdan Svarti brings. Continue reading
Mitosis is an album that swings from completely submerging the listener within its own narrative realms to the rhythms synching the mind with any task at hand like an internal soundtrack of one’s own making so seamless it almost isn’t there because it feels like it always is.
The ability of Mitosis to detach the listener from itself while simultaneously never leaving their side is all the more incredible when knowing the meaning of the album’s name and song titles (something I didn’t on first listen).
To quote from the album’s bandcamp page:
‘MITOSIS (/mai’toUsis/) is a part of a cell cycle in white replicated chromosomes are separated into two nuclei. Cell division by mitosis gives rise to genetically identical cells in which the total number of chromosomes are maintained.’
One thing I never expected to hear at a punk gig: a shout-out for ex-footballer Gary Lineker, and more so one well received. Such is the embarrassment of messes the BBC has made in dealing with Lineker’s Tweet of disgust for insidious government policy and terminology, the player I once jeered from the terraces when watching play against Chelsea—I still remember one glorious miss vividly—has become a hero of our times.
Coming from openers Volatile Idea (missing from flyer below), it was not only warning to the fascist elite that their days are numbered—for they definitely are when ex-footballers used to a lavish lifestyle (ish; there wasn’t the same money in football back in the 80s/90s) see eye-to-eye with those that same elite would consider society’s most ‘radical’—but also the first memorable moment from a night full of them.
N. P. Ryan 