With horizontal rain belting down outside, Portsmouth football club playing at home and the band being the early-afternoon opening act on The Loft stage, a tough gig was potentially awaiting Brighton’s LibraLibra at this year Dials Festival in Portsmouth. However, expectations didn’t match reality. The group’s unyielding and colourful noise-pop won the hearts of a decent sized crowd – lead singer Beth Cannon’s gutsy in the zone performance and huge vocal was an art form unto itself – and by the end of the day they were one of the talked about discoveries of the festival.
Which brings me neatly onto their new single Skin and Bone (part of a double header set they released on Friday – the other track being Lillith). If you’re of the mind set that pop music in 2018 has largely become as sterile as a surgeon’s instrument in the operating room, then LibraLibra are here to come and infect things. Because Skin and Bone has absolutely no interest in being anything but as forceful as fuck. It’s a song that mixes a vocal delivery something akin to Beth Ditto of The Gossip and Toyah, slabs of dirty industrial noise, precision military drums and off-kilter on the edge ferociousness. It it was a person, you wouldn’t pick a fight with it.
Skin & Bone will almost certainly scare your neighbours if you play it loud enough. So, you know what to do; throw open the windows wide and turn the volume up. Brutal and beautiful and bonkers. There’s definitely a space for that in pop right now.
LibraLibra - Skin and Bone
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