Two for the first Friday in August…
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Paper Dress are putting on a show of relative unknowns.
A few years old and already hailed as “highly engaging and loud”, Meat Candy provide star-studded retrofitted space rock high on lysergic sherbet and amp buzz: chasing the jets of Interstellar Overdrive while sliding towards harder rock and heavy metal. While early Pink Floyd is definitely the template for their chugging, droning sense of wonder, there are aspects of Voivod and King’s X in there too, both in their clanging solidity and the sturdily-banked harmony vocals.
The guttural yelps of Mur-Man are the product of an even younger band, one who haven’t got past their first demo yet. It’s a smart little nugget, though: the joining of ‘60s garage rock and ‘80s Liverpool post-punk is a well worn root by now, but ever-capable of putting out new shoots. For this one, there’s an extra dusting of raga rock – well, close but no sitar. As for the subject matter… well, they might be north Londoners, but Mur-Man sound as if they’re rather be stateside unbuckling the Bible Belt, with their randy tragicomic tale of a twisted love triangle (a horny boy breaking a commandment while wishing he was actually breaking another one).
Similarly recent are Husband, who’ve only been in existence for a slim season. That said, singer Dharshika Ariyadasa’s a veteran who’s already served time in heavy-acoustic band Heaven’s Heathens, acclaimed London folk rockers Ghosts Of December and wall-of-noise rock balladeers Autumn Leaf Boy. In all of these, his heroic stature and presence and his remarkable baritone-to-falsetto voice proved a magnet for attention. Husband are new enough (this is only their second live show) that there’s nothing to share yet as regards exactly what Dharshika is doing now; so here’s something of what he did back then…
Opening proceedings are wistful folk-rockers Hotel: similarly new and elusive, although a clutch of Facebook videos suggest something somewhere between Boo Hewerdine and Neil Young. Judge for yourselves…
Paper Dress presents:
Meat Candy + Mur-Man + Husband + Hotel
Paper Dress Vintage Bar & Boutique,, 352a Mare Street, Hackney, London, E8 1HR, England
Friday 3rd August 2018, 7.45pm – information here and here
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Moving into louder and heavier territories, this month’s edition of Chaos Theory’s Facemelter night features a couple of their old favourites, one of whom are celebrating an anniversary.
Post-metal stalwarts and Facemelter regulars Tacoma Narrows Bridge Disaster are celebrating ten years of playing and releasing music, taking in goth and prog and experimental rock atmospherics to build instrumental stews creating impressions of ravaged deserts, old sorting yards, tensions flaring. At this retrospective show at the Black Heart, they’ll perform a selection from across their career along with some previously unheard new music (for which all attendees will receive a free download code).
Flies Are Spies From Hell (who’ve played their own share of Facemelter shows) may be much jauntier than Tacoma Bridge Disaster, but both bands are storytellers without words. In the case of the Flies, they seem to have been on a fourteen-year mission to scour the glums out of post-rock clichés: their expansive instrumentals might maintain a little of that dour, hovering impression of bleakly glorious post-industrial landscapes (the kind I’ve just accused Tacoma of propagating) but if Tacoma illustrate spectacular polluted sunsets then the Flies represent a more hopeful sunrise. In addition to the basic post-rock moves, their own instrumentals seemingly quote everything from folk rock to house piano riffs, and somehow do so without making it all sound like a wacky polystylistic exercise. Instead, think of breakfast in a borderland, people from various walks of life or culture moving through and conversing.
Maziac are making their Facemelter debut at this gig. Pulling in former members of Manchester prog-metallers Phineas Gage, Canadian indie rockers Forgotten Fix and London screamos Knievel Genius, they’re the out-and-out dirtiest and heaviest band on the bill when they want to be (and the only one with vocals) but, paradoxically, they’re also the lightest. Behind the gnarly riffage and the blast beats, there’s a lot of power-pop honeycomb – they use something akin to The Wildhearts’ alleged wheeze of fusing sticky Cheap Trick melodies with gnarly Metallica amp savagery, decorating it liberally with tech-metal tricks and brief, perfectly placed instrumental fireworks.
A debut EP, ‘Parallels’ shows off well-developed songwriting skills to impressive effect. They don’t really seem to buy that much into the ornate and slightly solipsistic world of their billmates, but follow their own particular path: if Tacoma and Flies are urging you to stop and soak in a spectacular world, Maziac are busy powering out of the valley in order to get something done.
Chaos Theory Promotions presents:
The Facemelter: Tacoma Narrows Bridge Disaster + Flies Are Spies From Hell + Maziac
The Black Heart, 2-3 Greenland Place, Camden Town, London, NW1 0AP, England
Friday 3rd August 2018, 7.30pm – information here, here and here
Misfit City 