Kassassin Street - Yeah It's On

Here at Breaking More Waves we like Kassassin Street and their mind altering blend of indie rock so much that we’ve recently moved house to be closer to the very road they were named after. OK, maybe it wasn’t our only reason for moving, but whatever the reasons, it has led to a slight slow-down in the output of the blog over the last few months, although as you might have noticed this week has found us getting back into top gear again.

Likewise Kassassin Street have shifted their profile up a lot this year, with well received festival sets, their own headline tour and the forthcoming Radio Silence EP, due mid-October. Now with their foot on the pedal marked onwards and upwards we get Yeah It’s On, a swirling shamanic hallucinogenic piece of indie rock that’s as opium loose in its groove as it is sphincter taught in its riffs. Does that sound a bit pretentious? Probably, but once you’ve heard it you’ll know exactly what we mean.

Kassassin Street - Yeah It's On

Kassassin Street - Radio Silence

Incoming transmission from Portsmouth favourites Kassassin Street; Radio Silence finds the five piece raising the rafters with another dynamic and swaggering blend of indie rock, a perfect follow up to To Be Young, which picked up plenty of support from blogs worldwide. Here we find otherwise seemingly pleasant lead vocalist Rowan turn into a rather disturbing creature, singing of wrapping his tentacles (!) around your leg and neck before the song crashes headlong into an enveloping new-wave wall of sound. If you thought the boogeyman in the cupboard was frightening, Rowan goes one better: “I’m in your room under your bed,”  he tells us, and besides these stalker-scary words you can’t but help feel a sense of elation as the song pushes to its euphoric conclusion with its ‘”let’s raise this up” call. 

At Brighton’s Great Escape this year Kassassin Street managed to get a room full of hungover people dancing at lunchtime – that’s some accomplishment. Now they’re spreading their wings and doing what (possibly because of its island geography) so many Portsmouth bands fail to do, and get their music heard nationally, with a full UK tour this October. It takes in the likes of Glasgow, Leeds, Stoke, Manchester, Bristol and of course a date at the mighty Wedgewood Rooms in their (and Breaking More Waves) home city – that one’s bound to sell out. Tickets are available now from this link.

Kassassin Street - Radio Silence

The Alt-Escape 2015 - Preview

This coming Thursday, Friday and Saturday many a new music fan in the UK will be decamping to Brighton, Sussex for the 10th birthday of the Great Escape Festival. 

You can see our explanation of why we love the event so much on this link here.

Plus you can see 20 acts that we recommend from the official programme in our 5 blog post preview here, although line up clashes preclude anyone seeing all of those acts.

Today we’re turning our attention to the Great Escape’s kid brother event, the Alt-Escape, which just like its bigger sibling has grown beyond all recognition from its early days. The Alt-Escape is, in the words of the festival organisers, an “official series of showcases that take place alongside the core festival programme at The Great Escape.”

The Alt-Escape offers over 200 additional artists performing in over 15 venues, and unlike the Great Escape itself most of these shows are open to any member of the public who is over the age of 18 irrespective of if they have a Great Escape wristband or not. Some of these gigs are free admission for anyone, whilst others are free for Great Escape attendees and accessed for a small charge for those without a wristband. 

A number of bands who are playing the Great Escape also take the opportunity whilst they are in Brighton to play one of more Alt-Escape shows. So even if you’re not going to the Great Escape (tickets are now sold out) it’s still possible to enjoy 3 (or even 4 if you count the couple of gigs that are held for early arrivals on Wednesday night) glorious days in Brighton watching plenty of live music at little to no cost.

Here are 5 bands / artists playing at Alt-Escape that we recommend (programme clashes permitting). 

Arctic Lake – The Joker 1.45pm. Thursday 14th May

They might be playing a pub called The Joker, but there’s no joke about the band’s music. Beautiful minimal instrumentation coupled with Emma Foster’s haunting vocal, it’s no wonder that their song Limits found itself on daytime Radio 1 via the BBC Introducing playlist slot.



Curxes – Bleach 17.40pm. Thursday 14th May

Having just released their debut album proper via Strong Island Recordings and fresh from an album launch party the night before, electronic duo turned trio Curxes will be bashing all hell out Bleach (previously known as The Hydrant) in the north of Brighton just before you have your tea. Expect dramatic poses and an even more dramatic sound from the self-confessed blitz poppers.




Kassassin Street – Sticky Mike's Frog Bar 12.00pm. Friday 15th May

Arguably the finest band to come out of Breaking More Waves home city of Portsmouth for some time, Kassassin Street’s groovy blend of rock and electronics has found them being compared to everyone from Primal Scream to MGMT to Kasabian. The group have begun to find favour with the online press, particularly blogs, with their most recent track To Be Young entering the Hype Machine chart and being featured on the likes of Indie Shuffle, Ear Milk, Acid Stag and of course Breaking More Waves. Get out of bed early to catch them.



Syron – Horatios 17.00pm. Friday 15th May

Three days in Brighton wouldn’t be complete without a trip to the pier, maybe some fish and chips and then to a bar called Horatios which is set next to the funfair. It captures the essence of faded seaside glamour rather well and there you can get a dose of dance pop bangers from south London’s Syron as part of a showcase presented by Spindle and Firetrap.



Alice Jemima – 2.30pm The Monty. Saturday 16th May

Having featured heavily on Breaking More Waves as far back as 2011, Alice Jemima self-released her All The Boyfriends EP in 2012, appeared on a Radio 1 late night session and picked up over 2 million plays on Soundcloud for her cover version of No Diggity. However, in terms of new material there has been very little in the last couple of years. That's all changing now though as 2015 sees the slow return of Alice Jemima with a few gigs, and now a release of sorts, with Alice cropping up on Laura Doggett’s Into The Glass EP singing on Night Girl, a tune she co-wrote with Laura. At Great Escape Alice will be playing a show for Rob Da Bank’s Sunday Best record label, which no doubt will include plenty of new songs. Keep an eye out for further news about Alice, her music and releases as the year goes on.



We'll be publishing daily reviews of this years Great Escape on the blog and tweeting about some of the action live from Brighton as it happens.

Kassassin Street - To Be Young (Video)

Every time we listen to To Be Young by Kassassin Street we become more convinced of its brilliance. Whether it’s the driving Motorik beat, propelling the song forward towards relentless oblivion, the slowly spreading musical uplift or just that line about “we should have been someone, oh to be young, to be young,” something that probably 90% of the population over 25 could relate to, it hits home deeper every time we hear it. 

So now here’s another opportunity for you to latch on to the band, with their slickest video to date. A dark and disturbing tale of violence and danger, it fits perfectly, particularly the opening scenes of roadways and travel, which hark back to those propulsive trance inducing ideas of the likes of Kraftwerk on Autobahn.

If you're in London tonight and looking for something to do, Kassassin Street play live at Bloomsbury Bowling Lanes for a special Remix Show 15th Anniversary party for XFM. Plenty of summer festivals are on the horizon as well.

Kassassin Street - To Be Young (Video)

Kassassin Street - To Be Young

Right now there’s one band leading the charge from Breaking More Waves home city of Portsmouth and that is Kassassin Street. New song To Be Young is a fine example of why. A propulsive piece of indie rock that has become a staple part of the band’s live set, To Be Young goes at it like two lustful lovers who haven’t seen each other for months and doesn’t let up until it has climaxed after a glorious three minutes and forty seconds. “We could have been someone, oh to be young, to be young,” sings Rowan Bastable, looking back with just a hint of regret. No regrets about Kassassin Street being featured on this blog again though; To Be Young is a relentlessly formidable tune.

Recorded with Tristan Ivemy (Frank Turner/Tubelord) in London and mixed by Dan Grech (Lana Del Ray/Circa Waves/Beck) the song will be released on 30^th March, just before the five-piece play another 400 capacity sold out gig at Portsmouth's legendary independent venue The Wedgewood Rooms. 

Kassassin Street - To Be Young

Kassassin Street - Centre Straight Atom (Video)

Some bands who sell out London’s Shepherds Bush Empire, a venue which holds 2,000 people struggle to sell out the 400 capacity Wedgewood Rooms when they come to play in Portsmouth on the south coast of the UK. Why do we tell you this? Because Kassassin Street, arguably Portsmouth’s finest band by some distance, have managed to pack 'The Wedge' as its affectionately known with relative ease. It’s not just that one show though; tickets for their gig at the 250 capacity Rifle Club last weekend flew out the door, selling out way in advance. If this was London, A&R men and women would be flocking to get a piece of the action. Mind you aren’t blogs the new A&R? Er….no. But if they were, then they’d be doing a better job than the real thing in this case, with a number of sites picking up on the band’s new accelerating electro-disco-rock single Centre Straight Atom, a tune which wouldn’t have sounded entirely out of place on Primal Scream’s XTRMNTR and certainly would be quite at home in big halls or arenas.

However,  Portsmouth isn’t London, it’s miniature by comparison, (to the point where its seaside area of Southsea even has its own model village) so it seems weirdly appropriate that the new video for single Centre Straight Atom is shot entirely with miniatures. Expect plastic houses burning to the ground and creepy figures in the dark.

Kassassin Street - Centre Straight Atom

Kassassin Street - Centre Straight Atom

Local scenes may not be as powerful as they were in days gone past, after all it’s just as easy these days for a band or performer to connect to and be inspired by an artist on the other side of the world as it is one on the next street. However, in terms of music discovery, watching a band play live is still a lot easier to do when a band hails from and plays in your home city.

Which brings us neatly to Kassassin Street, a group that without doubt are one of the most thrilling live acts to hail from Charles Dickens birthplace and home of the HMS Victory in recent memory; that’s Portsmouth – home of Breaking More Waves for those who don’t know. It’s not only us who seems to think so either, their recent set at Portsmouth’s Victorious Festival pulled a crowd that was as big, if not bigger, than some of the national touring bands playing that day and they’re consistently selling out local venues (their next home city show on November 14th is already sold out).

Now Kassassin Street has unveiled their latest assault on the senses, Centre Straight Atom, which is released digitally on November 10th. A pulverizing stadium shaking beast of driving dirty electronics and space rock guitars it manages to grab you by the privates as both a club stomper and indie anthem. It’s like Kasabian with less of the bullshit. Freaky arms flailing dancing (or any other body part for that matter) is allowed to this one. 

Kassassin Street - Centre Straight Atom

Victorious Festival 2014 - Preview

In the over-crowded UK festival market any new entrants need to have a strong unique selling point. Victorious Festival, set in Breaking More Waves home city of Portsmouth has a pretty simple one – price. Early bird tickets retailed at just £15 per day before they were increased to £20 showing that it is seemingly possible to run a festival with some reasonably heavyweight names topping the bill (this year sees the likes of Dizzee Rascal, Seastick Steve, Naughty Boy, 2 Many DJs and Tom Odell) without charging exorbitant prices.

How does the festival achieve this? Some of the answers seem to include ramming in the punters, using plenty of cheap or unpaid local artists to flesh out the line-up and by the organisers maximising income by running the bars themselves rather than another company. And talking of alcohol let’s be honest here, Portsmouth as a city likes a drink; last year’s event just couldn’t cope with demand and if those in charge have any sense they’ll be increasing the bar lengths, numbers and staff for 2014.

Bars reaching capacity was just one of a number of teething problems the festival had in its first year as Victorious Festival (having previously run as Victorious Vintage) when it was held in the unusual setting of the historic dockyard in Portsmouth; food stalls had long queues and on the first of the two days it was reported that many of them ran out of food completely. Also the portaloo layout appeared to have been designed by someone with very little experience of festivals, meaning that servicing and queues became problematic. However, given the bargain price and general good-spirited nature of the event, these issues didn’t particularly detract.

However, 2014 finds the event relocating onto Southsea seafront, giving more space and more capacity for everything, hopefully ironing out the problems from 2013.

Being a city based festival Victorious will populated by many locals and its line-up and attractions are curated very much with a something for everyone ideology, but with a strong bias to b-list Brit-pop and beyond bands; Shed Seven, Menswear, Ocean Colour Scene, Razorlight, The Pigeon Detectives and Mark Morris from The Bluetones all appear. You’ll also find X-Factor contestant Lucy Spraggon, alt-rock from British Sea Power, electro hip-hop from Dan Le Sac vs Scroobius Pip playing their second to last show ever plus Beatles and Rolling Stones tribute bands.

So you can take your pick from those or the many other artists on the bill, or you can try the headphone disco, watch skaters and riders demos in Southsea Skate Park, visit the nearby  the D-Day museum, watch the sharks at the Blue-Reef Aquarium, explore Southsea Castle, visit the boutique market stalls, the real ale festival or the kids arena.

Alternatively you can try and catch the following Breaking More Waves approved acts. See you down the front for these? (Line up clashes permitting)

Sophie Ellis-Bextor : Castle Stage  (Saturday)

She might be best known for her disco pop hits such as Murder On The Dance Floor, Take Me Home and Groovejet (If This Ain’t Love) but Sophie’s 2014 Ed Harcourt produced album Wanderlust is the finest work of her career – an accomplished and mature record that takes in Eastern European folk, fairytale and mid-life crisis reference points and wraps them up into a captivating and enchanting listen. We suspect it will find a place on our end of year favourite album list.



Public Service Broadcasting : Seaside Stage (Saturday)

One of the great independent success stories of 2013, Public Service Broadcasting’s unique performances mash up video footage, guitars, vocal samples and a sense of humour to deliver a show that wins people over wherever they play.



Slow Club :  Acoustic Stage (Sunday)

From their early d-i-y country folk outings to their latest record Complete Surrender, Slow Club’s music has evolved, boldly stepping into a new soulful world whilst retaining their gorgeous vocal interplay and tenderness. Watch out for the bands often comical banter with the audience and expect more than the odd goose-bump moment as Rebecca sings.



Kassassin Street : Seaside Stage (Sunday)

“Capturing Eastern mysticism, psychedelia and a free flowing looseness, this five-piece have an exhilarating vibrancy and energy to their sound.” That’s how we previously described indie rockers Kassassin Street. That sounds about right. What we didn’t say was that they are also quite possibly Portsmouth’s finest live band - expect grooves and noise.



Eloise Keating : Acoustic Stage (Sunday)

Local singer songwriter Eloise Keating picked up her first Hype Machine listed blog appearance on Breaking More Waves and has subsequently been featured on a number of respected sites site as Line of Best Fit and The Von Pip Musical Express with her Great Gatsby inspired song Be My Ghost (The Green Light). Since then she’s been taken under the wing by same people behind one of our favourite (and ever on it) boutique record labels Duly Noted (IYES, The Night VI, Black Honey etc) and is beavering away writing new material. Victorious Festival is a chance to hear Eloise road-test some of these songs in an acoustic form before fuller electronic versions surface as well as perhaps a cover or two.





We’ll be carrying a full review of Victorious Festival 2014 shortly after it finishes. It takes place on Southsea seafront on the 23rd and 24th August 2014. Tickets info can be found using this link.

Kassassin Street - New Waves

Portsmouth, UK (home of Breaking More Waves) may have always sat musically in the shadow of Brighton, 50 miles down the coast, but over the last couple of years the city seems to be playing catch up with a slow fertile spread of musical goodness throughout its island location. Gone are the days when stagnant chindie acts and one dimensional metalcore bands were the norm, now there’s variety and creativity.

Part of that creative resurgence comes via Kassassin Street. Capturing Eastern mysticism, psychedelia and a free flowing looseness, this five-piece have an exhilarating vibrancy and energy to their sound. 

Having slowly developed over the last few years via a number of high profile local supports, festivals (Blissfields, Southsea Fest), a BBC Introducing session and with a debut EP (Moloko Velocet) under their belt, it’s the new single, the bizarrely titled The Royal Handkerchief Ballet that the group take flight. Built around a choppy kaleidoscopic guitar riff it finds Kassassin Street bagging some hypnotic rocks-off grooviness that reminds us a little of Kula Shaker (anyone remember them?) but instead fronted by the maraca shaking dude that is Rowan Bastable, a man who sings with a vaguely similar tone to ex-Charlatan Tim Burgess. Add in the fact that Kassassin Street are the most fragrant band you’ll probably ever see live (they have a taste for joss-sticks on stage) and we’re in danger of using words like ‘spiritual’ and ‘vibes’. Certainly The Royal Handkerchief Ballet has the ability to take you that little bit higher – no drugs or god required.

The Royal Handkerchief Ballet is released on the 26 May on iTunes and Spotify. The band play 93 Feet East in London on 16th May. Watch the rather mindf*ck video here.

Kassassin Street - The Royal Handkerchief Ballet