Peter Darling is a singer songwriter from Kent. So Peter Darling is some bloke strumming his acoustic guitar and singing yearning odes to countryside times gone by, probably with too much facial hair like the rest of them? Ha.

They say that every song has already been written, but that doesn’t stop so many artists just replaying them. On Limehouse the musical canon has been well and truly absorbed, the best of it all being seemingly seamlessly merged into striking song writing, to plug back in again to the ever evolving musical cloud.
Having a seemingly symbiotic relationship with his craft, from the opener Sunland (Intro) that quivers and quakes its way across the strings to final song Never Outstay Your Welcome, a fun and frantic acceptance of the frustrations of teenage life, this is the sound of someone coming of age, and realising that amongst the dichotomies of black and white exist shades of grey and that can be damn good fun.  Honest Again is engrossing and energetic whilst Venus sounds like George Michael’s best ballad – in a wonderful way. Changer chugs along with real grit, the strong  vocals adding a layer of almost menace to the melody. A rampant and random amalgamation of hooks, fuzzy electronics and striking styles abound, and startle with the conviction and ability with which each is grabbed.
The entire EP (bar a cover of Air’s Venus) was written and produced by Peter himself, and is available to download for free from his bandcamp page. Talented and generous.

Becky Glass

It’s hard to charm a selfconscious crowd, let alone one the size of a modest birthday party. But the Guillemots cast a spell every time they appear live, and their performance for the Hard Rock Café’s 40^th anniversary was no different.
This was no exceptional venue – it was a little too staged and sincere – but the band radiate talent, from frontman Fyfe Dangerfield, a vortex of charisma, to the button-clad Aristazabal Hawkes, the six-instrument-playing bassist; somehow they made it intense rather than awkward.
New songs earned impressed murmurs, and classics bristled with life like the first time they’d ever been played. A run of new and old tunes ended in a rip-roaring pop belter and a sultry, intense finale; the crowd, all prepared to play cynical spectators, were grinning from ear to ear.
From the primary-colour piping on Fyfe’s jacket to the in-jokes going back and forth on stage, the Guillemots are so fun because they are so into what they do. They very clearly, very passionately, believe in music. It’s a (surprisingly rare) quality, which seems to make everything fall, beautifully, into place.