Esben & The Witch - Chorea

Here’s a new video of Chorea from Brighton’s best gloom ghouls and Breaking More Waves regulars Esben and the Witch. Shot on a cliff in Seaford, Sussex the black and white video features crazy screwed up dancing, backwards waves and the apparent zombie-lemming like procession to suicide as repeated lyrics ring out of watching people “dance themselves to death.” This is not for the faint-hearted. The track is being released on 12” for Record Store Day, together with a remix of Eumenides by Stuart Braithwaite of Mogwai.

For those who are concerned for the safety of the actors in this film - fear not. We have living proof that no humans were harmed during the making of the video as we have spoken to one of the dancers as she worked behind a bar in a gig venue in Brighton just a couple of days ago. We’re sorry if we destroy the theatre of the piece, but she actually seemed like quite a nice normal girl, not some sort of spooky incorporeal being at all. Don’t believe everything you see on the internet.

Trophy Wife - The Quiet Earth / White Horses

This coming week Brighton’s dark soundscape magicians Esben & The Witch release their debut album Violet Cries which should you be quick and order from Rough Trade you will also receive a bonus 4 track CD. The three-piece are also about to go out on tour to promote the album. Expect skulls, lanterns and to be uncomfortably spooked if you’re in attendance at one of their shows. We’ll be catching their biggest headlining gig to date in their home city later this week.

Supporting them on the first leg of the tour are a band who we featured on the blog back last August – Trophy Wife. Since then the Oxford group have supported Foals and released their debut single Microlite through Moshi Moshi. They’re about to follow it up with another Moshi Moshi release – The Quiet Earth and it’s backed with the song White Horses.

The Quiet Earth continues the same laidback indie grooves that their debut demonstrated – in fact from what we’ve seen of the band live, pretty much all of their material follows this pattern. Subtle guitar riffs, quietly charming male vocals and just enough beats to get the feet moving a little.

They’re odd bedfellows Esben &The Witch and Trophy Wife, but when you put them under the sheets Esben & The Witch strip the beat naked and just leave sinister-strings and screwed up vocals that build towards a druggy messed-up climax that never actually happens. You can hear it all in the remix of White Horses below, together with the originals of both sides of the single which is released on 7” and digital download on February 28.

Trophy Wife - The Quiet Earth by trophywifeband

Trophy Wife - White Horses by trophywifeband

Trophy Wife - White Horses (Esben and the Witch Remix) by trophywifeband

Esben & The Witch - Warpath

Our last blog of the week is a short heads up for the new Esben & The Witch video – Warpath. The band has come a long way since we first saw them supporting Fight Like Apes in an empty basement back in November 2008 and their debut appearance on the blog in July 2009. Their placement on the BBC Sound of 2011 long-list was utter justification for the list – where else would you get that level of mass media exposure for a group who make such an uneasy, chilling, scouring but not necessarily disagreeable racket?

In that first write up of the band in 2009 we described them as ‘like a cobweb covered Portishead’ and whilst Warpath is far more guitar laden than anything Portishead ever did, it has that same unsettling atmosphere and let’s give ourselves a pat on the back here - the band themselves are covered in cobwebs in the video! Ker-ching.

The band hail from Breaking More Waves neighbouring city Brighton – a place probably better known for indie and dance influenced bands than something as gothic and disturbing as Esben & The Witch. Yet it shows that despite the city having had a number of music venue closures over the last few years, its musical output remains healthy in terms of creativity and diversity.

The band will play an album launch show in Brighton on the 1^st February and whilst this blog no longer carries live reviews, we’ll do our best to tweet about the gig whilst we’re there. Follow us here if you like that kind of thing.

Latitude 2010 - Review (Part 1)

The attempt by Festival Republic to establish and market Latitude as a safe and family friendly festival took several steps backward this weekend. The horrific reports of two alleged rapes on the site, the partial collapse of the canopy structure over the Sunrise Arena stage (pictured above before collapse) on Friday afternoon, and Crystal Castles lead singer Alice Glass throwing punches at a member of the crowd during their Main Stage set on Saturday evening all spoilt what was otherwise a good natured and friendly vibe. It highlighted the fact that despite festivals ethos of love, peace and harmony, such events can be high risk environments.

Under sunny skies girls waltzed around the site wearing flower and leaf headdresses, people relaxed in deckchairs by the now famous multicoloured sheep adjacent the lake, whilst the cream of Central St Martins and Chelsea graduates displayed fashion shows. Despite a few regulars grumbling that the site was even busier than years past, that there was a more boisterous teenage element present (lured no doubt by acts such as Florence and the Machine, Crystal Castles and Vampire Weekend) and that the toilets were still the disgustingly smelly long drop types, overall Latitude 2010 still had a significant amount of chilled goodwill at its heart.

The ‘quiet opening’ on Thursday night got underway with a special midnight set in the middle of the woods by Tom Jones, performing songs from his critically acclaimed album Praise & Blame. With a full to capacity crowd and delayed by technical hitches, Jones arrived on the small stage to ask “Can you hear me OK?” and received a roar of approval in reply. However as his set progressed a significant portion of the crowd grew restless shouting for Sex Bomb and Delilah - hits that Jones had no intention of playing. This was no nostalgia trip, but an opportunity for Tom to display the essence of his talent - his remarkable voice; a soft mix of Presley and Cash - going back to his roots. With a band including Ethan Johns of Kings of Leon and Laura Marling production fame, that played upbeat rock n roll and gospel tinged ballads, Jones may not have delivered a typical crowd pleasing set, but for those who were prepared to listen with an open mind, it was sterling stuff.

The Sunrise Arena is a beautiful fern lined clearing in the woods, covered with a tent-like canopy for shade and shelter. It provided a safety related incident on Friday. Following well received sets from local acoustic singer songwriter Mathew P and the indie-folk-rock of Kurran and the Wolfnotes, a small lunch time crowd were waiting for country singer Delta Maid, when one of the heavy central support poles to the canopy dislodged and kicked out, falling to the floor, presumably from wind force pressure. Luckily because the space was relatively empty nobody was hit or hurt. With the canopy now partially collapsed security were quickly on hand to clear the area and the public asked to leave, the stage closed for the time being.

Over at the Lake Stage local band These Ghosts drew a young home crowd to witness their brooding, epic and passionate guitar anthems. “You are the most beautiful people. Thank you for making this the best day of our lives,” their overawed lead singer proclaimed in a believable way. Next up the sensual eyed ex-Pipette and every geeky indie boys pin-up poster girl Rose Elinor Dougall took the prize for biggest stilettos of the day. Her songs reference late 80’s / early 90’s indie and Casio keyed 50’s film noir. Come Away With Me sounded not dissimilar to The Sundays, the intro to Start / Stop / Synchro hinting at Broadcast. Less commercial than The Pipettes, these songs are likely to be significantly longer lasting.

The Lake Stage continued to push out varied new bands all afternoon. The bobble hat wearing welsh surf-guitar instrumentalists Y Niwl got a varied crowd dancing. Their sound may be obvious with it’s 60’s Hammond organ and garage-twang guitars, but it was perfect for the glorious sunshine - it wouldn’t have been at all surprising to find Quentin Tarantino running down the hill in Bermuda shorts signing the band up for his next film soundtrack,

“This is my sister, she spat water on my groin,” a member of Yuck announced from the stage. It certainly made a change from the standard “Are you having a nice festival / good time,” question that virtually every band used all weekend as their conversation piece with the audience. Squalling guitars, whiney vocals, fuzzy shoe-gazing pop, Yuck have got indie-rock-like-it-used-to-be down to a fine art and are appealingly good. They’re starting to give The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart a run for their money.

Gold is her name and it seems that Gold is her colour - for Alice Gold had either overdone it with the fake tan or has gone a few rounds sunbathing. Looking more like a Jordan wannabe than a rock star she belted out her MOR rock-pop with a big pair of lungs, to a small crowd of curious onlookers most of whom were passing by on their way to buy food or drink.

Sarah from The Good Natured first came to our attention as a bedroom-demo keyboard lass back in 2009. Now playing as a three piece band she’s ditched the keyboard, relying instead on a backing track. Displaying a girlish nervousness between numbers, her performance was entirely composite and confident during the songs themselves. She prowled like a hotpants and black eyeliner wearing tiger, thrusting her arms towards the crowd, throwing the microphone lead around her neck and dropping to her knees to sing in her strangely captivating flat tones. Sarah is certainly playing at being a ‘proper’ pop star, but possesses a darker edginess. Fortune Teller was a hooky swirling danceable beast and Your Body Is A Machine a deeper scratch below the surface.

The scratch becomes a darker wound with Esben and the Witch. The Brighton trio were primitive, experimental and powerful, the reverb laden female vocal more than ghostly, the drums, thrashing guitars, electronic beats and pulses of ambient noise not for the fainthearted, but all spectacularly good. One of the highlights of the afternoon at the Lake Stage for those who like their music a little eerie.

New bands led to more established artists on the main stage and then The Word sponsored 6,000 capacity tent, as day turned to night.

Laura Marling’s second album I Speak Because I Can may be bolder than her debut but would her songs transfer in the huge open space of the main stage, known as the Obelisk Arena ? The answer is yes, her hushed folk sound and quality musicianship only being slightly spoilt by sound bleed from the booming Wild Beasts set from The Word stage. Devil's Spoke and Rambling Man were authoritative and passionate, and when unadorned of her backing band she bears fruit with songs of beauty. Not so much the shy or humble girl she once was, Marling even engaged in some between song banter and got the crowd to accompany her on a whistling solo.

In the Word Arena Richard Hawley was un-typically quiet in between songs, which he finally explained was due a bout of bronchitis. Despite this however his lovelorn melodies were timeless and wonderful, particularly during Tonight The Streets Are Ours which was so romantic that if babies haven’t been created to its sound, there’s something tragically wrong with the world.

It’s left to The National to send folks back to their tents with the best set of the day. It’s powerful, weighty and intensely euphoric. Matt Berninger’s baritone is imposing, the bands music almost overwhelming, layered, lush and hugely emotional. They start with the slow build of the exquisite Runaway, and by the time they reach Bloodbuzz Ohio and Fake Empire grown men are on the verge of weeping. Mass singalongs occur. It’s that good. It’s that exhilarating. It’s moments like these that make you realise that, in the moment, music is that important. The National are now challenging Radiohead as the worlds best rock band. Even bigger stages surely beckon. Very special and the perfect way to end the first day.

Latitude 2010 Day 2 and Day 3 review posts will be published daily this week.

The Great Escape 2010 - Preview

Following on from our recent coverage of the 2010 Camden Crawl our attention now turns to the UK’s south coast and the Great Escape, another multi-venue, multi-gig, urban festival held in Brighton. The Great Escape is currently Breaking More Waves favourite event of this nature in the UK, for a number of reasons:

• The event is three days long, rather than one or two like other similar festivals, enabling you to catch an even greater number of artists, many of whom perform twice at different venues and times.

• There is a significant emphasis on new music. Even many of the headline acts are still in their relative infancy.

• It is excellent value for money, particularly if you buy an early-bird ticket several months in advance, which this year was a snip at thirty-five pounds plus the obligatory booking fee for three days of musical frolics.

• Besides the main gigs there’s a full programme of parties, conferences and fringe events, although some of these do require you to purchase the significantly more expensive delegates pass. (eighty pounds early bird or one hundred and fifty pounds now excluding booking fees)

• The timetable is all published on line well in advance, giving punters the opportunity plenty of time to plan in advance, although remember that many venues are small and so capacity may be reached early, so make sure that if there is someone you particularly want to see you get there early, particularly if they are a more well known or 'buzz' act playing a smaller venue.

• The event operates a text message service which gives updates on which venues are full plus updates on secret gigs that take place. In past years we've seen Ida Maria sing on the outside balcony of the Theatre Royal, Peggy Sue playing in a toy and model museum and We Are Scientists perform a blistering set on a flat roof outside Audio Bar with traffic racing by behind them, all by using the text alert service.

• There are a variety of ticket options including day tickets and Friday / Saturday 2 day tickets. Our experience is that traditionally Thursday is a little quieter than the other two days in terms of numbers of punters.

• It’s in Brighton, which means that besides the event itself you can spend time lazing on the beach (weather permitting); many of the venues being located on the seafront. There are also two great record shops (Resident and Rounder) that are worth a visit, a number of quirky specialist shops in the North Laines, and of course the pier for funfair fun combined with the Horatios venue which this year will see the likes of Cold Cave, Warpaint and Darwin Deez performing there. And if it's warm enough, and you’re drunk enough, after everything has finished for the night you can go skinnydipping to cool off ! Just make sure you can actually swim first though.

So once you’ve grabbed your wristband, which bands to see? With such a fantastic line up of new music it’s simply not going to be possible to catch everything. Below we recommend ten acts for your viewing and listening pleasure. We hope to catch at least some of these ourselves.

Click on the artists name to go to their Myspace page.

Kid Adrift

“If you took a big raft of overblown pompous rock and set it off through a computer, mashed in some dubstep beats, a layer of distortion and gave the whole thing a post-apocalyptic shove of electronica you would probably be lurking off the same shores as Kid Adrift,” we wrote back last August. Since then this Glaswegian boy wonder and his band have signed to Island records, recorded a Radio 1 session with Vic Galloway and had their song Red Green and Blue named as “Record of the Year 2009” by Record of the Day. A new EP is to follow this summer and Kid Adrift is currently recording an album. A must see.

Let’s Buy Happiness

A five piece from the North East of England, Let’s Buy Happiness have already created one of our favourite songs of the last twelve months with Works Better On Paper and have been signed up to play the John Peel Stage at this years Glastonbury Festival after they got through to the final round of the Glastonbury Emerging Talent competition. Fronted by the ethereal sounding Sarah Hall the band create beautiful dreamy indie guitar soundscapes that remind us of The Sundays and The Cocteau Twins. In February we suggested that “Let’s Buy Happiness are about to make you fall in love.” Go to the Great Escape, experience Let’s Buy Happiness and that statement may come true.

Ghost Bees

Twins Romi and Sari Lightman are two Canadian Twins who are Ghost Bees. Like an alt.folk version of Joanna Newsom, their unsettling ghostly songs are formed out of glockenspiel, viola, acoustic guitars and antique mandolins. With girlish creepily beautiful voices their songs cover tales of past great empires and Greek mythology.

Egyptian Hip Hop

So loud is the buzz surrounding Egyptian Hip Hop that we are sure that a wasps nest is just around the corner. It all started when the Manchester four piece released their debut single Rad Pitt last year and it hasn’t really stopped since. There seems to be so much talk about Egyptian Hip Hop and yet very few people are pinning their colours to the mast to fully define the bands sound. Much of this is because it is too early to do so, with only a handful of demos and songs available and the four members of the band only being in their mid to late teens. So for the record we say that the bands style is loose, occasionally groovy indie. But the only real way to find out if Egyptian Hip Hop can live up to the hype is to go see them yourself and form your own opinion.

EGYPTIAN HIP HOP // Wild Human Child from theartof agency on Vimeo.

King Charles

With his knotted bee-hive, near death experiences and psychedelic folk riffs King Charles really is like nothing else. Expect pagan chanting, romping guitars and songs about Polar Bears and Crocodiles. King Charles has also stated that he’s going to get married by the end of the year, although he has yet to find the right girl, so if any ladies fancy becoming a queen, here’s your chance. His song Love Lust is soppy, philosophical and stupidly brilliant.

Esben and the Witch

Along with the many national and international bands on the bill of the Great Escape there are also a significant number of local acts playing, and Brighton’s own Esben and the Witch are without doubt one of the best. Fresh off a tour with The Big Pink the group will be bringing their spectral transcendentally disturbed tunes and dark yet beautiful tales to the Great Escape. A three piece formed out of Rachel Davies (vocals), Daniel Copeman (electronics, guitars) and Thomas Fisher (guitars, keyboards) the band are known to decorate their stage with porcelain owls, Victorian lamposts, skulls and minimal lighting. Reminiscent of the edgier experimental side of Portishead, or Bat For Lashes they share a kindred spirit with bands such as The XX in terms of the darkness of their sound.

Unicorn Kid

One of our Ones To Watch for 2010. The bleepy, 8 bit madness of Unicorn Kid has been a sound that Breaking More Waves has been celebrating since summer of 2009. For those who think his sound deserves arrest by the music police, well sorry but those very same music police are actually raving behind the bike sheds to the likes of Dream Catcher and Animal City; manic, frantic, bassy, games console dance tunes. He's also knocked out big remixes for Gorillaz and The Pet Shop Boys. Quite possibly the music of the future.

Stornoway

Another band we listed as one of our Ones To Watch for 2010, Stornoway are due to release their debut album Beachcomber's Windowsill at the end of this month. Our recent review called it “Quite simply an album of near perfect songs,” and in terms of live performance their humble intelligence charms and delights every time. Catch I Saw You Blink, Zorbing, The End Of The Movie and The Coldharbour Road as the bands status continues to grow.

Active Child

“It’s as if Bon Iver left his acoustic guitar in his log cabin and created a new wave electronic suite of chamber-like beauty that lays somewhere between the sonic architecture of Ultravox’s Vienna and OMD’s Jean of Arc (Maid of Orleans),” is how we described the music of Active Child last year. We wouldn’t go back on that statement at all. Beautifully cool electronic pop symphonies with new-wave synth-drums and pads, heavenly vocals and bags of class are coming to Brighton this May courtesy of one Pat Grossi who is Active Child.

Marina and the Diamonds

Marina and the Diamonds may be a rather obvious choice, but the reason is that this is probably your last chance to see Marina in a relatively small venue before she steps up the game later this year, returning to Brighton on November the 15th to play the Corn Exchange. By now you’ll probably be familiar with Hollywood, I Am Not A Robot and other tracks from her debut album. What you may not be familiar with if you haven’t seen her live yet is her theatrical stage presence combined with an underlying vulnerability that endears.

If you haven't got your ticket yet and want to come you can buy them by clicking here. We'll be bringing a day by day review of the event the week after it finishes, and if you sign up to our Twitter you'll also find us tweeting our way around the event.

The XX + Esben and the Witch @ Brighton Audio

Such is the growing popularity of The XX that their show in Brighton had already been upgraded from The Freebutt to the slightly larger Audio. With a capacity crowd in attendance there’s more than just suggestion that the wave they are currently riding could have taken them right down to Brighton’s seafront to the even bigger Concorde, where only a month or two ago they were the support act to Vampire Weekend (review here) It is no surprise that next time the band play Brighton in March 2010 they will be headlining the six hundred and fifty capacity Komedia.

Before the XX play, on a stage decorated with owl figurines, illuminated globes and lanterns, Brighton’s own Esben and the Witch entertain. This group seem to be the perennial support act in Brighton at the moment, but a billing with The XX is probably the bands most suited yet, in terms of an affiliated sound. Esben and the Witch are kindred spirits through their use of haunting female vocals, electronic drum patterns and moody soundscapes. They are however not as instantly loveable, their music being based less around melody. Instead Esben and the Witch concern themselves more with the dynamic of atmospherics, textures and clicking rhythms. Lead singer Rachel wears a Robert Smith Lullaby t shirt - and certainly Pornography and Disintegration era Cure seem to be reference points in their music, as is the possibility of an undead Portishead. It’s experimental music that is meticulously and selectively put together, the stuff of electric haunted houses and desolate landscapes. There are momentary blasts of Mogwai-esque dirty noise and fragile quiet moments that suffer from unwanted feedback interruptions, but overall the band provide more than enough justification for what they do. All three members of the group seem to immerse themselves fully into their sound, their guitarist almost violently so, and at the end he attempts to beat the life out of the single drum on stage before exiting out the back.

If there was a competition for cool, The XX would win hands down. They display a mix of studied intensity combined with a subtle and gentle nature that pushes them just to the periphery of distantness. With the whole band dressed in black, and plenty of jewellery chains on display, there’s a hint of urban goth to their self image. There is however something with this band that demonstrates that they have much more than just a fashion tag. There are the timid sweet thank you’s to the audience, the small smiles between vocalists Oliver (pictured) and Romy, the way their electronic drum pad player puts one hand in his pocket whilst playing - probably the most un rock n roll gesture ever, and of course let’s not forget the beautiful minimalist pop music that is played note perfectly. These are all reasons why The XX offer more, often through less, and achieve an unexpected coolness.

The cool factor is magnified by the fact that The XX are not the kind of band that are going to participate in high jinx tomfoolery, jumping or jiving around on stage. They line up at the front as a four piece; bordered by two glowing white X’s and deliver every song with a quiet confidence, including their now familiar cover of Teardrops by Womack and Womack. It’s songs such as VCR with its hypnotic exacting Cure (yes that band again) like guitar, and Shelter where Romy’s soulful downbeat deadpan voice ushers “Can I make it better, with the lights turned on,” that make you forget that you could just sit at home and listen to the album - such is the lack of the bands showmanship. It feels that standing in this virtually motionless crowd is something special, that you are watching songs being played that have depth - tunes that will last longer than whatever transient time period the bands coolness lasts for.

As the set comes to an end Oliver thanks Esben and the Witch for supporting, admitting that his band are “A little bit in love with them,” and thanks the audience for coming to watch their first ever headline tour. The applause is significant and the whole band look just a little bit bewildered at it. After they finish the call for an encore is long, but one is not forthcoming. Either The XX are humble enough to think they have not earned the right yet, or are just too composed for such gig clichés, but either way this was an impressive performance deserving of a return to the stage.

How the band will deal with larger venues remains to be seen. It may be that some other visual presence is needed in bigger halls where sometimes even the music alone isn’t enough. But for now the music was all that was needed.

DiScover Tour 2009 @ Brighton Freebutt

If 2009 has been the year that mainstream British pop music forgot about guitars, then on the evidence of this inaugural Drowned In Sound sponsored DiScover tour then the same can be at least partly said for the underground. Four very different bands play, but the common thread is the use of keyboards and electronica throughout.

Nullifier make a big noise, and its hardly surprising with a stage rammed full of two keyboard / electro men, two drummers, two guitarists, a bassist and a bare footed bespectacled vocalist. Their sound is often shouty and full on with quarrelsome keyboards and gruff guitars slapping each other hard round the face until they bleed in a battle for supremacy. Neither one gives in, but underneath the brutality we can hear a pop sensibility and some catchy hooks with neat tunes. It says something about a band whose vocalist loses his glasses to the floor halfway through the set, then just tosses them back to the ground again when an audience member hands them back.

Esben And The Witch (pictured) create a very different type of atmosphere. With skulls, lanterns and flower lights on stage the band evoke a ghostly hushed midnight chill. The band have improved technically since we first caught them at the end of last year, their sound now poised, dramatic and meshed with dark sonic innovation. With a drum at stage-front, similar to Florence And The Machine, the band maximise its use adding throbbing electronic beats, taught guitars, sinister synths and strong female vocals to create a haunting experimental sound that darkly enchants, particularly on the bass heavy Marching Song which sounds better live than on their EP. The trio end their set crowded round the drum, as if trying to cast some sort of spell from it, but their magic has already been evoked.

Rave hoodied up like a boxer about to enter the ring to dual with his laptop, Gold Panda seems strangely misplaced in the venues dark dingy space. His knob twiddling, sample firing, stuttering laptop trickery is surely better suited to an urban club vibe or an art school studio than the stinking drudgery of the Freebutt. Lit only by a single red light his crackly beats are both as geeky and as hip as where your thigh meets your stomach. Gold Panda is like a malfunctioning modern Aphex Twin, warped, wired up and skilfully good.

Three Trapped Tigers are the last band on and don’t quite make it to the end of their set due to the strict curfew. They have instrumental tracks that are named only by numbers. One of their trio bounces on the spot between tracks and head bangs during them. They deliver all over the place electronic jazz rock synth that refuses to stay in one place. There are acid rave basslines, prog keyboards, space invader arcade sounds and manic drumming that refuses to do anything as simple as a standard repetitive beat. Depending on your perspective its all either a little bit to clever and up its own backside or incredibly playful and challenging music that deserves to be given your full attention. We can salute the creative and intelligent musicianship, which manages to be both structured and chaotic, organic and mechanical all at the same time, but for us Three Trapped Tigers don’t grab our emotional core.

What this evening has proved is that the underground is in good health, with strong diversity and fresh sounds, all using electronica in exciting and often engrossing ways. Now, who fancies a listen to The Kooks then ? Er... thought not.

Esben And The Witch - New Waves @ Breaking More Waves

Esben And The Witch create darkly atmospheric creeping soundscapes that they describe as “Nightmare pop.” Like a cobweb covered Portishead or a celestial disconnected Slowdive their beautifully edgy and experimental sound is full of electronic beats, echoing floating vocals and the odd blast of intense punch hard guitar noise. It probably sounds ridiculous but Esben And The Witch are both wounding and healing all at the same time.

Named after a Danish fairytale and consisting of Rachael, Daniel and Thomas, the band hail from Brighton, UK. The group have picked up a variety of support slots in their home town and have released a debut EP entitled 33. Therein you can find Marching Song, a mesmerising sonic adventure that takes a template from School Of Seven Bells and moulds it with searing guitars and trippy aloofness. Even better is the immense Corridors which gradually builds over nine minutes of ambient bliss and transcendental disturbance; like a long intense shag, it will leave you feeling shell-shocked but fulfilled all at the same time. The band have even been known to bring Confide In Me by Kylie Minogue crashing down to earth in a gloriously morbid haze of gloomy guitars reminiscent of The Cure (see video below). You can catch the group at this years End Of The Road Festival in the UK and other selected dates.