brighton – and so she thinks

The Brave Faces – Lots of Nights Out

admin — Sun, 31 May 2020 07:50:28 +0000

Brighton based band The Brave Faces are releasing their next single Lots of Nights Out on Friday 29 May 2020.

It’s an energetic tune influenced by 80s post-punk, shoegaze and contemporary indie. And is that an Interpol vibe I hear there? It sounds good, regardless. On this tune competing soundlines bristle as a poppy melody line pummels along over the top. Lyrically, it’s an interesting take on the rock’n’roll lifestyle – is it really the answer? Together the contemplative lyrics and spirited sonics create something that tustles with tension as it envelopes its way around your ears. The pull back and build around three and a half minutes in makes you fizz with anticipation, before the grand crescendo at the end.

Lead vocalist Darrell says: ‘Lots of Nights Out is about getting to an age by which you’d always thought you’d have it all figured out, but you still haven’t. You’re in pain, you’re worried about getting old and you feel directionless. It explores and critiques the only ‘medication’ I had at my disposal at that time of my life: going out and getting drunk. It’s from the perspective of someone reflecting on their lifestyle, talking about the time they spend trying to escape and impress other people. This track is about taking a step back and seeing this mentality for what it was to me — fun, but ultimately exhausting and damaging. The end of the song tries to encourage anyone in a bad spot that things can and do get better.’

Introducing…Thrillhouse

admin — Thu, 19 Dec 2019 09:00:53 +0000

Having a chat with Sam from Thrillhouse to celebrate the release of new single One Of These Days,

So for those who don’t know, who are Thrillhouse?

Thrillhouse are Alistair Scott, Jackie B. Nielsen and Sam Burns.

One Of These Days is dark and lively in equal measure, a sort of sombre dance tune. Is it evocative of your usual style?

Not all of our songs are quite a ‘dancy’ as this one, but they’re all upbeat musically I suppose but with a dash of melancholy in the words.

There’s four of you in the band. Who writes? Is it a democratic process?

I write the songs and demo them in my pokey little flat and then get the others in to finish them off. So semi-democratic, semi totalitarian dictatorship.

You’re from Brighton – what’s the local scene like?

Brighton has a pretty good music scene at the moment. It seems to go in waves. I’ve seen some really good bands over the last few months. Squid and Fur are great…and are also great names.

Who or what influences you?

It’s been influenced by Talking Heads, where you can do a lot with quite a little. Brian Eno said ‘repetition is a form of change’ and we’ve tried to apply that to the music. It’s not just that we’re lazy, it was intentional…I think?

Pygmalion at Brighton Early Music Festival

admin — Sun, 29 Oct 2017 20:09:56 +0000

The theme of this year’s Brighton Early Music Festival is ‘roots.’ Art never exists in isolation, and the festival explores the tangled web of links that modern music has with ancient instruments, the way that classic pieces resonate with contemporary times, and the myriad influences of the globe on national sounds. The festival aims to bring fresh eyes to familiar work. Forms from the sonata to the string quartet, oratorio and opera, are all on offer. None of these classic forms sprang from nowhere, but are part of a rich tapestry of musical history that grew organically.

Like Pygmalion. Jean-Philippe Rameau’s opera is taken by Ensemble Molière and director Karolina Sofulak to the streets of 21st century Paris. We begin with a familiar scene, a man slumped over his laptop and fuelled by coffee, lamenting his life. Technology is used to excellent effect, as the cast of young singers performs alongside a newly commissioned animated film by Kate Anderson. It’s bright and vibrant, with text replacing surtitles summarising the action: ‘love’s a pain’ and ‘Crikey, my life’ being just a couple of succinct examples.

Josh Cooter is an impressive tenor in the role of Pygmalion, and the voices sopranos Roberta Diamond as Céphise and Angela Hicks as La Statue hold the audience well as Rosalie Wahlfrid dances the role of L’Amour. They are accompanied by Satoko Doi-Luck on harpsichord, flutist Flavia Hirte, Oonagh Lee on the oboe, violins from Alice Earll and Ellen Bundy violins, Jakab Kaufmann on bassoon and Kate Conway playing the viola da gamba.

It reminds me a little of Raymond Briggs’ The Snowman, with the delightful sketches and evocative music, and even more so as we go on travels around Paris, Venice and London. It won’t be a spoiler to say that love triumphs, and conquers all, including the audience.

THIS WEEKEND!! Rameau's #Pygmalion in #Brighton First-timer-friendly opera🎶 https://t.co/qGdDvJeAiE @BREMF #Sussex #DigitalOpera #animation pic.twitter.com/TM7Jd5atws

— Ensemble Molière (@ensemblemoliere) October 26, 2017

Thyla – Pristine Dream

admin — Fri, 28 Jul 2017 16:16:49 +0000

Dream pop doesn’t usually come with as much bite as this tune from Brighton’s Thyla. Slices of eighties synth vie with dense vocals and airy guitars to create something a bit shoegazey and a bit sky soaring. Far from pristine, there’s plenty of simmering grit in here as Millie Duthie leads the quartert into powerful rapture.

BOA – Steal It

admin — Fri, 17 Mar 2017 17:06:27 +0000

With shimmering effulgence over jerky beats Bristol x Brighton trio BOA explore that age old topic of unrequited love, but with euphoric swoons and escapism. New single Steal It gurgles with relaxed grooves and youthful indulgence, as they seek to capture ‘endless summer days, lost love and being in the moment’ according to vocalist Hugh Reilly-Smith. It’s pretty tough to find out much about them, so instead just sit back and listen to this simmering and hypnotic web of a tune.

Released by Manchester-based independent label LAB Records on March 17th, they are heading south to play the Queen of Hoxton, London on April 8th.

Demob Happy – Dream Soda

admin — Wed, 23 Dec 2015 13:32:42 +0000

Sometimes you’re just angry and need to get it all out. At least that’s the situation that Brighton grunge band Demob Happy seem to be in, and in getting it out they’ve made an album that is brash, visceral, and arresting. Brutally cynical about the record industry in which they operate (In an interview with the NME earlier this year frontman Matt Marcantonio said how ‘I’m sick of the smell of these self-serving psychopaths muddying the good name of the human race.’) they don’t shy away from shouting out about it. How much is a young anarchic spirit that craves attention and how much genuine punk sensibility we will come to see over time, but for now the tone is one of authenticity and primalism, rough, sleazy and distorted.
Opener Haat De Stank (Take From Me) is a messy scuzz tune borrowing from the best of the nineties. The title track from their debut EP Young And Numb still shines with its glitchy and riotous riffing under screeching vocals. Raging and thunderous Wash It Down is the sound of angst letting rip, whilst the polluted groove of Succubus is all the more sinister.

There’s a hint they might be softening when Man You’re Wrong starts out like a love song but that too soon turns into an ode to disenchantment, although later on a warbling acoustic intro to Underneath Your Tree nods at sensitivity.
But through most of Dream Soda it’s as though Demob Happy may self implode at any second under the weight of their furious darkness and blazing savagery. And you want to hear it happen. It’s 45 minutes of unadulterated riff riots and fuming rhythms – frantic, fucked up, and fantastic.
Out now on SO Records.

First published on Joyzine

Last Heir – Monkey Heart

admin — Tue, 05 May 2015 06:43:14 +0000

Brighton trio Last Heir make striking music, as in music that literally rocks up, thrashes you around the head with its dazzling punk spirit and wends its driving rhythms onwards. There seems to be no thought to the songs – which is meant in the best possible way – these are tunes compulsively riding along with attitude and intuition. On Monkey Heart chords and melodies rise out of the gut and pummel on like the crashing waves of their hometown of Brighton, whilst snake like slices of bass interweave with pounding beats. All within barely more than three minutes.

Morning Smoke- Hunger/Stephanie I

admin — Thu, 20 Nov 2014 15:39:00 +0000

A dark and riotous double A side from Brighton-based noisy post-punkers Morning Smoke, this duo skids with fever and lack of direction, with smoky tension on the lead guitar cavorting with anguish with the tormented bass riffs. Milo McNulty’s vocals echo with Joy Division and Sonic Youth style emotion, angst ridden and drowning in raw distress, harking back to classic and drama heavy tracks. Hunger is a powerful tune, the heavily reverberated guitars running with an unbound and slightly sinster energy, whilst the layers of subtle spoken French flirting with the fizzing and grainy chords on Stephanie, I suggest an almost menacing romance.

We Were Promised Jetpacks – I Keep It Composed

admin — Wed, 27 Aug 2014 16:12:04 +0000

Menacing and brooding, as propulsive as ever I keep It Composed is the first track to be taken from We Were Promised Jetpacks‘ forthcoming LP Unravelling. It’s dark than before. Assured and strong, although always quivering with fraught emotion, this is a powerful and reactive track that demonstrates the impassioned perfection and talent of the Scottish band.
lhttps://soundcloud.com/fatcatrecords/we-were-promised-jetpacks-i-keep-it-composed-1

Benjamin Booker & Tigercub @ The Old Blue Last

admin — Fri, 30 May 2014 19:42:35 +0000

May 20th 2014
When people say retro, they’re being a bit lazy. With thousands of years behind us, the idea that something is evocavative of the past isn’t in itself particularly revealing. For example, there’s not a lot uniting the two acts on the bill tonight in terms of the actual sonic output, but both have clearly learned from their forbears. Three piece Tigercub spent a youth listening Nevermind, whereas headliner Benjamin Booker bubbles over with blues, boogie and soul style.
Upstairs at the Old Blue is more full than empty when Tigercub set to the stage, their brash dirge pop ricocheting through the building. This is grunge with melody, less aggressive than their pals The Wytches, and they pump through the set with a solidity and stamina. Raw and fuzzy, they play with a louche power, no doubt helped by the gangly yet definite presence of seven foot tall front man Jamie. Whirring distortion fuelled tracks like Mother, Little Rope, and latest single Blue Blood land well, and although there’s a general feeling that these guys aren’t reinventing the wheel, but when the wheel includes Sonic Youth, Nirvana, or Dinosaur Pile Up, there might not be a need to.

Benjamin Booker is the man everyone is here to see. A glance around the crowd shows how broad an appeal the man has, with suited city types standing next to skinny jeaned hipsters, with industry chin strokers and music fans alike mingling between them. The names David Letterman and Alabama Shakes are not usually names I would consider it to be beneficial to be associated with, in terms of guiding my listening choices (because that’s what a band worries about…), but along with a recent Letterman performance, album production from Andrija Tokic of Alabama Shakes fame, and touring with Jack White, Booker has the talent and tunes to back it up.

Booker, 24, grew up in Tampa and spent time playing in a garage rock duo, but it is evidently his years in New Orleans that really honed his sound, adding that blues melody layer to urgent garage chords, and creating something immediate and fresh, yet which hits the cerebral cortex: that mash of old and new being ignited being the root of good music. Tonight performing with backing musicians, Booker is clearly the master of his craft and the stage, and there was almost no need for the drummer, so tight and rhythmic is Booker’s sound. Running through tracks from his debut album, out on Rough Trade later this year, Booker demonstrated his expertise in quick clipped riffing and vibrant scales, underpinned by rocking chords.
And when he launched into Violent Shiver, exactly that was felt through the venue, with foot shuffling and limb twitching starting to accompany the chin nodding. A cigarette and whisky voice, an ear for a good tune, and a passion for playing are all alluring for any crowd, even the Vice-tastic Old Blue one.