In the UK the number of feral shouty punk or post-punk bands that are in thrall to artists such as The Fall, Joy Division, Idles and Fontaines DC is almost ten-a-penny now, but this latest gang of newcomers from the outskirts of London have delivered a debut single that is really worth pounding your ears with. They are called TV Priest and the song they’ve just released is House of York.
House of York is a raw, lip-curling and violent piece of music that struts up to you and kicks you in the nether regions hard. Lead singer Charlie Drinkwater sounds like a drunk cousin of Ian Curtis and Mark E Smith, his words nearly folding and slurring into each other: “This is not my national anthem,” he intones as guitars rip into each other like a cocktail made from shards of glass, metal and red wine. It’s gloriously uninhibited and intense.
“House of York broadly addresses the approach to class and the philosophical and psychological impact a monarchy has had on our country. The idea of an ordained family, traditionally and historically appointed by ‘God’, has defined our country in both ways both good and bad.
We were interested in the less positive outcomes this sense of ‘leadership’ has had, how an individual is conflated with a national ‘cause’ or set of rights and macro actions. Can the UK ever truly be meritocratic with a principle like a constitutional monarch? Our guess is probably not,” says Drinkwater. It’s fair to say that House of York isn’t about us all getting jiggy in da club or chatting on your cell phone then.
If you like your music to sound angry, to sound cacophonous and to stir something inside you then they might just be your new favourite band.
TV Priest sound like carnage and are all the better for it.
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