Brighton after dark: 3rd June 2014
BEN BAILEY
On a masked man and sweet Clams
A masked man, an unknown identity and one hell of a scary sound. All we know about Vincent Vocoder Voice (Hope, Wed 4 June) is that he comes from Brighton and makes the most disturbing music we’ve heard for some time. It’s full-on heavy without slipping into a rock furrow and packs in some surprising melodies underneath spasms of surging noise and random clatter. Some of VVV’s songs recall the wonky art rock of Cardiacs, just with the fun replaced by uncomfortable lyrics and unpleasant imagery. Which is great. But it’s not to say there isn’t a certain humour at work here. The press release for last November’s eponymous album spoke of “capturing the second of murderous anger at being cut up at the roundabout or being handed a half-full cappuccino.” Either he’s a tit, or he thinks you are.
Smoke Fairies (Sticky Mike’s Frog Bar, Wed 4 June) call themselves dream-pop, but really it sounds like good old folk rock. Perhaps hoping to dodge the unfashionable connotations of both those words, the Chichester duo have tried to rebrand what is essentially trad folk harmonies with tinkling piano and/or softly distorted guitar. It’s pristine and pretty, but stands or falls depending on how many mid-tempo ballads you can manage in one sitting. Judging by the girls’ ongoing success, audiences can’t get enough. They’ve been championed by Richard Hawley, toured with Laura Marling and were signed by Jack White.
A good indicator of the folk rock influence, right there.
Shannon And The Clams (Hope, Thurs 5 June) take a decidedly lo-fi approach to the squeaky-clean sound of the 50s and early 60s music. In thrall to both prom-pop and early garage, the band combine sweet and simple tunes with fuzzed-up guitars and drums that sound like somebody’s kicking a shed. The Oakland trio might be a little rough round the edges, but it all serves to offset what might otherwise be a cheesy pastiche of Buddy Holly and The Shangri-Las. That stuff has an innocence that can’t be done these days without gagging. As filtered by the Clams, that music is battered and
broken-hearted, but it’s all the better for it.
Pic Credit: Vincent Vocoder Voice
Brighton Noise
Alastair Reid on the week’s best gigs
Thirty-two years after Carlton Douglas Ridenhour released Public Enemy #1 on tape while studying graphic design at Long Island’s Adelphi University, his legendary crew are at the Concorde on Tuesday. Public Enemy’s 2012 double album “Most Of My Heroes Still Don’t Appear On No Stamp/The Evil Empire of Everything” was re-released on vinyl for this year’s Record Store Day and although the clocks around Flavor Flav’s neck keep ticking, Chuck D and the rest show no signs of slowing down. It’s close to £30 but, well into their fifties, this may be one of the few times left to catch one of hip-hop’s greatest-ever groups.
Angel Olsen is at the other end of her career but back in Brighton for the second show promoting February’s Burn Your Fire For No Witness on Wednesday.
The Missouri native creates a fine mixture of old-timey warbles over fuzzy new wave and folk classics that hit the listener like a bottle of whiskey and a broken heart. The Old Market couldn’t be a better place to see her return.
Psych-rock weirdos The Cosmic Dead recorded their eponymous debut album yards away from the tragically enflamed Glasgow School of Art in 2011 and bring their glorious 80-minute foray into the cosmos to Campbell Road Studios on Thursday.
Before the Great Escape, Campbell Road was a slightly damp pair of shipping containers under the viaduct near Preston Circus, but the festival spurred a fresh and cosy renovation that should make it a mainstay as a venue for the future.
Local luminaries Jungfrau and Portsmouth’s You’re Smiling Now But We’ll All Turn Into Demons, support.
For a band to have amassed more than 3000 likes on Facebook with only 25 seconds of recorded music is some feat, so if you want to know what the fuss is about, get down to the Prince Albert for Girl Band on Saturday. That 25 seconds – ‘The Cha Cha Cha’ – spits in the face of everyone else on this list, not least because of its disregard for form or structure, and is a rolling boulder of post-punk fury built around a five-second riff. But it’s really good.
The excellent Future Islands – at the Concorde on Saturday after a recent Letterman Show appearance that was half-croon, half-growl, all awesome – also get a nod this week, but Dog In The Snow is at the Green Door Store on Monday so that’s where we’ll be.
Follow: @BrightonNoise
