LEICESTER BANGS
I have a dark grey V-neck jumper which I wear quite often, both in the workplace and at home. Every time I put it on I think of when I acquired it, slightly over three years ago. I say “acquired” because it found its way into my bag – accidentally, your honour – after a gig in Buffalo headlined by Diet Pills, playing in Cardiff for the first time. What a great band they were, even more so when they returned to the city in 2011 for a couple of raucous shows at the Gower pub (the Nov ’11 date is the last ‘loud’ show that’s been promoted in there, I think). Pick up all their releases too, especially the self-titled LP on their own Force Fed label: horrified, crawling noise-rock coated in litres of sludge woodstain.
That, however, is the past! Diet Pills broke up last year sometime, but each have flung themselves into the wild world of the new band, mostly teeming with comparable heaviness and unease. From their Leicester homestead, Duane Farrow and James Fowler, DP guitarist and drummist, have founded DISABILITY with another dude, Aaron Clayton. 2012 saw them spring swiftly into action with a four-track EP, ‘Rock’n’Roll Tigers’ – buy it on CD or tape, hopefully at this gig if they have copies. It’s more direct in its pummelling than Diet Pills, or at least what they grew into, but still thrills in the way it bolts weird jazzy interludes onto raw patties of ornery (not ordinary) Pissed Jeans / Hammerhead noiserock. I am amped about seeing them, on a Friday night and ev’ryt’ing.
The supporting cast are three bands who are all playing their first Lesson No.1 shows. Continuing the theme of dim memories of rock gig minutiae, ZINC BUKOWSKI were booked to support the great Foot Village at this gig a couple of years back, but the drummer decided to leave the band one day beforehand. Hopefully this will not happen again, not least because Pontypridd trio ZB now have the hardest-hitting drummer in the ‘scene’. They have also, in the last 18 months, turned into one of south Wales’ raddest rock bands on the sly. A self-released album, ‘Nature Finds A Way In The Face Of Woe’, mixes up anti-purist thug garage, Sonic Youth-y scree and destructo punk rock.
HOMOH will be playing their third ever gig here, I think. Their first one, back in January, was a trip, for them what likes Eyehategod-style southern sludge muck and downtuned/trad doom. They’ve finally uploaded a track in half-decent fidelity, so you can prep yourself. And before them we have THINK PRETTY, a Cardiff-based duo called Laura and Mikee. They do stripped-down grunge/punk/riot grrrl/goth rockouts that make we want to hit caps lock and type PJ HARVEY, BABES IN TOYLAND and WILD FLAG maybe.
OK then! As is customary with Friday (and Saturday) gigs in Buffalo, this is an EARLY START (7pm) and EARLY FINISH (10pm). With four bands, even though all sets are half an hour or less, we are running the tightest of ships. Think Pretty will be on at 7.25pm, and we’re not waiting round for slackers to turn up. It’s only FOUR POUNDS on the door, which is old skool to a fault, and will of course all be going to the bands in appropriate segments. Oh yeah, sorry about the flyer, I did it using scissors and glue in work.
posted by Noel Gardner at 9:16 pm
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