DIY, March 2022 by DIY Magazine

Wet Leg

are the New Queens of the Indie Game

PLUS NILÜFER YANYA PLACEBO, THE MYSTERINES, NOVA TWINS

M AT E

& MORE

THE NEW ALBUM - OUT 25 MARCH

INCLUDES: BEAUTIFUL JAMES / SURROUNDED BY SPIES / TRY BETTER NEXT TIME

PRE-ORDER NOW AT PLACEBOWORLD.CO.UK UK TOUR ON SALE NOW - SEE WEBSITE FOR TICKET DETAILS

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March HELLO

Editor , s Letter

Question!

Wet Leg decided on their band name after whacking together the words from two random emoji ( ). What two emoji would Team DIY choose for their own band names?

💦🦵

SARAH JAMIESON • Managing Editor Think I’ll keep things simple and go with because that was once my unofficial title when previously working at a famous UK pizza chain… (It absolutely wasn’t).

🍕⭐

EMMA SWANN • Founding Editor Google tells me there were some ‘70s punks called The Negatives already, so let's go Illuminated Fruit. Obviously.

🔦🍆

LISA WRIGHT • Features Editor My two most used emojis are , which I am going to say translates as the deeply on-brand Definitely Maybe.

👌🤷

LOUISE MASON • Art Director Terrifyingly deep and real.... : Black Hole Gymnast. I prefer their early stuff.

🕳🤸

ELLY WATSON • Digital Editor My two most used emojis are which perfectly sums up the music I listen to, so let’s go with Crying! At The Disco.

🕺😢

Ever since the slick-but-sarcastic sounds of Wet Leg’s insatiable debut single ‘Chaise Longue’ landed in DIY’s inbox last summer, we were well and truly hooked. A glorious mix of deadpan wit, peppy beats and scuzzed-up guitars, it was the track that changed it all for the band. And now, less than a year on, we couldn’t be more thrilled to be inviting them to our cover to celebrate their brilliant self-titled record and the whirlwind journey they’ve found themselves on so far. Elsewhere in our March issue, Nilüfer Yanya opens up about her new album ‘PAINLESS’, The Mysterines welcome us into their Liverpudlian base to chat their unexpectedly challenging debut, and we start prepping for The Greatest Live Event Happening in East London This Year (ahem)… DIY Alive! It’s gonna be a doozy, we promise. Sarah Jamieson, Managing Editor

Listening Post

WARPAINT - RADIATE LIKE THIS It’s been six years since Warpaint gifted us with an album, but thankfully the quartet have lost none of their particular magic. Preceded by the gauzy magnetism of ‘Champion’, the band’s long-awaited fourth will draw you back into their web in no time. DANIEL ROSSEN - YOU BELONG THERE Most famed as one quarter of US lush indie favourites Grizzly Bear, ‘You Belong There’ marks Daniel Rossen’s first solo release but still bears all the hallmarks of his rich, swoony day job. THE BEATLES - SGT. PEPPER’S LONELY HEARTS CLUB BAND At the time of going to print, we only have a cheekily-shared Wordle pre-dated 25/6 to hint that Paul McCartney will indeed be taking Saturday’s Glasto headline slot, but while we wait for confirmation let’s all whack ‘Sgt. Pepper’s…’ on and get a little misty eyed at the thought of the most hit-packed set to ever grace the Pyramid Stage.

ISSUE PLAYLIST Scan the Spotify code to listen to our March playlist now.

C o n 30 t e n t 44 s News

6 L i l y M o o re 10 N o v a Tw i n s 12 P l a c e b o 16 m xm t o o n 18 H a l l o f F a me

NEU 22 24 26 28

Chri s s i VLURE Luna Li G rov e

Wet Leg

BODEGA

Charlotte Adigéry & Bolis Pupul

The Mysterines

Buzzard Buzzard Buzzard

Shout out to: All at state51 for their continued support and for teaming up with us to film the Hello 2022 sessions (watch via youtube.com/diymag now!); Dev and P-C at SXSW for helping to make our stages happen, and Marshall for their support in getting us out there; Jasleen at Dawbell for shipping everyone to Liverpool; Miranda for stepping in as DIY Alive’s social media hero, and all of you who’ve already bought tickets for what is primed to be the greatest weekend of music April 23rd and 24th has ever seen - if you’ve not got yours, head to diyalive.com now!

Founding Editor Emma Swann Managing Editor Sarah Jamieson Features Editor Lisa Wright Digital Editor Elly Watson Art Direction & Design Louise Mason Contributors Alex Cabré, Alisdair Grice, Bella Martin, Ben Tipple, Burak Cingi, Carolina Faruolo, Chris Hamilton-Peach, Cordelia Lam, Ed Miles, Elvis Thirlwell, Emma Wilkes, Gemma Samways, Ims Taylor, Joe Goggins, Louisa Dixon, Max Pilley, Rhys Buchanan, Ryan Bell, Sarah Taylor, Tom Skinner, Tyler Damara Kelly, Will Richards.

REVIEWS 5 2 Al bums 6 2 E P s , etc 6 4 Li v e

For DIY editorial: info@diymag.com For DIY sales: advertise@diymag.com For DIY stockist enquiries: stockists@diymag.com All material copyright (c). All rights reserved. This publication may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form, in whole or in part, without the express written permission of DIY. Disclaimer: While every effort is made to ensure the information in this magazine is correct, changes can occur which affect the accuracy of copy, for which DIY holds no responsibility. The opinions of the contributors do not necessarily bear a relation to those of DIY or its staff and we disclaim liability for those impressions. Distributed nationally.

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Nilüfer Yanya

NEWS

alive look

As we move ever closer to the inaugural edition of DIY Alive next month, we get a little better acquainted with bluesy Brighton singer - and our Sunday night headliner - Lily Moore… Words: Elly Watson.

“I’m gonna be 40 and singing songs about sucking dick!”

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“I

have a real memory of listening to ‘Do What You Gotta Do’ by Nina Simone on the way to school and being like, ‘Oooooooooh’,” Lily Moore smiles, recalling the lightbulb moment when she realised she had found her calling. Armed with soul-tinged powerhouse vocals, Lily’s inspirations are clear to see, and when she steps up on stage for a sold-out show at London’s Village Underground shortly after we chat today, it’s evident why she’s been gathering comparisons to music’s bluesy greats. Although raised in Brighton by a musical family - her father was famed guitarist Gary Moore who performed in Thin Lizzy and Skid Row - Lily’s musical education properly began when she took a job in a pub and

stories about getting older,” she muses, “and this one nicely captures where I am in my life. I’ve come out of Brighton and I care a little bit less about what people think of me now, so it’s about how I actually feel and not what I think people want me to say.” Experimenting sonically too, Lily’s changing up her easy-breezy ballads for something a little bit different, notably now set to release songs that - in her own words - are “fucking quick!” “If you deliberately try to experiment, it always ends up looking a bit try-hard,” she explains. “But I like just doing whatever I feel like doing that morning. I think what ties them all together is that they’re my stories, and my voice. I’m not scared to do lots of different things anymore.”

iving her fans the new music they’ve been waiting for, Lily’s already built a loyal fanbase, noting how the front rows at her gigs are normally full of teenage girls who know every word. “Caitlin Moran did this piece about how teenage girls who are music fans are like this special superhuman breed in terms of their loyalty and love for you, and yeah, I like that. It’s good vibes,” she smiles. “I’ve got this song called ‘Better Than Me’ which is really naughty, about being down on your knees and smoking weed,” she

“Teenage girls who are music fans are like this special superhuman breed in terms of their loyalty and love for you.” was introduced to soul and pop music. “Everyone thinks it’s my parents, but my mum and dad’s music taste for the best part is quite shit,” she laughs. “They just love Britney!” Growing up when Amy Winehouse, Adele and Duffy were constantly on the radio, Lily was instantly enamoured with their big voices. Singing ‘Chasing Pavements’ at school talent shows and any other given opportunity, she pinpoints Adele’s confidence as being one of her main sources of inspiration. “I was quite bullied at school, so it was nice to see somebody that wasn’t wearing a pair of low-rise jeans and a crop top,” she notes. “It was like, ‘It doesn’t matter, you can do this’. At school I was then known as ‘the singer’, and I would sing all the time, rather than [being] ‘the weird fat kid’.” Since leaving school, Lily has channelled that love into crafting soul-tinged musical gems that instantly pull on the heartstrings. Dropping her excellently-named debut mixtape ‘More Moore’ back in 2019, she’s now gearing up to share a new EP. Written during the week where no one could go home over Christmas in 2020, she describes the forthcoming project as exploring “a collection of lessons” that she’s learned.

APPEARING OVER THE WEEKEND We’ve got more than 60 artists playing across DIY Alive’s jam-packed weekend. Here’s what a few more of them have to say about it.

Shame You’ve been hard at work in the studio, what can you tell us about the new material? Charlie Steen: Our management set us a challenge, which was to come up with as many new songs as we could in two weeks and be able to perform them live for two different nights at the Windmill in Brixton, under the alias Almost Seamus. It’s safe to say this is the most productive we’ve been in a long time, having nine completely new songs for both the shows and a load of others we’re continuing to work on. They have a lot more of the live element about them and seem to be heavy on melodies. Where are you finding inspiration for the music you’re making at the moment? I think everyone’s listening to different stuff, which has always been the case and is what helps when it comes to writing, as everyone can shine through their own inspirations. Personally I’m very much into ‘New York’ by Lou Reed, ‘L’Etat Et Moi’ by Blumfeld and ‘Children of Desire’ by Merchandise. You’re headlining DIY Alive on the Saturday! What can we expect from your set? New songs, brown hair and higher hairlines. Are there any surprises you’ve got in store for us? We’ll be crucifying Eddie 17 mins into the set.

continues. “It’s really frustrating because it’s the best song I’ve written [in terms of] streams, so I’m never gonna run away from it. I’m gonna be 40 and singing songs about sucking dick! But the front row knows every single word and they scream it at the top of their lungs. Even if it’s a bit embarrassing for me, I’d rather that I said it and they feel better than no one said it.” Bringing the good vibes to DIY Alive next month, Lily is set to take the stage as our Sunday headliner on 24th April. “If it’s a headline show, you’re the last thing people see on the day, so it’s got to be good and they’ve got to have a good time,” she states. “I used to get quite cheesed off if people were pissed in the crowd and chatting away, but actually I just want people to have a fucking good time!” Hoping to “see everything, drink everything, eat everything”, Lily promises that her set will be an emotional rollercoaster, including some new songs to “boost people up”, as well as some sad ones to have Tickets for “a little cry and a drink” to. “It will DIY Alive are definitely be loud,” she grins. “A loud available now via rollercoaster of emotion! And we’ll diyalive.com. just have a big laugh. That’s the main thing.”

“I think every EP that I’ve done has been

CARO d

You released your debut album ‘Heartbeats / Heartbreaks’ last year, what have you been up to since then? I’ve played a few gigs and been working on new music. Can we expect the album’s follow-up soon? I’m trying to finish two things I really like, hopefully they’ll be ready soon.

Master Peace

Can you tell us a bit about the new music you’ve been working on? My third EP is on the way, which I recorded in January. I think it’s the best music I’ve ever made. I really feel like I’ve found my sound and I’m ready to go all the way.

What’s your favourite thing about performing live? Meeting new faces and seeing friends. And also when I get to that point where I feel truly comfortable on stage during the performance and I can really get into the emotions of the tracks. What’s your favourite thing to do at a festival? Watch other artists play, discover new music and talk to people.

You recently teamed up with The Streets! Did Mike Skinner give you any words of wisdom? Mike is my brother for life – he showed me love from the start, which was such a big deal to me to be on a tune with one of my music idols. It’s actually pretty wild, I’m still not over it. Definitely a box ticked off there for me! You’ve always said that performing live is when you shine. What can we expect from your performance at DIY Alive? New sound, new swag, new noise and the rest… Who will you be sticking around to see? Definitely wanna see the conversation with Self Esteem. I’m a big fan of the music so I think it will be an interesting listen!

Panic Shack You’ve recently announced your debut EP, ‘Baby Shack’! What can you tell us about it? Sarah Harvey: The EP is a collection of our earliest songs that we think perfectly sum up who we are as a band: basically a group of best friends messing around and having fun. We write about experiences we've had that are funny with an extra sprinkle of angst in there for good measure. We don't take ourselves seriously at all so hopefully that translates and our listeners can relate to us. For people who haven’t seen you before, what can we expect from a Panic Shack show? Think classic punk rock meets ‘00s girl band. Choreographed dance routines and infinite energy! Who else will you be seeing over the weekend? We've been fans of Do Nothing for ages so it'll be really cool to see them again, and Lime Garden we haven't crossed paths yet but they are killing it at the moment and we're loving their new releases. Describe your live set in three words… Tickets for Raucous, chaotic, playful. DIY Alive are

available now via diyalive.com.

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Current Joys

Adrianne Lenker

Juan Wauters

Keeley Forsyth

Imarhan

SUN 6TH MARSOLD OUT EARTH THEATRE

THU 10TH MAR VILLAGE UNDERGROUND

FRI 11TH MAR MILTON COURT

THU 17TH MAR THE DOME

Cakes Da Killa

The Weather Station

Federico Albanese

Navy Blue

WED 23RD MARSOLD OUT SCALA

FRI 18TH MARSOLD OUT SAT 19TH MARSOLD OUT THE DOME

WED 23RD MAR CORSICA STUDIOS

TUE 6TH SEP UNION CHAPEL

The Beths

Yard Act

caroline

MON 4TH APR O2 FORUM KENTISH TOWN

TUE 5TH APRSOLD OUT EARTH HALL

THU 7TH APR CECIL SHARP HOUSE

Jeff Rosenstock

King Hannah

TUE 19TH APR ELECTRIC BALLROOM

The Tallest Man On Earth + GORDI SAT 23RD APRSOLD OUT SUN 24TH APR MON 25TH APR EARTH THEATRE

TOPS

Mario Batkovic

THU 17TH MAR ST PANCRAS OLD CHURCH

Japanese Breakfast

FRI 25TH MAR QUEEN ELIZABETH HALL

MON 28TH MAR XOYO

WED 30TH MAR O2 FORUM KENTISH TOWN

Damien Jurado

Jenny Hval

The War On Drugs

SUN 10TH APR EARTH THEATRE

MON 11TH APR EARTH THEATRE

TUE 12TH APR THE O2

Wesley Gonzalez

HEALTH

Alex Cameron

Spirit Of The Beehive

WED 20TH APR OSLO

WED 20TH APR MOTH CLUB

THU 21ST APR STUDIO 9294

FRI 22ND APR EARTH HALL

FRI 22ND APR MOTH CLUB

Rodrigo Amarante

Jonathan Bree

Porches

Ryley Walker

Kim Gordon

WED 4TH MAY SCALA

FRI 6TH MAY POWERHAUS

FRI 13TH MAY LAFAYETTE

SAT 21ST MAY EARTH THEATRE

MON 23RD MAY KOKO

Machine Girl

Bikini Kill

Wu-Lu

Surf Curse

Moses Sumney

MON 13TH JUN ROUNDHOUSE

TUE 14TH JUN VILLAGE UNDERGROUND

WED 22ND JUN HEAVEN

TUE 28TH JUN KOKO

IN THE ROUND

SUN 12TH JUN O2 ACADEMY GLASGOW

WED 1ST JUN VILLAGE UNDERGROUND

WED 1ST JUN ELECTRIC BALLROOM

Destroyer

The Magnetic Fields

Hurray for the Riff Raff

Ólafur Arnalds

Porridge Radio

SUN 10TH JULY EARTH HALL

WED 31ST AUG EVENTIM APOLLO

FRI 9TH SEP LAFAYETTE

FRI 16TH SEP SAT 17TH SEP EVENTIM APOLLO

THU 3RD NOV O2 SHEPHERD’S BUSH EMPIRE

In The Studio

Nova Twins

With 2020 debut album ‘Who Are The Girls?’, Nova Twins ripped up the rulebook of rock music and then some. With follow-up ‘Supernova’, they’re declaring who they are for all to hear. Words: Sarah Jamieson.

hough it may have taken Nova Twins four years to graduate from their debut self-titled EP through to finally unleashing their first full-length, ‘Who Are The Girls?’, back in 2020, the duo aren’t planning on wasting any time on its follow-up. Having already whipped up a frenzy off the back of that debut - from calling for the MOBO Awards to introduce an ‘alternative’ category, to bagging spots on huge tours alongside the likes of Bring Me The Horizon and Enter Shikari - the pair are already hurtling headfirst towards the release of the aptlytitled ‘Supernova’.

“So much was happening, it felt like chaos,” begins vocalist and guitarist Amy Love, on where they found themselves after unveiling ‘Who Are The Girls?’. Released just a handful of weeks before lockdown was brought in across the world, the sudden halt would make a huge impact on their next steps. “The world shut down, everything changed as we knew it,” she continues, “and I think we just wrote what we were feeling, and wrote in the moment.” Using lockdown as a catalyst to begin writing (“We were just like, ‘We’ve got all this time, why don’t we just start?’” confirms bassist Georgia South), it was only when the band completed the electrifying rally call of new track ’Cleopatra’ that ‘Supernova’ really began to come to life. “That was when we had been watching

“We always wanna take back the power, and give that power to the people.” - Amy Love

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Netflix, chilling, and then I dunno…” laughs Georgia. Working separately, the pair would exchange ideas and riffs via Logic. “I sent the song to Amy, and when she sent back the lyrics I was literally in tears,” she continues. “It feels so empowering - I think it was at the time of the whole BLM movement as well - it was just such a powerful song.” "It gave us hope, didn’t it?” Amy chips in. “After just doing nothing, and then suddenly you sent this idea, I was like, ‘That sounds amazing’ and we just got inspired. Sometimes, during the first lockdown, you just wouldn’t feel in the mood to write - we just didn’t wanna do anything! But then ‘Cleopatra’ gave us hope again; we were like, ‘Yes we can do this, let’s push ourselves’. We didn’t know when live music was gonna come back, and people were wondering if it even was going to, so it was just like, ‘Let’s keep going’, and it got us through, for sure.”

leopatra wasn’t the only famous female to give Nova Twins a bit of much-needed encouragement, however. Returning to the studio after writing most of the album apart, the pair found themselves almost finished, but exhausted, and with a 24-hour deadline to finish a key track. “Oh with ‘Choose Your Fighter’, it was so funny,” quips Amy. “I don’t know why we were so tired, but basically we were just lying on the sofa being like, ‘We need to keep going!’” Enter pop royalty’s most motivating hit… “We just kept playing Britney Spears’ ‘Work Bitch’ on our phones. We kept playing it and playing it, and every time we were slacking, we’d be like ‘Britney’s saying we gotta work

bitch!’” “One of us would be like, ‘Oh I can’t go on’,” laughs Georgia, "and the other would be like, ‘….You gotta work bitch!’” Building upon the ferocious punk-fuelled hybrid of genres they explored on ‘Who Are The Girls?’, this time around, things feel amped up to another level entirely. “‘Who Are The Girls?’ was us coming out and breaking onto the scene,” explains Amy. “But ‘Supernova’ is us saying: ‘This is who we are - there you go!’ “We always describe ‘Supernova’ as a journey,” she continues. “It’s not always pleasant, but sometimes it’s the best feeling ever - and what you can take from it is that it’ll prepare you for anything. We always wanna take back the power, and give that power to the people.” From the scorching riffs of single ‘Antagonist’ - released late last year - through to the sassy playground chant of sex positive ‘Puzzles’, via the slinking shadows of ‘A Dark Place For Something Beautiful’, the album may delve into different moods and feelings, but the band were sure to emblazon it with a real sense of strength. “It’s very yin and yang,” confirms Amy, "but no matter where you’re at in life - whether at your lowest point or at the peak of the mountain - you’re gonna come through it. That’s why, even though there are darker elements to it, it’s still empowering.” ‘Supernova’ is out 17th June via Marshall Records. DIY

“We just kept playing Britney Spears’ ‘Work Bitch’ on our phones every time we were slacking in the studio”

SONG WARS!

FKA twigs vs Grizzly Bear

Of all the words in all the world, sometimes artists just plump for exactly the same ones. But which of these identically-titled songs is technically, objectively the winner? Ready, set, FIGHT!

THIS MONTH:

‘Wake Me Up’ Foals vs Girls Aloud FOALS Year released: 2021 How has it aged? The first track from the all-conquering equestrians’ forthcoming seventh album ‘Life Is Yours’, ‘Wake Me Up’ hasn’t had much time to bed down yet but it’s already kick-started many a party during their postpandemic live sets. A future Foals classic? Quite possibly. What’s it saying? Yannis has been vocal about the hedonistic potential of Foals’ new material, declaring their next album “riotous” with “an ecstasy to it”. ‘Wake Me Up’ is indicative of all that, literally sounding the alarm for a world that’s back in action and raring to get lairy once more. Banger rating out of 10: An aural tequila shot, it’s a worthy 8.

GIRLS ALOUD Year released: 2004 How has it aged? Yes, we all adore Little Mix. Yes, the Sugababes reunion is one to treasure. But Girls Aloud remain THE girl band of the 21st Century and the fact that they can throw out a track like ‘Wake Me Up’, with its razor-sharp hook and gloriously trashy party spirit, just as well as a classic sugary pop hit only cements that fact. What’s it saying? Caught in the haze of a whirlwind destructive relationship, ‘Wake Me Up’ is a distillation of all that mess. “Was it just the margaritas or are you lookin’ at me?” questions Cheryl in her thick Geordie twang. We’ve all been there, love. Banger rating out of 10: Show us a Girls Aloud hit that is anything less than a 9 and we’ll call you a liar (so yes, it’s a 9).

RESULT Two strong contenders, but if Foals are tooting the clarion call of the party then we want Girls Aloud to be there waiting for us when we arrive.

- Georgia South

NEWS

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DIY

in deep

“We weren’t trying to be extremely different, we were just trying to be us.” — Brian Molko

here there is culture, there is always counterculture, and since the ‘90s, counterculture has meant Placebo. Formed by singer/ guitarist Brian Molko and multi-instrumentalist Stefan Olsdal back in 1994, the band found themselves catapulted into the pop arena when they dropped their self-titled debut album two years later. A hurricane of vitriolic alt-rock, ‘Placebo’ peaked on the UK album charts at Number Five, introducing the trio - then completed by drummer Robert Schultzberg - as vicious new stars of the British band ecosystem. At the apex of boozing-on-the-beach Britpop, Placebo, with their venomous tones and broody personas, offered an alternative. Having taken up guitar as a teen, inspired by the sordid sounds of Depeche Mode and Sonic Youth, frontman Brian would soon move to London to study drama at Goldsmiths. There, a chance encounter with Stefan - a trained musician who had once been a schoolmate of Brian’s - sparked a creative partnership which endures to this day: next month

marks the release of ‘Never Let Me Go’, their first full album of new material in close to a decade. Down the phone on a lazy Sunday evening, Brian casts his mind back to those early years. Such a positive reception to the debut came as a shock to him and Stefan, he tells DIY.

“We really felt like we’d duped everyone,” he laughs. “We fooled somebody into giving us a budget to make an album and, like naughty school children, we were gonna get found out sooner or later. So, when success happened, we grabbed at the entire rock’n’roll cake extremely enthusiastically and threw ourselves into it. I didn’t imagine that it was going to last. I thought I was living in a kind of alternative reality, you know? I thought the drugs were working better than they really were.” What stood Placebo apart from their sideburnsporting, lager-chugging contemporaries was as much to do with their looks as their tunes. Doe-eyed and slim, his pale face set behind a soft, black bob, the young Brian oozed androgynous mystique. When the accepted stage wear for a frontman consisted mostly of tracksuits and anoraks, Brian donned dresses, low-cut tops, lip-gloss and eyeshadow. To much of the general public discovering the band live for the first time, Brian was a walking, talking question mark. And he loved it. “People who didn’t know much about Placebo were coming and a lot of them thought that Placebo were a female-fronted band. That became a very fun thing for me. Particularly because sometimes it was people in Oasis T-shirts, and they’d find the singer in the band sexy and then they’d have to go home and ask themselves a few questions once they found out the singer’s name was Brian. That tacit challenge of homophobia just by being yourself was as close to political, I guess, as we could be at the time. “Looking back now,” he continues, “it seems that was a real necessity for us, to express ourselves that way. We weren’t trying to be extremely different, we were just trying to be us.”

etween their provocative aesthetic, razorblade sonics and lyrics about outsiderdom, gender and sexual identity, and mental health, Placebo quickly accrued a passionate fanbase of “misshapes” they share a deep connection with to this day. As their own band grew in stature, they collaborated with other prolific square pegs, reaching the upper echelons of rock

DIY In Deep is our monthly, online-centric chance to dig into a longer profile on some of the most exciting artists in the world right now. As they gear up to release their first album in almost ten years, who better to catch up with than the iconic Placebo? More than 25 years into their career, the duo are as vital as they’ve ever been. On the cult heroes' long-overdue eighth album ‘Never Let Me Go’, they're steeling themselves for the end of the world as we know it. Keep reading for an extract, and head over to diymag.com/placebo to peep the full feature… Words: Alex Cabré.

lore at the hands of their own teen idols. Brian mentions The Cure’s Robert Smith and Michael Stipe of R.E.M., who he duetted with on ‘Broken Promise’ in 2006, as guiding forces in his life, both in and outside of music. But when DIY asks about the proudest achievements of his career so far, one name comes up immediately: David Bowie, who lent his vocals to a version of Placebo’s 1998 single ‘Without You I’m Nothing’, and for whom they served as tour support for five years. “We started touring with him even before we put out our first record,” Brian recalls. “We’d do our half-hour set and then every night we’d get to smoke a joint and watch Bowie and learn stagecraft. Learn what it really is to perform.” There could be no better mentor for the young punks, and Brian took a lot personally from their relationship. “David certainly was a legend, but he never behaved like he thought he was. There was always a bit of the working-class boy who grew up in Brixton still in David,” he says, imitating a subtle London accent. “David was the kind of person that treated everyone with dignity. It didn’t matter if you were Bono or if you were the plumber. He talked to these people exactly the same way, with kindness, dignity and compassion,” he pauses. “You know that Foo Fighters song, ‘My hero, he’s ordinary…’? There was a lovely ordinariness about David, an approachability and a kindness which I think has affected me very, very deeply.” And while being recognised as a peer by the artists he grew up loving gave Brian strength, he’s quick to admit to having self-deprecating tendencies and finds it difficult to appreciate his own output. “It hasn’t totally taken away that voice in my head always telling me I can do better. You know, ‘It’s not Leonard Cohen or Bob Dylan, now really, is it?’ I have that voice!” he cackles. “‘You got away with it, but it’s not exactly Billie Holiday!’” Read the full feature at diymag.com/placebo. 'Never Let Me Go' is out 25th March via So Recordings. DIY

NEWS

MURA MASA FT. LIL UZI VERT, PINKPANTHERESS AND SHYGIRL

bbycakes

Now that Uggs and low-rise jeans are apparently on the menu for those of us who didn’t experience the Y2K boom the first time around, it perhaps shouldn’t come as too much of a surprise that Mura Masa has decided to take on cult 2004 hit ‘Babycakes’. And yet, somehow, the re-emergence of 3 Of A Kind’s earworm classic still wasn’t what anyone saw coming. Now aptly titled ‘bbycakes’ - because why not - and featuring an all star cast of collaborators - PinkPantheress, Shygirl and Lil Uzi Vert are all part of the crew here - the track is a polished and glitchy delight, that’s sure to soundtrack many a TikTok from now. Sure, it’s not quite got the same round-around-the-edges charm of the original, but with a line-up like this, it’s still ridiculously fun. (Sarah Jamieson)

have you heard ?

SUNFLOWER BEAN Who Put You Up To This?

In the latest issue of DIY, Sunflower Bean guitarist Nick Kivlen noted how even the group's closest friends have no idea what their next song will sound like. And 'Who Put You Up To This?', the second track to be shared from the group's third album - May's 'Headful of Sugar' - continues this beautifully unpredictable trajectory. Where previous single 'Baby Don't Cry' was a glorious slice of powerpop, 'Who Put You Up To This?' is a smooth, slinky take on '70s sepiahued sun-kissed melodies. And obviously, it's great. (Emma Swann)

DENZEL CURRY FT. SLOWTHAI Zatoichi

PORRIDGE R ADIO Back To The Radio Porridge Radio’s Dana Margolin wrote

new single ‘Back To The Radio’ in late 2019, months before the release of second album ‘Every Bad’ and while sensing that something big was ahead of her and her bandmates. The adulation and attention she expected duly followed – and this mix of excitement, fear and trepidation flows through the fantastic new single. The most anthemic the band have ever sounded, ‘Back To The Radio’ packs Killers-level bombast with Dana’s distinctive, idiosyncratic lyrical style and perfectly distils the intoxicating feeling of being on the edge of something huge, and the excitement and terror it brings. (Will Richards)

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FLORENCE + THE MACHINE King Florence Welch’s comeback anthem, ‘King’, finds her grappling with how her ambitions as an artist align with a desire to settle down. While previous album ‘High As Hope’ reflected her newfound sense of calm, the Jack Antonoff-assisted new single follows the singer on a journey into the next phase of her life. Ultimately, Florence’s niggling uncertainties about the future are put to bed. Guided by dark and fantastical motifs, she lands on a killer chorus that grows in ferocity and self-assurance: “I am no mother, I am no bride – I am King.” All hail! (Tom Skinner)

Make no bones about it, ‘Zatoichi’ - the second track released from Denzel Curry’s forthcoming ‘Melt My Eyez See Your Future’ is a banger. Its verses are almost minimalist, Denzel’s flow the driving force, the direct delivery of his typically deft wordplay (“Bulimic throwing up the peace sign, see we call can dine / Man, I ain’t woke, I’m just sleep deprived”) sitting atop a soothing, breathy beat. The chorus, meanwhile, is an explosion of punky drum and bass chaos: the invitation for slowthai to take part here was a perfect move. “Fuck a Benz, fuck a Porsche, say my name, I teleport” - contender for oddest line yelled back at stages in 2022 so far? (Bella Martin)

g n i o G s ’ t a h W ? . . . h t i W n o

NEWS

on the

‘Gram These days, even yer gran is posting selfies on Instagram. Instagran, more like. Everyone has it now, including all our fave bands. Here’s a brief catch-up on music’s finest photo-taking action as of late.

mxmtoon

Yard Act have really been monopolising the musical discourse of late. How to self care: the punk (@yardactband) rock edition (@idlesband)

mxmtoon pushes the boundaries of her bedroom pop origins on new single ‘Mona Lisa’, and invites us into a bolder, more personal sound. Words: Cordelia Lam.

hy do I have to be the one to write about someone? Why won’t someone write music about me?” laughs Maia, or mxmtoon as she is known to her millions of fans. This question forms the origin of her latest single ‘Mona Lisa’, a savvy and sun-drenched pop tune that builds on her confessional ukulele pedigree and cleverly flips the authorial lens onto herself. “I wanted to view myself as worthy of being a subject,” she continues. “So many of my songs are about wanting to hide and be invisible; on this song, I ask to be adored for once instead of writing about another person. Celebrating myself in a song felt really important.”

been pigeonholed into that sad, indie girl role,” she continues. “People may not expect me, as the ‘emo ukulele girl’, to be a #1 ABBA fan, but being perceived one-dimensionally makes me feel trapped inside a label, when there is actually a broad horizon of things that I am.” Having just celebrated the five year anniversary of putting her first song online, Maia may still only be 21, but she’s developed a natural faith in her artistry as mxmtoon that she’s now bringing into everything she does. “As an 18-yearold Asian girl working with older white guys who have been in the industry for a long time, I think a lot of my ideas were lost in the creative process because I didn’t feel confident or deserving enough to speak up,” she says of her earlier recording experiences. “Years later, I can walk into these situations with my head held high and insist on my ideas, lyrics and direction.”

“Disco has always meant so much to me - especially as a queer young woman.”

With a debut album in the works that sees her stepping into new genres and inspirations (“I actually listen to such different music than I make,” she notes), her forthcoming release is set to be heavily influenced by her childhood favourites: disco, ABBA, and even nursery rhymes. “In the pandemic, I leaned on the things I loved growing up for comfort,” she explains. “Disco has always meant so much to me - especially as a queer young woman for its history and its liberation of queer identity.” And nursery rhymes?! “The song ‘It’s Alright to Cry’ by Rosey Grier from ‘Free to Be You and Me’ had such a profound impact on me as a child. It gave me my first experience of emotional release. You can find such comfort in familiarity with the things you grew up singing. “I definitely look to Mitski a lot, as I think we’ve both

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And with her long-awaited first full-length due for release this year, and a huge US tour run announced for summer, mxmtoon’s confidence is growing in every direction. “My first tour was very acoustic and stripped down, like my early work. This run is going to be really big, with lots of confetti,” she grins. “Nothing compares to singing along with your audience.” DIY

The new reboot of Ghostbusters was starting to get vibey. (@metronomy)

When your Hinge date doesn’t quite look like their profile pics. (@lynkslynkslynks)

NEWS

HALL FAME OF

CHARLI XCX - SUCKER Before transforming into a PC Music-adjacent, innovative future-pop behemoth, Charli XCX’s breakthrough LP found the singer embarking on a bratty and brilliantly unapologetic opening era. Words: Elly Watson.

“Fuck you, sucker!”

Charli XCX yells on the opening title track of her 2015 album ‘Sucker’. Bold and in your face, it made for the perfect introduction to Charli’s kind of anthemic pop: loud, proud and with a chorus made to be screamed back by thousands. But those thousands weren’t always there to be seen. It's hard to think given her position as one of the trailblazing pop greats in 2022, but back in the ‘10s Charli’s name was mainly preceded by the word ‘feat.’. She might have written 2012 chart-topping smash ‘I Love It’, but it was Icona Pop who stood front and centre, XCX only appearing for a bracketed guest spot (but still spawning the classic call-out: “I thought this song was big in Germany, what the fuck?”). In early 2014, Charli would continue her success as a featured vocalist when instant smash hit ‘Fancy’ by Iggy Azalea thrust her into the more mainstream pop world. However, she was always destined to be much greater than just an add-on, and a few months later, with the debut of infectious banger ’Boom Clap’, the world soon began to wise up to the fact that Charli could most certainly stand on her own. “It’s so exciting. It feels like it’s such a long time coming,” she told DIY back in 2014 of that breakthrough single. “Being a featured artist is great, but it is nice to finally have a song of my own that people really care about.” Following the success of ‘Boom Clap', Charli announced her second studio album ‘Sucker’ with another hit, ‘Break The Rules’: a bratty XCX party anthem about “getting high and getting wrecked” that provided the perfect showcase of what the album would entail. Penned during sessions with Weezer’s Rivers Cuomo and Vampire Weekend’s Rostam Batmanglij, ‘Sucker’ blended pop-punk elements into infectious pop stompers. With an aim

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THE to making a “consistent but next-level pop record”, each song sizzled with the kind of forward-thinking sensibilities that have since come to define the musician as one of the best pop writers of our time. ‘Doing It’ - which would later be re-released featuring Rita Ora, a decision which coincicded with a further delay to the record’s release this side of the Atlantic - remains a joyous, shimmering, bubblegum Released: 16th February 2015 (in Europe) pop gem, while ‘Body of Key tracks: ‘Boom Clap’, ‘Break The Rules’, My Own’ is a sickly sweet ‘Doing It’ ode to self-pleasure (“Yeah, Tell your mates: ‘Boom Clap’ was apparently I can do it better when I’m offered to Lizzie McGuire star all alone / Lights out, so Hilary Duff, but Charli was high”). ‘Die Tonight’ arrives told it wasn’t “cool” as a euphoric cut about being enough… at your happiest; the raucous ‘Breaking Up’ includes the iconic lyric “You have an ugly tattoo and fucking cheap perfume”, and closing track ‘Need Ur Luv’ perfectly encapsulates that well known feeling of wanting love even when it hurts.

THE

FACTS

Across the album’s 14 tracks, Charli crafted pop bangers primed to break through (which they did), while in turn delivering something completely refreshing. “This feels right, everything about it feels perfect,” she explained at the time. “I’ve grown in confidence. I know now that I can write a hit song, and I feel like I’ve come into my own.” Eight years later, and she’s still doing just that. DIY

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Photos from JM Enternational

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The Goa Express performing at The British Music Embassy Sessions. Photo by Thomas Jackson / TyneSight Photographic

FESTIVALS FESTIVALS FESTIVALS SXSW th 22 11th - 20 March 20

fter two years away from the dusty roads of Austin, Texas, we’re raising a frozen margarita to the return of SXSW this month. And not only will we be there on the ground, scouting out the hottest tips from the world’s most celebrated new music festival, we’ll be hosting two nights packed full of our favourites while we’re out there too.

On Monday 14th, DIY will be taking over the British Music Embassy at Cedar Street Courtyard with a line up featuring CMAT, Nuha Ruby Ra, Moonchild Sanelly, Buzzard Buzzard Buzzard, Coach Party and Gallus. Then, on Wednesday 16th at Augustine on Rainey Street, we’ve got a heavy-hitting line-up that boasts Self Esteem, Yard Act, Surfbort, Baby Queen, Priya Ragu and Gustaf.

Photo: Ed Miles

“I’m gonna meet the love of my life at SXSW, so I’m excited about that.”

CMAT had been rinsing her 50ps to get some riding practice in before SXSW.

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FESTIVAL

news in brief WE’RE SO EXCITED, WE’RE ALREADY SWEATING INTO OUR COWBOY BOOTS. BUT EVEN WE’RE NOT AS HYPED AS DUBLIN’S PREMIERE COWGIRL CMAT…

Hi CMAT! This is your first SXSW rodeo and, of everyone on the line up, we’re guessing the pilgrimage means quite a lot to you… I am SO EXCITED. I’ve never been to Texas or to the South or anywhere near there, and it’s the main feature and setting for all of my favourite songs and films. I don’t know what’s going to happen to me. I’m worried about doing one gig and then the rest of my band members not being able to find me for the rest of the time because I’ve gone off to find a cowboy. Have you got a mental picture of how you expect Austin to be? It sounds like it’s going to be very chaotic and I thrive in chaos, so I’m excited for that. And as always, whenever an event like this comes up and there’s going to be loads of people, what I say to all my friends is that I’m gonna meet the love of my life there so I’m excited for that. I’m looking for someone who is not in any way, shape or form involved in the music industry: a rancher, maybe someone who owns a dive bar, maybe an art dealer. Fifty-plus preferably, someone who’s done the starter marriage and the main meal marriage so I can be the dessert marriage. I want all of the money and land when they die.

Sounds like a plan! How many cowboy boots do you think you can fit in an EasyJet small luggage vessel? My plan is: no luggage on the way over, and just two empty suitcases to come back. I like to say I’m a clothes collector because it sounds nicer than a hoarder, and I’ve been ordering clothes from vintage shops in Austin since I was a teenager. It’s really expensive to ship over but it’s literally the only place in the world where you can get the kind of clothes I wear, so it’s actually a good business investment for me to fill up two suitcases and bring them back.

You’re playing DIY’s Monday night showcase! Why should people come and watch you? ‘Cause I’m class and I have a band now, so there’ll be five people on stage being a) amazing and b) just some of the bestlooking people you’ve ever seen in your life and I do not say that lightly. Every single one of us is a 10/10. And we’ve coordinated outfits so there’s a whole styling thing going on. It’s worth coming to see us physically, but we’re also some of the best musicians in the UK and Ireland. And all my songs are bangers. Why would you see anything else? Your debut LP ‘If My Wife New I’d Be Dead’ will be out by then. It’s an album full of flights of fancy, would you say you’re a big daydreamer? The number one mental health issue I’ve had in my life has been actual breaks from reality and I really struggle with reality versus what’s in my head. There was a period in my life where I’d love going home from work and sitting on my couch and just thinking for hours, just sitting and staring into space and creating a whole alternate reality. I’d go so deep into it that I’d almost live in it, and I had a bit of a ‘menty b’ in 2017 because I did not recognise myself when I looked in the mirror or in pictures. I think the way I’ve been able to deal with that and come back into the real world has been by putting it into music and compartmentalising it, because then it’s a real world but it only exists for three minutes and then I can move away from it again. What do you think is the biggest curveball on the album? I think what will catch people the most off guard is the guitar music songs, the ones that are super influenced by alternative indie music. I think also maybe people will be shocked that all of the best songs that they’ve ever heard in their life are on this record? It’s a bargain, because you’re buying a record that’s the same price as all the other records in the world, but it’s actually better than all of them. It’s so good that I did that.

DIY@THE BRITISH MUSIC EMBASSY

Paul McCartney and Kendrick Lamar join Billie Eilish at the top of the bill for this year’s GLASTONBURY (22nd - 26th June), with Olivia Rodrigo, Phoebe Bridgers, Wolf Alice and Lorde among the new names announced. Phoebe Bridgers, Little Simz, Rina Sawayama, Fontaines DC and Lewis Capaldi are among the first names for this year’s LATITUDE (21st - 24th July), where Foals will also headline. The Horrors, PVA, Dream Wife and Sorry head up the latest names for WIDE AWAKE (27th 28th May), joining headliners Bicep and Primal Scream, the latter set to perform their seminal ‘Screamadelica’ in full at the South London event. COMMUNITY (16th July) is returning to Finsbury Park for 2022, with Two Door Cinema Club, Pale Waves, Alfie Templeman and Courting among the acts set to appear. New acts have been added to DOWNLOAD (10th - 12th June), with Drag Race UK icon Bimini confirmed to join the likes of Biffy Clyro, Deftones, The Distillers, Creeper and Descendents at the Donington bash. The Smile, Doja Cat and Playboi Carti have been added to Poland’s OPEN’ER (29th June - 2nd July), where they’ll perform alongside artists including Dua Lipa, Megan Thee Stallion, Little Simz and Royal Blood. The final artists for Derbyshire’s Y NOT (29th - 31st July) have been announced, with Kelis, Laura Mvula, SOAK and dodie joining acts including Manic Street Preachers, Pale Waves, Sports Team and The Big Moon. Yard Act, Sinkane, Self Esteem and Dry Cleaning are among the latest additions to Yorkshire’s DEER SHED (29th - 31st July), with comedians Rosie Jones, Shaparak Khorsandi, David O’Doherty and Stewart Lee also added to the bill.

CEDAR STREET COURTYARD 14TH MARCH

GALLUS • 8PM NUHA RUBY RA • 9PM STRAWBERRY GUY • 10PM CMAT • 11PM MOONCHILD SANELLY • 12AM BUZZARD BUZZARD BUZZARD • 1AM

Sigrid and Snail Mail head up the newest names for POHODA (7th - 9th July), with Wolf Alice, Metronomy, Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds and Flume among those already confirmed for the Slovakian festival.

USTINE DIY@AUG TH

16 MARCH GUSTAF • 8PM BABY QUEEN •9PM PRIYA RAGU •10PM SELF ESTEEM • 11PM YARD ACT • 12AM SURFBORT • 1AM

The first wave of DOT TO DOT (28th - 29th May) artists has been revealed, with Nottingham and Bristol city centres set to host the likes of Squid, Ghetts, Alfie Templeman, Just Mustard and Lime Garden. The 1975 will headline Japan’s SUMMER SONIC (20th - 21st August), with other acts confirmed including Måneskin, Megan Thee Stallion, St Vincent and Carly Rae Jepsen.

It’s nice to feel like, when someone says they love my music, there’s also a bit of love for me there as well.” 22 DIYMAG.COM

CHRISSI Confessional songwriting and onstage bants by the bucketload, from the 20-year-old Londoner putting all of herself out there. Words: Lisa Wright. Photos: Emma Swann.

any artists might profess their dedication to rawness and authenticity, their willingness to lay themselves fully on the line, but few actually follow through with it quite to the extent of Chrissi. Take a trip through the 20-year-old Londoner’s debut EP ‘Back In The Day’, released at the tail end of 2021, and by the end you’ll find the singer gulping back very real sobs. When she was recording closing track ‘Stupid Little Girl’ with Mercury-shortlisted brother Berwyn on production, she was having a particularly rough day; encouraged to allow herself to be vulnerable, and buoyed by the freedom it left her with, she decided to keep the take in - warts and all. “I’m the most… something really bad can happen to me and an hour later I’m like, ‘Let’s get the beers in’, and I’m making jokes. And everyone’s accepted that to be me. I’m Chrissi, I’m the jokey one, you go to her to feel good,” she begins. “And that’s great, but Berwyn’s my brother so he’s like, ‘No, actually what’s going on?’ He turned all the lights off and closed his eyes, and I don’t cry in front of him but it was just a moment. We decided to leave it because when I listen to it, I don’t feel sad about the situation and I don’t feel weak. I was homeless at the time and I remember being so unstable and so upset, but in that moment I was so free because my brother was giving me the permission to just fucking cry which I felt like I hadnt been given in years.” Though barely out of her teens, wrangling with the multitudes of her identity has clearly been something that’s been at the heart of Chrissi’s journey for a long time. Born to Trinidadian parents, she spent her childhood listening to traditional Soca music at home and then going to school in Romford where she was the only Black person in the building. Obsessed with One Direction, Paramore and Five Seconds of Summer, she recalls moving up to college in East London at 16 and having no clue as to what any of her new friends were referencing. “I’d never studied with so many Black people before and they’d be like, ‘What do you listen to?’ And I wouldn’t know anyone they were naming - Erykah Badu, Jill Scott… The extent of R&B I’d listened to was Beyoncé, because everyone listens to Beyoncé.” Even when she started penning her own music as a teen, it was from a genuinely genreless place; a couple of years later, she laughs, she began listening to soul music for the first time, and realised that’s what she’d been writing all along. It’s a story that strangely suits her: more than a singer

indebted primarily to a style, Chrissi - whether in her vulnerable, uncensored songwriting or hilarious, affable stage chat - is an artist where it all truly just stems from her at the centre. “I started performing at Sofar Sounds shows and it was the perfect space to do what I love doing now, which is just talk at people and tell them about the most embarrassing shit as well as singing,” she laughs. “It’s like building friendships instead of people just coming to see a 20-minute set; I’m probably oversharing and it’s probably very embarrassing but if they feel like they know me then they can go home and listen to my songs which can be so vulnerable and honest and it works both ways. “There are a lot of songs [in the world] that aren’t really sad songs - they’re the template of every sad pop song ever but they don’t really hurt to listen to or hurt to sing,” she continues. “Maybe it’s just my own therapeutic thing, but it’s nice to feel like, when someone says they love my music, there’s also a bit of love for me there as well.” Currently, Chrissi is prepping her second EP - a release that she describes as giving even more of herself than before. You imagine, if the love is already starting to trickle in her direction, her next moves will only open up the floodgates even further. “There are sad songs with humorous lines, and hype songs about shaking my arse that are actually really sad, about begging for affection, that are more me. My first single’s called ‘Lipo’ and that’s probably the most honest song I’ve ever written. It just feels good and complete and like something I’m gonna be proud of when I release it,” she smiles. “There was a time when I couldn’t imagine looking the way I do and having a record label. I would talk to my nan and we’d watch all these movies about music industry horror stories, about what is ‘acceptable’ to look like, and so with all of it, I feel like it makes sense if I come as I am - in the music, in how I look, in my dialogue on stage. It’s not a script and there’s no facade there. It’s just 100% me.” Chrissi plays DIY Alive, which takes place in London on 23rd and 24th April. Head to diyalive.com for details. DIY

neu

VLURE

o get a real idea of the evolution of VLURE so far, you’ve got to go back to the beginning. One glance at the Glasgow quintet’s first creative output into the world - their visceral video performance of ‘Desire’, that was released back in December 2019 - shows a band already impressively fully-formed, the black-and-white clip showcasing their powerful first venture into dark post-punk. Yet it’s clear that, even two years ago, they were just on the precipice of something.

Meet the Glaswegian Prodigy and Nine Inch Nails, the five-piece - completed by Conor’s quintet rewriting the brother Niall, alongside drummer Carlo Kriekaard and keyboardist rulebook on post-punk, Alex Pearson - have instead taken the jagged energy they first and giving it a good captured with ‘Desire’, and melded it together with pummelling dose of club culture. Words: Sarah electronics and throbbing synths to create something altogether Jamieson. more devious.

“Over time, especially as the pandemic hit and there were no gigs, we managed to expand our sound and really give into what we wanted to be,” explains frontman Hamish Hutcheson. The time away from regular social lives and live gigs saw the group instead decide to expand upon their already arresting sound, pushing further towards the dance and techno sonics that they themselves were listening to. “Something we’ve always really wanted to do is burst the bubble of what a ‘postpunk’ band should sound like,” nods guitarist Conor Goldie in agreement. “I don’t think we’re ever in a place where you can define what our sound is,” Hamish picks up. “We want to continue to evolve and create new and exciting stuff. If it excites us, we feel, in turn, it can excite other people.” Inspired by the multifaceted sounds of the likes of Faithless, Underworld, The

“Some of my favourite bands are people who’ve brought something new to the table,” Conor says. “That’s kinda what we’re really trying to do; tell our story through what we’re making without pigeonholing ourselves into a certain genre or holding ourselves to constraints.” It’s on their debut EP that the feeling’s best captured; last month’s ‘Euphoria’ nothing to do with the TV show, admittedly - feels like a kind of hedonistic fever dream, or maybe just a massive, sometimes existential, night out… “It’s about going out, finding out who you are, what you want to do in this world, finding the people you love and learning how to treasure those people,” Hamish details. “It’s dealing with the turmoil that goes on in your head, and that existential ending of when you’re waking up hungover on a Monday, and being like, ‘Why did I do that to my body and mind?’ But also feeling like it was absolutely class and you wouldn’t change it for the world.” Quite the universal feeling, then… VLURE play DIY Alive, which takes place in London on 23rd and 24th April. Head to diyalive.com for details. DIY

We’ve always really wanted to burst the bubble of what a ‘post-punk’ band should sound like.” - Conor Goldie

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THE

Photo: Phil Knott

DOCTOR’S ORDERS

Every week on Spotify, we update DIY’s Neu Discoveries playlist with the buzziest, freshest faces. Here’s our pick of the best new tracks:

Not only has Class of 2022 star Role Model announced details of debut album ‘Rx’ - set for release on 8th April - he’s also headed out on the road. Alongside dates across North America and mainland Europe - taking in festivals including Bonnaroo, Sziget and Coachella along the way - the singer known to pals as Tucker Pillsbury will play London’s Kentish Town Forum (29th Aug, 2nd Sept), Manchester Ritz (31st Aug), Birmingham’s O2 Institute 2 (1st Sept) and Bristol O2 Academy (4th Sept). Listen to brand new track ‘if jesus saves, she’s my type’ on diymag. com now.

All the buzziest new music happenings in one place.

DEADLETTER HERO With a chorus that brings to mind the stabbing urgency of ‘00s indie heroes TV on the Radio’s seminal ‘Wolf Like Me’, the latest from South London-via-Yorkshire’s DEADLETTER is actually far more suited to the dance floor than it might want to admit. Of course, the vocals are spat out in a mardy speak-sing tumult; of course there’s some added sax parping (because what is an alt-guitar track in 2022 without some added sax parping). But actually, stick a cheap double vodka mixer in its hand, and ‘Hero’ could be somewhere in 2008, getting off with an inadvisable boy with an asymmetric haircut.

BUZZ FEED

SCOUT’S HONOUR It’s been a while since Neu has heard from Dama Scout - the London/Glasgow trio played our Hello 2017 series before impressing later that year with a self-titled EP. However, they’re back and with debut album ‘gen wo lai (come with me)’ in tow. Their first full-length will be released on 22nd April, featuring new track ‘emails from suzanne’. Watch the self-directed video which the band say explores “the death of the office, the nature of emerging flexible work environments and the relationship between labour and the millennial condition of perpetual adolescence” now on diymag.com

PLAYLIST

MOONAGE DAYDREAM Alfie Templeman is to release his debut album this spring. ‘Mellow Moon’ will follow last year’s mini-album ‘Forever Isn’t Long Enough’ on 27th May. Speaking to us back last year, he assured fans “it’s not just 14 puny, shitty pop songs. I promise!” adding “A lot of this record is influenced by Krautrock, weirdly enough! Also a lot of proggy stuff, bits of Genesis, Pink Floyd. There’s a Santana influence as well, and a Beatles-y bit.” Tell your Dad. He’s also off on tour this month, finishing with a huge date at London’s O2 Shepherd’s Bush Empire on 16th March. See all dates, and listen to latest track ‘Broken’ on diymag.com now.

MOMMA ROCKSTAR Momma – aka Brooklyn duo Allegra Weingarten and Etta Friedman – said that with ‘Rockstar’, they wanted to write “a song about making it big, and becoming rock stars.” On the unashamedly huge, anthemic track, they force their wish into existence. Using classic loud-quiet dynamics from past rock heroes, the track’s enormous chorus and the pair’s air of effortless cool means they’re well on the way to becoming the rockstars they dreamed of being.

MARIA BC THE ONLY THING ‘The Only Thing’, the first taster of Maria BC’s debut album ‘Hyaline’, is a song about the “full, effervescent, sun-iscoming-up feeling of new love,” they say. These feelings are transmitted gorgeously through their stunning voice, which rises to goosebump-inducing peaks and has hints of FKA twigs, all filtered through a delicate, sparse indie-rock framework. Its arresting video, of a subject being thrown about by the elements on a snowy beach, furthers this sense of emotional heaviness and beauty.

ENUMCLAW 2002 Tacoma, Washington four-piece Enumclaw made waves last year with their debut EP ‘Jimbo Demo’, and enter 2022 by throwing it back 20 years. On ‘2002’, their first song since signing to Luminelle Recordings, frontman Aramis Johnson pens a sarcastic take on “how I wake up everyday and try to be the worst possible human.” Aside from its deliberately narcissistic lyrics, ‘2002’ is a brilliant slice of raw, untamed indie rock that cuts through the noise.

Want to stream our Neu playlist while you’re reading? Scan the code now and get listening.

neu

LUNA LI I want the Luna Li universe to be a place where people can feel accepted and welcomed no matter who they are.”

itting on a sunshine-soaked step outside of her LA Airbnb, Toronto newcomer Luna Li is basking in the rays ahead of what is set to be a life-changing moment. In a few short weeks, she’ll be sharing her eagerly-awaited debut album ‘Duality’, and finally fully welcoming us all into her intoxicating dream-pop world.

Embracing her dual loves of classical and rock music, Luna Li is armed with a debut album that celebrates her uniqueness - and sounds damn fine doing it. Words: Elly Watson.

First starting work on her debut four years ago, Luna has always been immersed in music, with her mum running the music school she went to growing up. “I was definitely the one at the recital performing like, five times on five different instruments,” she laughs. Eventually finding her own taste away from her classical upbringing, however, Luna fell in love with Tame Impala and Paramore (the latter’s ‘The Only Exception’ was the first ever cover she performed), and gradually began to get more involved in the Toronto music scene. But it wasn’t until one fateful semester studying violin at university in Montreal that she became sure she wanted to divert from the traditional classical path. “We had a class at McGill [University] where every week someone would come in from a different career that they had chosen to do after their music degree, and every week I was like, ‘I don’t want to do that’,” she recalls. “So I was like, ‘I probably shouldn’t be here…’”

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Initially thinking that she should just go down the rock route (“I thought that playing my violin was not very cool!”), the lightbulb moment came in realising that integrating her classical background would be what made her stand out. Plugging in her violin to the loop pedal her grandma got her for her birthday, she began to build orchestral soundscapes and thus began the genesis of what would become Luna’s uniquely genre-splicing sound.

Subsequently, this month’s ‘Duality’ is named for two ideas that are key to her: exploring Luna’s balance between classical and rock and pop, as well as her dual Korean-Canadian heritage. She also teamed up with other Asian women, including beabadoobee and Jay Som. “It’s always been a goal of mine to work with and uplift other women of colour when I work, because I really didn’t see myself represented when I first started out,” she emphasises. “I just feel like they can understand where I’m coming from and understand my art more. “I want the Luna Li universe to be a place where people can feel accepted and welcomed no matter who they are,” she continues. “I hope that people can feel that with this record, and I hope they can dance to it in their rooms and feel like they have a place for themselves in the world.” DIY

DAISY BRAIN

Will Tse’s project sees a grunge sound meet bedroom pop aesthetics.

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neu

While a lot of nostalgia at the moment looks to the early 2000s for inspiration, Will Tse’s Daisy Brain takes it back half a decade and channels the late ‘90s. Musically, the music is defined by its grunge guitars and emo attitude, but, like his contemporaries, he tackles distinctly modern issues and doesn't feel out of time. LISTEN: Raucous latest single ‘What Would You Do?’ is a distillation of his brilliance. SIMILAR TO: Grunge greats put through a Gen-Z filter.

PANIC SHACK WILLOW KAYNE Pop-rap’s next big thing. She may have only dropped her debut track in April last year, but Willow Kayne has already racked up some careermaking moments in the last 12 months, winning an Ivor Novello award one moment and hanging out with Nile Rodgers the next. It was clear from her debut, the infectious ‘Two Seater’, that Willow was onto something special, moulding the worlds of rap and pop into something refreshingly unique. When her debut EP ‘Playground Antics’ landed earlier this year, full of playful genre-blurring bops and packed with whip-smart lyrical quips, Willow was already onto a winner. And she’s only just getting started. LISTEN: Debut EP ‘Playground Antics’ will have you dancing around your bedroom. SIMILAR TO: An intoxicating musical cocktail with a splash of Charli XCX, M.I.A., Remi Wolf and Ashnikko.

Cardiff quartet with chaotic energy and hooks-a-plenty. Asked for three descriptors of their music, Cardiff's Panic Shack accurately call themselves "raw, honest and always chaotic". Excellent new single ‘Mannequin Man’ - written about a man the band met who works as a mannequin, obv - features hip-shaking funk, riot grrl energy and doo-wop harmonies. Basically, anything makes the cut for them as long as it's damn fun - and that's a winning recipe to us. LISTEN: Their debut EP ‘Baby Shack’ (out 8th April) is set to be a winner. SIMILAR TO: A mixtape tied together by energy and vibe, not genre.

NUKULUK Meet South London’s new experimental hip hop collective.

ANORAK PATCH

Colchester teens spinning darkly poetic tales.

Though most of Anorak Patch would still get turned away from a Wetherspoons, the Colchester quartet are already mastering a line of noir-tinged, riffy melodrama that goes far beyond your average teenage diary musings. With a hint of early Wolf Alice to the likes of recent single ‘Cousin Sam’’s blend of gnarly riffs and curious storytelling, they may be the first band to come out of the town since Blur, but this lot are more Brit-grunge than Britpop revivalists. LISTEN: ‘Cousin Sam’ is the first taste of debut EP ‘By Cousin Sam’, due next month. SIMILAR TO: Ellie Rowsell’s little Essex step-family.

While their recently-released debut EP might be titled ‘Disaster Pop’, this South London collective couldn’t be further from disastrous. Having already played one of our Hello 2022 shows earlier this year, their evocative blend of raw hip hop and brittle electronics - guided by co-vocalists Syd and Monika - might’ve been a little rough and ready during that early performance, but it certainly made a mark: we’ve already got them booked to play at DIY Alive next month. Watch this space. LISTEN: ‘Disaster Pop’’s opening track ‘Ooh Ah’ is a frenetic, ferocious delight. SIMILAR TO: Genre-blending greats like Young Fathers, HO99O9 and Paris, Texas.

neu

The fluidity of a human being is viscous and doesn’t need to be contained in boxes.”

We told you Grove was an excellent wrapper.

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E V O

Rising Bristolbased artist and producer Grove on their search for identity and how, sometimes, fulfilment is found by cultivating your own safe space. Words: Tyler Damara Kelly. Photo: Khali Ackford.

they’d throughout their life, and it’s a dialogue that being like to put focus on. “The fluidity of a human ned in is viscous and doesn’t need to be contai ing the something like this or that,” they say, mimick not for act of putting something into boxes. “That’s sing the benefit of people experiencing or expres to need who people of t benefi it; that’s for the risation categorise things. The need for catego alist stems from an extremely Westernised, Coloni into history, and the lack of needing to be placed tes one space is what the core of my being gravita towards.”

“I wish I could say that, whe n I was younger, I had a stron g sense of identity and I’ve alwa ys known who I am, but that’s not my reality. There is so much figur ing out that has gone into where I am now, and it’s a constantly evolving journ ey,” explains Bristol-based vocalist and prod ucer Grove.

Growing up in Cheltenham, they explain, had its limitations, and it wasn’t until moving to a bigger city that they were able to begin culti vating a life that was ultimately more fulfilling. “Che ltenham was a place that was quite bizarre to be doing anything other than being in a guitar band,” they begin. “If you’re into hip hop or electronica, it wasn’t encouraged apar t from within a few love ly havens of people pushing others to pursue their passions within that field.”

We all intrinsically have huge amounts of power even though we often feel powerless in any kind of situation.”

As a displaced teenager in a predominantly white area, music was the outlet in which Grove felt most comfortable to express them self: “I had all of these pent-up emotions and this was the only way I knew how to get them out. There wasn’t too much of a community; it was a very insular, very brooding process.” Initially, they spen t time being mentored by hip hop collective 5 Mics , before playing a shor t stint in a prog-rock band called The Noble Experiment, as well as lending their nihilistic touch to the electronic duo BAAST; in their own ways, all of these stages have foun d a place within the firecracker sounds of their curre nt personal project. “There is a certain way of hold ing your space which I think I've transferred from the performance style of heavy rock. I do enjoy starting a nice big dance pit,” they say, arms and elbows simu lating a mosh pit in a way that channels big rave energy as opposed to the take-your-eyes-out men tality of some metal gigs. They also look to the intricate flows of hip hop, and politically-charged elements of punk, but while it’s the swelling darkness of electronic music that predominantly inspires Grove’s sound, the cheekiness of dancehall MCs comes through as well. Their debut EP - last year’s ‘Que er + Black’ - marked a point in the musician’s life where they finally felt like they’d discovered who they were: “There comes a point where you reall y have to stop and look inwards. I took it upon myself to learn about my heritage and what makes me happy,” they note. And often, the answer would be times spent within Kiki and Pxssy Palace – inclu sive spaces for queer people of colour. “They’re a beautiful reminder of how minority groups are not alone, and there’s a lot of power we have both as individuals and collectives.”

Grove’s half-Jamaican, half-English/ Irish heritage has become intrinsically woven throughout their music. ‘Spice’ is an ode to Bristol with its “nasty basslines,” but is also political in the sense that it challenges homophobia. Grove openly sings about their love of cunnilingus on ‘Skin2Skin’, despite it being an act that would see you demonised in Jamaica. Even though they are aware that there’s only so much you can laugh about personal and pressing subjects, they’re trying to make music that represents themselves and others like them, and they’ve realised that collaboration is key to reaching as wide an audience as possible. “I have some insecurities to overcome in thinking my work is good enough to collaborate, but the process of doing that is a very beautiful and

enriching process,” they say.

After releasing their bad bitch anthem ‘BBB’ with chaotic queer icon Lynks, and becoming aware of Bristol-based artist Solomon g O.B, Grove learnt that not only is workin alongside others who have been through the same struggles the perfect way of cultivating a community who are fighting the same fight , - it’s helped them discover their inner power of ts amoun huge have ically intrins all “We too. power even though we often feel powerless in any kind of situation,” they nod. “In future and bodies of work, I want to explore power a how it’s perceived, because power feels like dirty word – power is the thing you have to

scramble on top of others to get.

“But that’s an illusion. It’s just a case of sharing that we all have it, and the more we share it, the more it’ll grow within us without thinking that we have to climb up a horrible slimy ladder. I’d like to harness that as a thought and try to embody it within conversations with other people.” Grove plays DIY which Alive, place takes London in on 23rd and April. 24th to Head d i ya l ive.co m for details. DIY

By jumping between a myriad of influences, ‘Queer + Black’ is genreless and clear in its intent. It’s a reclamation of self: an act of defining your own identity before anybody else tries to define it for you. This is something that Grov e has experienced

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Hyped as overnight sensations with their image on billboards from Times Square to Tokyo, Wet Leg’s instant classic of a debut album arrives next month to prove that you really can believe the hype. DIY finds the pair clinging onto each other through the whirlwind career trajectory of dreams. Words: Rhys Buchanan. Photos: Ed Miles. Art Direction: Louise Mason. Styling: Emma Lipop. Make up: Alice Dodds

THE

ig plash 31

et Leg look right at home as they weave through a magical emporium of props and scenery. Assembled in a discreet space just off Brick Lane, the mini universe comprising a giant chess board littered with playing cards and roses could be taken from the set of Alice In Wonderland, but instead, today, it acts as a suitably bizarre backdrop for the world’s most exciting new band to playfully push each other around. There’s a sisterly love between Rhian Teasdale and Hester Chambers that’s instantly apparent as the pair lark about on set, exchanging giggles, glances and whispers in front of the lens. It’s not long before they tumble backwards into the intricately laid-out decor around them. “Ooops! I’ll try not to ruin

anything,” promises Hester before attending to a buckle that’s popped off one of the enormous platformed heels of her partner in crime: “Oh, now that’s gonna ruin the whole thing, nobody is gonna listen to our music now!” This morning’s Mad Hatter’s Tea Party setting is, in its own strange way, a fitting one; there’s been a sense of the surreal about Wet Leg since they exploded from thin air last summer with the once-in-a-generation indie banger ‘Chaise Longue’. And though nobody could have predicted that two girls from the Isle Of Wight in cottagecore dresses singing loaded lines about furniture and buttered muffins could have caught on in this way, with their self-titled debut album arriving next month, the level of noise around the band shows absolutely no sign of letting up anytime soon. Taking a seat upstairs away from the hustle and bustle between shoots, we ask if they’re finally getting used to being the name on everyone’s lips? There’s a lengthy pause, before Rhian gently acknowledges the tiniest, smallest idea that maybe they really do deserve to be here: “It still really feels weird, but we’ve come a really long way...” Hester, meanwhile, speaks with a whisper so delicate

“Every step of the way we have to raise one another up, I think that’s really important.” - Hester Chambers 32 DIYMAG.COM

you have to listen closely. “It’s really surreal to think about everything we’ve done over the last few months,” she decides. “We’re just holding on to our buttholes for dear life, aren’t we?”

t’s no wonder that the pair are feeling the full velocity of seat-of-your-pants madness; the bucket list milestones that many bands can spend years chasing (and often still never achieve) have whizzed by in a matter of months. In the first meagre months of this year already, they’ve appeared on billboards from Tokyo to Times Square, placed second in the BBC’s Sound Of 2022 poll and sold out UK and US shows within seconds. Given the pair have previously been cautious about getting too caught up in their own hype, it’s been a hard thing for them to even begin processing. “There’s no comprehension,” remarks Hester softly. She looks for help with the answer as Rhian attempts to make sense of it all. “We keep

seeing all of these things come through and it’s just so funny. We went to see our album announcement billboard in LA when we were there and it was really strange. If we went back and told ourselves in college that we were going to be going out in LA to play some shows, and then we’d go and visit our billboard, it’s just so silly.” She cites their recent Later... with Jools appearance as just one example of the list of achievements we could spend hours talking about. “That was such a big one for me. Whenever I’d see an artist on there I’d be like, ‘Woah that’s so legit’,” she grins. “Everything’s happened so quickly that it feels like imposter syndrome and that hits pretty hard sometimes. Luckily we didn’t have to go into the studio for Jools though because I think I’d have been shitting myself.” He’s just one notable name to have been gushing over the band recently, however. They’ve also won fans in everyone from Iggy Pop through to Hayley Williams and were recently interviewed by bona fide legend and emerging talent champion Elton John during his Rocket Hour radio show. Hester pulls a terrified face when we even mention the name. “I couldn’t really say anything, I was just spinning. I just love him, you’re almost born knowing his songs aren’t you? It’s very

incomprehensible.” Rhian feels the same: “He just complimented us loads. He’s so iconic isn’t he? I can’t remember what he even said, he’s such a legend that I struggled to concentrate.” Considering that Wet Leg’s songs come stuffed with a brutal and deadpan humour, it’s unsurprising that the pair often bat down their serious achievements as a joke. “When people find out that the album’s not real, that’s when we’ll change our names and go live in Acapulco,” whispers Hester in a tone that half suggests she wishes she could do exactly that. Rhian laughs, “We’re just doing it for the pre-orders, we’re getting the album money then heading for the hills.” DIY points out one problem with their escape plan - that we’ve heard the album with our own two ears. “That wasn’t us!” Hester exclaims. “That was Let Weg!” Whatever they want to call themselves, however, the duo are trying to just take the wild ride one day at a time. As Hester notes, putting on her best spacedout hippy voice, “We’re just riding the wave man, riding the wave...” “It’s crazy that we’ve known each other for so long and that we’re doing this now, to consider the lives we’ve built for ourselves,” Rhian ponders. “It’s a good thing that you can’t see the future otherwise we’d have probably sabotaged it for ourselves.” “It’s just really bizarre, but we’re really lucky to have each other through all the scary stuff,” Hester nods in agreement. “Whether we’re recording, playing a show, doing interviews or photoshoots - every step of the way we have to be there to raise one another up, I think that’s really important.”

Wet Leg: they really are beret beret good.

s their purported (and thoroughly unconvincing) Let Weg alias might insinuate, Rhian and Hester still seem reasonably incapable of believing their own hype. Lucky then, that their debut album does all the talking for itself. It’s a gripping listen from the very first notes of punchy grunge-pop opener ‘Being In Love’: a track that dispels any concerns that the record wouldn’t live up to their thrilling thread of early singles.

Fun has been at the centre of their mission statement from the word go after the old college friends saw an IDLES set at End Of The Road festival in 2019, realising they wanted to pick up some guitars and start a party of their own. The approach was radically different from the pair’s folk-leaning, insular past projects. They owe the sense of freedom behind the album, they explain, to cutting loose from past confines, having toiled with more introspective sounds previously. “I think we just let go of trying to do anything with our music,” explains Rhian. “We’ve both been in bands since we were sixteen, and this time we were just totally doing it for ourselves. We’ve spent so many years feeling the pressure of our peers; we put a lot of pressure on ourselves. This time, we realised that music should be fun, we need to be doing it for ourselves and nobody else.” Hester adds: “That’s something to try and hold onto amidst all of this craziness.” “For me personally,” says Rhian, “maybe it was a little bit more convoluted beforehand. I wanted to do it so badly that I was just anxious the whole time and not in the best mental state. It’s funny that the moment you stop trying and just give up on something it clicks. We were both so busy working our jobs, and we’re not super super young when, with music, there’s so much weight on [that]” She has a point, but luckily there’s been a trend of bands recently who’ve been finding joy a little further on in life’s game. Wet Leg’s own sources of inspiration IDLES found fame in their thirties with ‘Brutalism’, and in the same age bracket, Leeds’ postpunks Yard Act nearly clinched a number one spot with their recent debut album ‘The Overload’ - a record that embraced fun and humour in similar fashion. Wet Leg broke out when Hester was 27 and Rhian was 28 and, though hardly old, Hester explains they both felt a stigma around age before that. “When we started the band we were talking about this and finding solace in the fact we can still do it and be as silly or childish as we like with the music and it’s OK,” she says. “It

“[Rhian’s] always been super effortless with her writing. She’s always had this kind of magic vibe.” - Hester Chambers 34 DIYMAG.COM

SOUND OF THE UNDERGROUND Wet Leg placed second in the BBC’s Sound Of... poll this year, and they’re already plotting a new friendship with its winner. “It was cool to see loads of women there alongside us,” says Rhian. “We don’t actually have any pals on the list yet, well, we do but they don’t know about it yet! I really love PinkPantheress, she's awesome, one day we’ll meet her and fangirl. It’s really nice to meet other people on this really weird journey that’s quite unique.”

You’d have thought the Domino album advance might have got them some slightly bigger digs than that.

“It’s a good thing that you can’t see the future otherwise we’d have probably sabotaged it for ourselves.” Rhian Teasdale 36 DIYMAG.COM

doesn’t matter that we’re not twenty. There’s such a big thing about age that we do think about it, there’s so much pressure for us ladies especially.” Their album can be silly, childish and fun, but it can also be incredibly hardhitting at the same time. A perfect example comes with ‘Piece Of Shit’ - a brutal airing which leaves little to the imagination. Rhian sings about a barrage of messages from her ex, signalled by arcade phone sounds. “Now you call me up / Alright I’m not enough / Alright I fucked it up / Alright I’m such a slut.” The track comes as a flick of the middle finger that says it all. Rhian says that Hester has been central in encouraging her to open up so completely on such matters, another example coming with the festival-ready groove of past single ‘Wet Dream’, a track that also deals with said ex calling her up with unwanted information (“What makes you think you're good enough / To think about me when you're touching yourself?”). “Sometimes I’m like, ‘Guys is it OK to say this?’ when I’m with the rest of the band,” she chuckles, “and they’re like, ‘Oooh, it’s harsh, go ahead’.” It’s this brutal honesty and razor-sharp delivery that undoubtedly makes Wet Leg such a formidable force; there’s an alchemy behind the songs that merits all the hype. When we ask why they feel they’ve struck such a chord, meanwhile, things take a sweetly emotional turn. Rhian mulls on the thought before suggesting, “It’s very difficult for us to see because we’re so in it.” Hester, meanwhile, looks directly into her counterpart's eyes and gives it a go. “It’s because you’re a very eloquent lyricist and the way you present your feelings is very different and quite unique, but they’re so relatable and such a joy to listen to.” Rhian begins blushing, hiding behind a long strand of her hair that she’s fashioned into a make-do moustache over her lips. Hester continues: “It’s like when you’re reading and there’s an image that’s part of the story you’re reading; it’s so visual, it hits like a big spark,” she smiles to her bandmate. “You’ve always been super effortless with your writing, you can just make a hooky chorus. Even in the sadder songs, they’re really beautiful but clever. You’ve always had this kind of magic vibe.”

et for release via Domino (Arctic Monkeys, Franz Ferdinand, Blood Orange), the possibilities of ‘Wet Leg’ and its eponymous authors feel limitless. Though the label association might increase their chances of bagging a Number One, they're not fussed on the thought of a chart position. “Someone is thinking about it but we’re not,” explains Rhian. “There have been conversations behind the scenes and it’s quite interesting to hear, but it’s not something we’ve been pushing towards.”

When it comes to looking forward, Hester says focusing on their own creativity helps them remain blinkered from the noise. “We’re just quite off-the-cuff people, flying by the seat of our pants,” she shrugs. “When we think about what’s to come, it’s actually more about looking forward to practising with the band and working towards new stuff. It’s about trying some new songs and writing together. We're always looking forward to what we’re going to do with our future and our time.”

DIY points out that it would be the first UK number one album for an artist hailing from the Isle Of Wight - surely a huge achievement for their stomping ground? “That’s so funny,” says Rhian. “I think everyone back home is like, 70 and not our target demographic. There are some younger people in bands there though. When we were growing up we had The Bees, I think it’s important to have representation if you’re going to have any kind of aspiration. It would be cool if some other girls from the Isle Of Wight were like, ‘Hey let’s start a band’, because it can be done.”

Given the band started out as a hobby, just like their efforts in roller skating and longboard dancing through the pandemic, should we expect a similar upward trajectory for those pursuits too? A Wet Leg Longboard Olympic 2024 bid perhaps? They both take on a glum expression. “It’s so gloomy and wet out and longboards are so impractical because you can’t fit them in your suitcase,” Hester explains. “Maybe we’ll look forward to picking it up properly again in the summer.”

Wet Leg

In Numbers unique band name.

Even though she says it with a cautious whisper, that’s just fine: the world will be doing Wet Leg’s shouting for many years to come. ‘Wet Leg’ is out 8th April via Domino. DIY

T b he le and num ge h b nd ad er a r b e of y D fo d e om re mo in sign s t o Re i n g h e c o to rd th s. e

4 11.02 Random emoji pushed to find their

It doesn’t look like Wet Leg will have time for that, however. There’s the milestone of their imminent debut to hurdle first, plus a long sold-out UK tour, another US tour, a summer jaunt to Australia, a series of hyped festival slots… With all signs pointing to a second all-conquering year, the only people left to hop on the Wet Leg hype train are the duo themselves. Finally, as today’s interview comes to a close, Rhian lets her humble guard down ever so slightly. “We’re onto something really good,” she nods slowly. “We’ve got our fans now, we’ve got each other, we’ve got a team we love. It’s such a nice journey to be on with our friends.”

52 51 Rhian’s longest scream in seconds, as counted down on ‘Ur Mum’.

Live appearances lined up for the year at time of going to print, including a full US and UK tour.

Times the band mention a chaise longue in ‘Chaise Longue’.

10,000,000 The number of streams their breakout banger ‘Chaise Longue’ has on Spotify alone to date.

On their bold new album ‘Topical Dancer’, Charlotte Adigéry and Bolis Pupul have become masters of their own musical Trojan Horse.

Perfect

38 DIYMAG.COM

Words: Max Pilley.

s Mary Poppins taught us, a spoonful of sugar helps the medicine go down. That’s a lesson that Belgian duo Charlotte Adigéry and Bolis Pupul kept close to their hearts when putting together their debut album, ‘Topical Dancer’. It’s a record that tackles subject matter of the most serious nature post-colonial racism, misogyny, social media abuse - but does so with such joyous musical playfulness and razor-sharp lyrical wit that you gladly absorb its message. “We don’t want to stay bitter,” says Charlotte from her home in Ghent. “Even though we have our suffering and we’ve been through all that stuff that we talk about on the album, humour is a great way for us to evolve through it and to not stay stuck in it and be bitter.”

Far from preachy or didactic, ‘Topical Dancer’ slyly pokes fun at the everyday bigotry that the duo have both experienced in their lives, over a bed of leaping, hyper-energetic synth beats. As Bolis explains, “There’s a difficult marriage between music and humour. If you use too much humour, people don’t take it seriously anymore, but we feel like it helps us to use it as a tool to address some of the heavier topics.” The duo first met when they were both invited to take part in a soundtrack project in 2016 by Stephen and David Dewaele, the brothers behind Soulwax. They immediately struck up a close friendship and, within a week, had written an EP’s worth of material together which was released in 2017 under Charlotte’s name. A follow-up EP, ‘Zandoli’, arrived in 2019, but for this full-length project, they have chosen to be credited equally as a duo. “We felt misunderstood,” says Charlotte. “People saw me as a singer, the diva, and Bolis as the producer. I got asked many times, ‘Who’s the DJ behind you?’ Eww, no, we make music together and the music couldn’t have been made without him or me. We had to make the statement now or otherwise it would be too late.” The Dewaele brothers continue to have a godfather-like influence on the pair: not only are they credited as co-producers on the album, but it will also be released on Soulwax’s DEEWEE label. “Bolis always says they are great musical chiropractors,” says Charlotte. “They fix your blockages and then you’re ready to go and make new music again and you’re inspired.”

“Belgium doesn’t realise the effect of post-colonialism and how people suffer from it, a lot of people are still oblivious to that,” she continues. “I don’t think Belgium has even apologised to Congo for what they did. Like, how is there still a statue of Leopold II standing in Brussels? How are streets still named after him? There’s a long way to go.” The song ‘Esperanto’ tackles the corrosive decline in standards of public discourse over the last decade, with a series of wry, withering one-liners:

“Humour is a great way for us to evolve through [troubles], and to not stay stuck in them and be bitter.” - Charlotte Adigéry “Don’t say ‘Only a man is fit for this job’ / Say, ‘At least you tried, Karen’” or “Don’t say ‘Nice pair’ / Say, ‘I love the symmetry of you’”. It’s a demonstration of the duo’s lightness of touch that they’re able to throw shade at both those who want to over-police language and the people who seek to use language as a weapon in the same lyric. Elsewhere, ‘Topical Dancer’ ranges from the sweetness of ‘Ich Mwen’, a duet between Charlotte and her mother Christiane on the subject of womanhood and motherhood (Charlotte and Bolis signed their record deal on the day that Charlotte found out she was pregnant in December 2020), to the caustic ‘Ceci n’est pas un cliché’, on which they list every hackneyed, cringeworthy song lyric that they could think of end-to-end (“I was walking down the street / When I woke up early this morning / I said ‘Hey Mister DJ’”). The pièce de résistance, however, comes with the album’s closer, ‘Thank You’, which finds Charlotte throwing every misogynistic, condescending, mansplaining comment she has received in her career back in the faces of the world with one giant, triumphant middle finger. “I hope the people who told me those things hear the song. Especially the one who said that he discovered me,” she says, before collapsing into laughter. “Yeah, that song was our way to get a little revenge and take control.”

e c n a l a B

hough a delicate balance between the serious and the comedic looms large throughout ‘Topical Dancer’, nowhere is it more carefully struck than on recent single ‘Blenda’. “Go back to your country where you belong / Siri, can you tell me where I belong,” Charlotte sings. Growing up in Belgium with Guadeloupean and French-Martinique ancestry has meant that she’s been exposed to casual racism on a painfully regular basis; the same is true for Bolis, whose Chinese descent has prompted abusive comments since his school days. “Those comments are real,” says Charlotte. “I hear it all the time. It’s, ‘OK, but where are you REALLY from?’ or, ‘Wow, your Dutch is amazing’.

After releasing an album as accomplished and addictive as ‘Topical Dancer’, you’d hope she won’t be dealing with dismissive comments like that anymore. ‘Topical Dancer’ is out now via DEEWEE. DIY

40 DIYMAG.COM

Do You Wanna Be In Her Gang?

Leading her band through a drawn-out debut album process that was tumultuous at best, it’s lucky The Mysterines’ Lia Metcalfe seems the type to thrive within life’s rawer corners. Words: Joe Goggins. Photos: Carolina Faruolo.

young PJ Harvey gazes out across The Mysterines’ Liverpool rehearsal space. The framed photo of the iconic rocker from around the time of her early ‘90s emergence is propped against a wall, waiting to be mounted; it was a birthday present from the photographer Steve Gullick, to the band’s singer and key creative force, Lia Metcalfe. Steve shot the fledgling Liverpool outfit recently, and would probably tell you he sees in Lia some of what marked out Harvey as a special talent around the time he first met her. You’d imagine Polly Jean would approve of what she’d hear if she could gaze out of the frame and into the room, too. The Mysterines’

which looks like what you might expect a tour documentary directed by David Lynch to be. As the group’s principal songwriter, and with a keen handle on every aspect of their output, The Mysterines is very much Lia’s band - a commanding presence onstage, with a line in conversation that’s thoughtful one minute and wisecracking Scouser the next. If the group started out as a vehicle for her writing, you get the sense it’s because going down the traditional singer-songwriter route was never an option. She seems invested in the idea of what it means to create with like-minded people, particularly when she talks about the additions to the lineup in 2020 of Paul and guitarist Callum Thompson, as well as in the opportunity to build a mythology around her songs that

Lia isn’t so sure; in contrast to the freewheeling rock’n’roll of their band’s live shows and her dominant presence as frontwoman, doubts crept in during the recording process, something she said she “resented” at times. “Some of these songs were written when I was 16, so I have a lot invested in them,” she explains. “When something means so much to you, it can be hard to have resistance against it. To introduce it to this new lineup, to then be taking it to London, there’s a lot of pressure on,” she continues. “You get signed, there’s singles to think about, then the album, it’s like, ‘How the fuck did we get here?’ And things have moved so fast since the beginning of 2020 after moving so slow for a few years for me and George. So that was overwhelming. I had some resentment towards the album at

“I had time to try to craft a definitive story on the album:‘What else can I say now? How far can I take my ideas?” - Lia Metcalfe debut record ‘Reeling’ shares its title with a song on ‘4-Track Demos’, the legendary raw takes that paved the way for PJ’s breakthrough LP, ‘Rid of Me’. It’s that album that The Mysterines’ own ‘Reeling’ recalls; slick but emotionally turbulent, polished without rounding off the cutting edges from the singer’s razorsharp writing. Its release marks the end of a winning road for the group’s two remaining founding members, Lia and bassist George Favager, one marked by lineup changes and COVID-enforced inertia. Drummer Paul Crilly arrives first today to the industrial estate about a mile north-west of the city centre that the band currently call their base. He’s marvelling at some bizarre prospective footage that the singer has put together for the video for their next single, the incendiary ‘Life’s a Bitch (But I Like It So Much)’,

tends to come more readily to bands than to solo artists. Her position as the brains of the operation perhaps explains why the arduous process of putting together ‘Reeling’ seems to have been harder on her than anybody else; today, she talks about the recording with the occasional wince. “We spent three weeks in the studio,” she says. “But they were months apart. July, November, and then March. So there were these long drawn-out months in between where the lockdowns meant we couldn't really do anything. So that was kind of intense.” “It was a bit of a double-edged sword,” adds Paul, “because it gave us time to write a few more songs. If we’d done three straight weeks before COVID happened, this would be a very different album.” As much as he’s able to see the positives,

times that made me not enjoy it. With a little bit of distance from it, I’m proud of it now. It’s a good snapshot of that time.”

nitially Lia did, in her own way, enjoy the derailment of the band’s plans. After finishing up a UK tour - Paul and Callum’s first - in March 2020, she found herself living alone for the first time, and the isolation suited her: not just because she had nothing to do but write music, but because she had nothing to do besides listen to it, either. More of her heroes have been honoured with photos on the wall, including Bob Dylan and her biggest lyrical inspiration, Tom Waits - although it’s worth noting that not all legends are revered here, not even local ones. ‘BRING ME THE HEAD OF PAUL McCARTNEY ON HEATHER MILLS’ WOODEN PEG’ reads a scrawling on the space’s back wall, with Lia and

Paul both quick to deny responsibility. More time digging into those influences, as well as more contemporary ones such as Queens of the Stone Age, Black Rebel Motorcycle Club and The Strokes, meant that Lia was able to retool lyrics and look for new thematic avenues to wander down. “I didn’t worry about running out of inspiration,” she says. “It was kind of the opposite, because I’d never had that sort of time on my hands since we started the band. I had time to try to craft a definitive story on the album. Just asking myself questions - ‘What else can I say now? What else can I think about? How far can I take my ideas?’” By the time the later sessions had rolled around, however, the strain of making sure they could faithfully realise their artistic vision on their debut was biting The Mysterines hard - something not helped by the fact that the four were all now living in the same house in lockdown, creating a pressurecooker environment. “I was convinced I was going to end up sneaking a lyric about being pissed off that somebody hadn’t put the milk away in there,” laughs the singer. “But because it was lockdown, we only really had each other. And when you’re spending so many hours a day working on something you’re so passionate about, and then you can’t even go to the pub at the end of the day - that was intense. That’s not how I would have chosen to do it, definitely.” Paul makes repeated reference to certain aspects of the record’s gestation “playing to our advantage,” and on the evidence of the finished product, the intensity Lia talks about fed into ‘Reeling’ for the better. There’s a searing irrepressibility to the album, from the bluesy menace of the title track to ‘Life’s a Bitch’’s runaway punk, via the steadily soaring ‘All These Things’. If there was a torment to the process, it’s only served to imbue the album with an

Marks To Prove It Catherine Marks' typically slick production work on ‘Reeling’ is merely the latest addition to one of the most impressive studio CVs of the past decade (including engineering credits on PJ Harvey's ‘White Chalk’ and ‘Let England Shake’). Lia: It was apparent from the first day that she was the right person for the job. I don’t think anyone else could’ve delivered what she did, and I know I wouldn’t have gotten through the process personally without her. She definitely got the best performances out of us, and we had a lot of the same opinions about things - she understood our references straight away, because she’d heard the demos. That was a relief, because there’s nothing worse than presenting your work to someone, and they get the complete wrong idea.

added strength of feeling, especially when some of the more emotionally wrought tracks - closer ‘The Confession Song’ is the obvious case in point here - were the ones that ended up left on the back burner the longest, completed not long before it was time to lock the album in for good.

etween how utterly all-consuming - physically, emotionally, intellectually - the process of putting together their debut was, in addition to the fact that touring of any description was firmly off the table for two years, you could almost forget that Lia and George’s slow-burn rise to prominence was achieved the old-fashioned way: steadily building a fanbase with raucously fun live shows. The opportunity to make up for lost time beckons in 2022, set to be a massive year of touring that will involve among many other things, a show at the BBC 6 Music Festival in Cardiff at the end of this month. They’ve been staples of the station’s playlists so far this year, but their avowed and unswerving commitment to making fizzing guitar rock almost marks them out as outliers on the poster. How much do they have in common with their contemporaries in a world where the ‘last gang in town’ indie-rock mentality seems to be a genuinely dying breed? “I think the beauty of that is that we don’t really need to think about it,” explains Paul. “I mean, the one thing all the artists on that lineup probably have in common is a similar mindset of not worrying about commercial aspects - just make music that reflects who you are. If you don’t, you set yourself up to fail.” “One minute you’re second-guessing what you’re doing musically,” grins Lia, “and the next you’re questioning what your role is on Planet Earth.” ‘Reeling’ is out 11th March via Fiction. DIY

Paul: She trusted us to do what we had to do, and then would be as hands-on as she saw fit. I think she could tell from the start what we needed from her. Sort of like Nanny McPhee, but with an Australian accent and more teeth.

“One minute you’re second-guessing what you’re doing musically, and the next you’re questioning what your role is on planet earth.” - Lia Metcalfe 42 DIYMAG.COM

www.icea.se

THROUGH

OND I D I O SY N C R AT I C N E W YO R K B A N D B O D E G A’ S S E C A L B U M , ‘ B R O K E N E Q U I P M E N T ’, O F F S E T S A H E A LT H Y S C E P T I C I S M O F T E C H N O LO GY W I T H

A D I S T I N C T LY H U M A N E D G E .

W O R D S: W I L L R I C H A R D S . P H OTO S: P O O N E H G H A N A .

ODEGA frontman Ben Hozie believes that many of the words he writes, sings and shouts in his band aren’t entirely his own. “If there’s one BODEGA thesis that we’ve had all along, it’s that we don’t trust our own thoughts,” he tells DIY just minutes into a Zoom call from his New York apartment. “We know that we are being thought by the media, or something as seemingly innocent as a YouTube advert that we saw that day. The older I get, I realise that many of the words that come out of my mouth are not my own.” So far, so heavy. This deep thinking and scepticism of technology has always been deeply ingrained in BODEGA’s music since the beginning, the title of their 2018 debut album ‘Endless Scroll’ emblematic of the way Ben and songwriting partner Nikki Belfiglio skewer modern trends with openly pretentious wit on their songs. Listening to BODEGA has always been more fun than that sounds though, with ‘Endless Scroll’’s biggest hit, ‘Jack In Titanic’, seeing Ben compare himself to Leo DiCaprio’s beloved character through a host of winking one-liners. On ‘Doers’, the first single from second album ‘Broken Equipment’, Ben hits out at the ‘always on’ culture, bemoaning how he’s been dragged down with the rest of us into a hazy malaise of scrolling, scrolling, scrolling. As is his skill, though, the track ends up being as funny as it is thought-provoking. In its chorus, he borrows from Daft Punk’s biggest hit, saying that this lifestyle is making him “bitter, harder, fatter, stressed out.” His painfully-relatable schedule, which he lays out in the track’s bridge, goes: “Ten minutes Calendar / Ten minutes Bandcamp / Ten minutes Wiki browse / Ten minutes planning my next ten minutes.” It’s not entirely surprising for an endlessly wordy, literate band that the genesis of ‘Broken Equipment’ came from a book club Ben and Nikki started with friends at the start of 2020. At the time, the band’s bassist Heather Elle and guitarist Madison Velding-VanDam had left the band to focus on their own groups - Flossing. and The Wants respectively - and the book club’s leader, philosophy professor Adam See, also happened to be a bassist. “We thought, ‘Oh it’s too bad Adam isn’t in our band’ because BODEGA is somewhat of a philosophical project,” Ben remembers, with the band then inevitably recruiting him. “A lot of our discussions impacted my lyric writing.”

hile the first handful of songs on ‘Broken Equipment’ are easily identifiable to older BODEGA fans - Ben and Nikki’s sardonic delivery set over wiry post-punk - the album takes a turn around a third of the way through, when speaking is replaced by singing and melody is suddenly prioritised. On ‘NYC (Disambiguation)’, Ben sings of how his hometown was “founded by a corporation” - a familiar subject matter for BODEGA - but its lyrics are sung with such a melodic turn and set over anthemic electric guitars that it ends up sounding completely joyous. “After touring the first record for two years, I was getting sick of shouting every night,” Ben says. “A songwriter ultimately wants to convey their soul or worldview through song, and I started to feel like only a slither of the Ben that I’m constantly in dialogue with in my head is coming through in this music. I’m not that guy. When I grew up I was a Beatles obsessive,” he adds, revealing that - despite developing obsessions for The Fall and Parquet Courts, bands who make music that’s tonally aligned with the original iteration of BODEGA - his favourite band of all time is Athens, Georgia-based indie-pop masters Of Montreal. “We wanted to convey a gentleness and sense of humour with the music,” he says. “We want to be a little sunnier, a little more

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“If there’s one BODEGA thesis that we’ve had all along, it’s that we don’t trust our own thoughts.” – Ben Hozie

fun, a little more inviting.” This softening of the band’s tough, worn-down exterior is extremely evident on the album’s back half. ‘Pillar On The Bridge Of You’ another warm, melodic departure - is the first love song Ben has ever written for Nikki, while the album closes with ‘After Jane’, a stark and emotional ballad written for Ben’s mother, who passed away while the band were recording ‘Endless Scroll’. In getting as personal as it’s possible to get, he also firmly reclaims the words and thoughts he believes have been taken from him by society. “We haven’t recorded them yet, but we have 33 new songs already written,” Nikki says matter-of-factly, stating that the second half of ‘Broken Equipment’ and its brighter, warmer textures signal the way forward into the band’s future. “After the first three songs on the album, we’ve started a new era,” she adds. The song that’s emblematic of this change, balancing the new and old BODEGA delicately but perfectly, is album highlight ‘Statuette On The Console’. The sugary, wonderfully addictive song sees Nikki pondering religion, overlords both ancient and modern, and “anyone who puts their reality on your back and forces you to carry it around.” To embody the different perspectives in the song, she recorded vocals in nine different languages.

the

“When you look through the lens of discovering who you are,” Nikki says, “the first step is to define who you’re not. A lot of the things that you’re not are these external forces pushing down on you. We don’t have any answers on this album, we’re just still reflecting upon the weight bearing down on us… or maybe it’s the Wi-Fi.” ‘Broken Equipment’ is out 11th March via What’s Your Rupture? DIY

WIRES 45

“T

here’s this Slovenian proverb that says if you’re trying to sit on two bar stools at once then you risk falling through the middle,” begins Tom Rees. “And I think, in a way, that’s perhaps how people perceive us. But I don’t think that’s the case. I think we’re sitting on our own barstool, but perhaps it’s just in the smoking area somewhere.” The bar stools that Buzzard Buzzard Buzzard have been hopping between since their inception could indeed be configured into a fairly unique formation for a band operating in 2022. When Tom spoke to DIY a couple of years ago, he professed that the band’s debut LP would be comprised solely of “only really lovey-dovey stuff and then hell-or-death rock”: an assertion that, at the time, seemed sort of plausible. Now, with ‘Backhand Deals’ finally out in the world, its actual contents is slightly less bipolar but still full of contradictions. Buzzard are a band whose hearts lie unashamedly in the sonics of the ‘70s but whose lyrical head is firmly rooted in the present day; they’re a band who, as the singer admits, are probably “too soft for the leather jacket guys but not soft enough for the Matt Maltese fans.” “But hopefully we can be a bridge between the two worlds,” he caveats - and, really, it’s in the unlikely middle grounds that ‘Backhand Deals’ thrives. Having previously fully leant into the self-professed rock’n’roll pastiche of 2020 EP ‘The Non-Stop’ and its Levis-eulogising lead single ‘Double Denim Hop’, when it came time to tackle The Big Debut, Tom decided it was time to really work out what he wanted his band to stand for. “There’s a lot of fun in leaning into that sort of thing, but there’s not a lot of longevity in it. So we thought, how can we create something that pulls from

ROCKIN’ FREE

Welsh wonders Buzzard Buzzard Buzzard have always embraced a hop back in the musical time machine, but that pastiche that’s always going to be present because I’m so obsessed with ‘70s rock, but brings it into the 21st Century a bit more? How can we confirm to people that it’s happening now?” Maybe, we ask, he wanted to be known as more than just the man singing about durable fabrics? “I think there’s some hardcore daddy issues in there deep down,” the singer nods. “I just wanted somebody to take me seriously.” Seriousness, too, is an idea that the band dance around on their debut - addressing weighty topics such as capitalism and power abuse, but coating them in joyous riffs and the distinct, constant caveat that, at the end of the day, they’re a band first and political commentators second if at all. “The level of political discourse that happens at a societal level informs the discourse that

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IN THE

“THE DELIVERY SYSTEM OF GOOD POP MUSIC IS LIKE INSEMINATING A COW - THE COW DOESN’T EVEN KNOW IT’S HAPPENING.” - Tom Rees

happens at a creative level, so at the moment everyone is very very serious about their opinion and that’s mirrored in the music,” the frontman suggests. “But the reason I love pop music so much is because the delivery system is so clean; I made a joke the other day that it’s like inseminating a cow - the cow doesn’t even know it’s happening. “It’s especially interesting when you’d normally go and watch music to forget about all that stuff, when suddenly now you’re going to watch music to reassess it all even more,” he muses. “More and more, I’m going in harder on the fun thing: I think humour is a really important part of our music. Hopefully not in a Blink 182 way, but a really important part all the same. It’s about encouraging people to have fun with these ideas instead of being serious about them all the time.” The irony here being that Tom’s insistence that his opinions be taken with a pinch of salt (“The worst thing I can think of happening is if someone took one of our songs and used it to inform their political outlook, outright”) probably shows a greater nuance than any of the bands sledgehammering their points more brazenly home.

WORLD

on debut ‘Backhand Deals’ they’re straddling the past and present with a greater dexterity. Words: Lisa Wright. And in a strange way, that’s an attitude that seems to sum Buzzard Buzzard Buzzard up nicely. ‘Backhand Deals’ is full of the kind of timeless melodies - a bit of McCartney piano here; a touch of Randy Newman sweetness there that are more than worthy of being seen as songwriting of clout, but you sense the frontman and his cohorts would rather be having a laugh and soaking it all up than thinking too long and hard about their social standing. Tom is a music obsessive (“I could very easily have been one of those Lord of the Rings guys at home reading fan fiction, but instead I’m just Googling things about Steely Dan…”) who also gleefully can’t stop himself from making jokes at any available opportunity and their debut encapsulates both sides - plus a few more smarts than they might wilfully acknowledge - with aplomb.

They might be sitting out in the smoking area on their own, but pull up a stool - you’ll be hard pressed to find more entertaining company. ‘Backhand Deals’ is out now via Communion. DIY

“I’m not into the idea that people have to suffer for art or for music, or for any job actually…” 48 DIYMAG.COM

Opening the FLOODGATES D

With a second album that drills down deeper into the core of her personality - as a musician, as a human and as a member of society - ‘PAINLESS’ finds NILÜFER YANYA opening up with ease. Words: Gemma Samways. Photos: Talie Eigeland.

ifficult second album syndrome might be the ultimate music cliche but it remains a phenomenon firmly rooted in truth. The reality is a successful debut can be a millstone for many, and it takes some real inner steel to ignore the external pressures that circle an artist while writing the follow-up. Fair play to Nilüfer Yanya, then, who has not only conjured a second LP even stronger than her critically-adored debut ‘Miss Universe’, but who felt so zen throughout the creative process that she was inspired to name the resulting record ‘PAINLESS’. “[Writing ‘Miss Universe’] I was in constant motion, doing loads of shows and touring,” the 26-year-old West Londoner recalls, speaking over the phone from The Social in Central London, where she’s soundchecking for an intimate preview show later that evening. “I was writing as I went along too, which makes me uneasy because it’s like I don't really know what I'm even working on. Plus everyone around me was constantly like, ‘How’s the record going?!’”

concedes. “Whereas this album I feel is much more focused, and the songs speak for themselves a lot more. But then, I don't know if it's my job to decide if it's good or not… I don't think analysing things is helpful; I find it quite debilitating.” Debilitating or not, her analysis rings true. For where ‘Miss Universe’ intrigued with its genre-hopping hybrids and nebulous lyricism, ‘PAINLESS’ dazzles with a newfound musical and thematic directness. Tonally, it’s melancholic, from the ‘In Rainbows’-esque indie of ‘Midnight Sun’ and tightly-wound post-punk of ‘Stabilise’ to the hypnotic, synth-flecked groove of ‘anotherlife’. And it’s a ‘less is more’ palette that makes the very best of her versatile voice, which is gravelly and insouciant one moment, silvery and emotionally vulnerable the next.

“The art world has always been run like a bank, but art informs everything that we do.”

By contrast, Nilüfer spent much of the making of ‘PAINLESS’ hidden away in a basement studio in Stoke Newington, leaving only to record vocals at her uncle’s studio in Penzance, or to track drums at Press Play in Bermondsey. Better still, this time round she finally felt confident enough in the power of her own ideas to truly lean into collaboration, bringing in old friends Wilma Archer, Bullion, band-mate Jazzi Bobbi, and Andrew Sarlo (Big Thief, Raveena) as co-conspirators. Looking back on those sessions now, she talks fondly of her almost telepathic bond with Archer, of Bullion’s instinctiveness, and of Sarlo’s experimental approach building songs from a patchwork of disparate experiments. She discusses playing the saz on ‘L/R’ - a traditional instrument she inherited from her Turkish father - in an attempt to connect with her heritage. She talks, too, of avoiding repeating “mistakes” from her concept-driven debut, which took aim at the wellness industry with a series of satirical skits featuring a fictional helpline called WWAY HEALTH. “I forced [the concept] a bit because I was self-conscious about the music: I felt like the songs didn't sit together as well as an album maybe should,” she

hematically, ‘PAINLESS’ provides perhaps the most vivid insight into the singer-songwriter’s psyche yet, which is no mean feat considering how guarded she can often seem in conversation. It’s not that Nilüfer is uncooperative or morose, you understand: it’s more the shyness of a self-professed introvert. And her lyrics convey that reticence, couching very personal musings on desire, loneliness, and claustrophobia in purposely abstract imagery.

“Opening up felt good, actually,” she says of the evolution, adding with a laugh: “Though I didn't realise that's what I was doing until I’d finished the album. But yeah, it just felt good. I don't know if [that change was inspired by] me growing up and wanting to connect with people in different ways, or just wanting to connect with people more because of the way the last couple of years have gone.” Nilüfer actually started writing for the record at the start of 2020, coming up with ‘L/R’ and ‘The Mystic’ before putting the project on pause for a year. Looking back now, she realises she was struggling with a form of writer’s block caused by pandemic-induced apathy. She shrugs, “It's not even like I didn't have anything to say: it's more like I didn’t even want to say something. Life was just so static.” Ultimately, it was collaboration that drew her out of this temporary funk, but that sense of oppression lingers in the lyrics of a song as suffocating as ‘Stabilise’. Featuring the refrain “I’m going nowhere,” and referencing high rises and dogs fighting, it’s a song firmly rooted in Nilüfer’s corner of West London, just a stone’s throw from Grenfell. “There's a big class divide, and that becomes even more

“I'm not an activist but some of that energy has definitely seeped into my songwriting.”

apparent when you're not travelling, and always in the same area.” Though always an active member of her community, during lockdown the singer threw herself into her work with her sister’s social outreach project, Artists In Transit, which she raised funds for with her vinyl-only compilation ‘Inside Out’ at the end of last year. Founded following their 2016 trip volunteering in the refugee camps of Athens, Artists In Transit provides art workshops to vulnerable children in times of hardship, an initiative Nilüfer describes as “a nice way to show solidarity, but a nice way to make friends and connect as well.” Considering the fact that both of Nilüfer’s parents are visual artists (her BajanIrish mother is a textile designer, and her father a painter and printmaker whose work is exhibited at the British Museum), it’s not especially surprising to learn that art was integral to hers and her sisters’ upbringings. Today, she attests to the healing power the creative arts still provide. “The art world has always been run like a bank, but art informs everything that we do. When I'm not doing art, that’s when I feel like, ‘Who am I? What am I doing?’ Whereas if I’m able to focus on something creative - like music or making something with my hands - it feels like I actually know who I am. And I think the way the education system works - especially in this country - doesn't appreciate that.”

hich brings us to one of the other meanings behind the title ‘PAINLESS’, which seeks to debunk the myth that great art only arises from pain. “While I think trying to escape every kind of pain is a bit pointless, I’m not into the idea that people have to suffer for art or for music, or for any job actually… Like, if everyone had a nice place to work, and everyone had their own space, wouldn’t that actually be better?”

ART FOR ALL

As her work with Artists In Transit attests, Nilüfer is a passionate advocate for making art as accessible as possible. She explains how her own early artistic experiences played a part in shaping her career. "I went to Pimlico Academy, which had a Performing Arts specialism so they were funded by the government. You'd pay £250 for the whole year and it would cover all music-related lessons and after-school clubs. Being in contact with teachers that were fulltime, world-class musicians [The Invisible’s Dave Okumu was Nilüfer’s guitar teacher] was so inspiring. So while it’s hard to say whether I'd be still doing music without that experience, I think it helped me be more open-minded, especially when it comes to music."

support for Black trans youth, Black Lives Matter and the victims of the Windrush scandal. And while none of these causes are explicitly namechecked in her output, it’s interesting to wonder whether she sees that activism bleeding into her songwriting? “I think so,” she replies thoughtfully. “I feel like the songs feature phrases you might carry around with you: the kind of thing you can shout, like a slogan. I mean, I was thinking about that as well in 'L/R', with the marching energy it has to it. So I'm not an activist but some of that energy has definitely seeped into my songwriting. “But mostly, I've always hoped my music can be a reflective space, because when I listen to music that's what I get out of it… When I was younger, whenever I was sad I always wanted to listen to sad music to empathise with that. Music can be so cathartic, and I think that’s really important.” ‘PAINLESS’ is out now via ATO. DIY

This display of social consciousness isn’t a new development. On social media, Nilüfer has always been a vocal ally for the causes close to her heart, showing

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

Charli XCX CRASH (Asylum)

It’s a bold move to tease an album’s release with an image of your own gravestone on Instagram, but then again not every pop star is like Charli XCX. From her breakthrough in the early ’10s and hits ‘I Love It’ and ‘Break The Rules’, to her influential hyper-pop innovation and love for experimentation in projects like ‘Pop 2’ right through to her landmark lockdown album ‘how i’m feeling now’, Charli’s been a pioneering tour-de-force of the pop world for nearly a decade. Now her fifth full-length ‘CRASH’ arrives, and Charli is ready to add to her legacy of boundarypushing records.

Someone got a little carried away with the hair diffuser, didn’t they Charli?

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For album number 5, Charli has placed a tongue-in-cheek emphasis on this record being the end of an era in her career, as well as a new beginning. The aforementioned gravestone was part of a winking nod to ‘CRASH’ being “the fifth and final album in my record deal…”. She’s been filling her social media with lighthearted ‘tips’ for new artists (“tip for new artists: it only gets worse” one reads, “tip for new artists: suffer in silence” states another), and has been embracing a deal-withthe-devil motif. “I’m exploring what it means to be a pop star on a major label in a not very current way,” she’s previously explained. “And that’s really fun to me.” Welcoming us to her “new chapter [that] embraces all that my life has to offer in today’s world - fame, glamour, inner demons and global hits”,

A beaming record that builds on his candid chatterbox delivery. 

Rex Orange County WHO CARES? (Sony)

An album that cements her status as a true pop trailblazer. this may be her final record in her contract, but Charli was never not going to go out with a bang, opting for yet another album that delivers something exciting and unexpected. Moving away from the hyper-pop that has characterised her most recent releases, 'CRASH’ delivers a sublime slice of punchy power-pop helmed by an allstar lineup of producers including AG Cook, The 1975’s George Daniel, and Ariel Reichstaid (the latter having previously worked on the singer’s debut ‘True Romance’). ‘CRASH’ is glistening with influences ranging from Janet Jackson to Cyndi Lauper, and fist-pumping power-pop tropes that shone throughout the best of the ‘80s.

Versed and tenured in the far-reaching grasp of gooey pop, Rex Orange County returns to past collaborators to produce a beaming radio-worthy record that builds on his candid chatterbox delivery, painting a portrait of a more seasoned and shrewd artist. Pairing with Benny Sings (they previously worked together on 2017’s breakout ‘Loving Is Easy’), the record conflates Benny’s modest production (recorded in his Amsterdam home) with Rex’s distinctive soothing vocals, sidestepping his token plucked guitar backbone in favour of more synth-driven and orchestral melodies. Reuniting with Tyler, The Creator on ‘OPEN A WINDOW’, meanwhile, sees Rex lean further into his newfound groove, embellishing the track with a comically compressed bass stomp, bombastic string quartet swells and a stunted staccato beat. ‘IF YOU WANT IT’ borrows the tensity of sustained single synth notes from Tyler’s ‘IGOR’S THEME’ while ‘WORTH IT’ and ‘7AM’ welcome ample interpretations of Rex’s fawning ballads of love. Each track offers a swathe of uplifting instrumentals that is more reductive, and therefore more precise than we accepted on 2019’s ‘Pony’. This pinpoint approach leaves little sonic filler but can also serve to make the more lo-fi tracks feel vacuous and empty. On ‘WHO CARES?’, Rex’s diaristic, amiable style meanders ambivalently around themes of love, the tribulations of fame, the critical self-analysis therein and comes to an equally hazy conclusion; the acceptance of a new reality is the first step to understanding it. While missing the flecks of pop brilliance and cloying hooks that made 2017 Rex so endearing, the record’s release in the genesis of a twee renaissance is near-perfect timing. ‘WHO CARES?’ delicately posits escapism as a human need, not a choice. (Alisdair Grice) LISTEN: ‘IF YOU WANT IT’

The record kicks in with thumping drums as Charli sings how it “ended all so legendary” over twinkling synths on the opening title track. The nostalgic pop influences quickly seep in, further highlighted by its guitar-solo finale. Elsewhere, previously released singles, such as the iconic Caroline Polachek and Christine and the Queens featuring ‘New Shapes’ and the ‘September’-sampling Rina Sawayama collab ‘Beg For You’, shine brightly, while the pounding and anthemic ‘Good Ones’ stands as one of the best from Charli’s back-catalogue. But at no time does Charli lose her forward-thinking pop flair either. The dramatic ‘Move Me’ and ‘Lightning’ reinvent what pop and dance ballads should be, while ‘Constant Repeat’ is a refreshing slice of pure pop that shimmers as Charli sings about a relationship that could’ve been (“you could’ve had a bad girl by your side”). Dynamic strings open up the sleek, sexy bop ‘Baby’, and ‘Every Rule’ explores falling in love under tricky circumstances over dreamy synths. ‘Used To Know Me’ is a dance-floor ready club-pop number, while infectious ear worm ‘Yuck’ sings about simping hard (“that boy’s so mushy, sending me flowers, I’m just trying to get lucky”). ‘Twice’, which Charli originally premiered in a livestream concert back in March 2021, brings a close to the 12-track record on a shimmering note as she sings about living in the moment (“All the things I love are gonna leave me, one day you’re never gonna be there / I tell myself to take it easy, don’t think twice about it”). ‘CRASH’ may be closing a chapter for Charli but it is in no way a swan song. Instead, she once again explores new ventures, crafting a pop album that celebrates the old classics as well as the new, and cements her status as a true pop trailblazer. (Elly Watson) LISTEN: ‘Good Ones’, ‘Lightning’

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Kojey Radical Reason To Smile (Asylum)

Kojey Radical’s enigmatic attitude is a highlight of this debut album. His witty wordplay, laidback verses and endearing flow are paralleled intelligently with heavier themes of immigration, government inadequacies and Black identity. After four acclaimed EPs and a list of features that resembles the MOBOs guest list, Kojey has been brewing ‘Reason To Smile’ for a long time, incubating his best work yet to create a full project that transcends his current reach. The record pairs Ghanaian highlife influences with contemporary flow and meter, culminating in a distinct sound. ‘Together’ shows a powerful understanding of funk (flute solo included), while ‘Nappy’ is a deft meditation on Black identity. He teams with the soul savant Masego in the indulgent ‘Silk’, splicing neatly with Kojey’s quasi-comedic verses. ‘Pressure’ takes a soundbite from Kojey’s mother musing about being thankful she emigrated from Ghana, and ‘Born’ buttresses this with a similar story: “Send a pretty penny to my brothers back in yard.” ‘Born’ also taps into the dreamy cadence of Afrobeat, complete with Cashh’s melodic flow and easy manner. The record exudes authenticity, with the presence of his mother’s voice carefully sampled throughout to great effect. With a combination of features that call back to hip hop greats (Wretch 32, Kelis) and lay the cement for the relatively new kids on the block (Ego Ella May) Kojey acts as a medium for others to find their voice, and unearth their stories of “Black pain, Black peace [and] Black love.” As the play time increases, a dark shadow looms over the lyrics; Kojey sounds physically frustrated about record label norms on ‘Pusher Man: BWI’ while ‘War Outside’ eludes to public ignorance of world truths. It soon becomes evident why Kojey hasn’t released a full length project to date; the consuming industry pressure, endemic racism and gripes with his own psyche that have pushed him back at every step have taken time to overcome. ‘Reason To Smile’ is not just an album, but a beaming victory lap, allowing Kojey to unearth and conquer the demons that have been haunting him for so long. (Alisdair Grice) LISTEN: ‘Pusher Man: BWI’

Not just an album, but a beaming victory lap.

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Aldous Harding Warm Chris (4AD)

The human voice can be an overlooked tool in an artist’s arsenal, but Aldous Harding has the right idea. On her fourth album, the eccentric New Zealand singer-songwriter puts her pipes at the foreground of an evocative, alt-folk soundscape that could only be hers. On 'Tick Tock’, she slips from dulcet lows to lofty harmonies with ease while a crisp beat rattles beneath. On the intimate title track, she sounds almost childlike, so soft and close to the ear it feels as though she could slip inside and curl up, if she wanted. Simply by singing in such a variety of styles, she adds depth to the often sparse arrangements, and creates a world within an album populated by different characters. Aldous has developed her unearthly persona across her previous records; 2019's ‘Designer’ added wiry guitar and shuffling percussion to the melancholy sound she finessed on ‘Party’ two years earlier. Where ‘Designer’ had shade, ‘Warm Chris’ offers light. It still feels bizarre, like stepping inside a doll's house or a hall of mirrors, but it’s less garish, and ushers back in some of the vulnerability of ‘Party’. ‘She’ll Be Coming Round The Mountain’ exemplifies this; “Living for the things I love / Killing the ones that love me”, she sings, over lone piano, her lyrics purposefully obscure, rewarding repeat listens. Aldous Harding is as much a great musician as she is an illusionist who dazzles the listener with stylish tricks. But when she takes off the costumes and harlequin make-up, there’s a devastatingly honest songwriter underneath. (Alex Cabré) LISTEN: ‘She’ll Be Coming Round The Mountain’

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Nilüfer Yanya PAINLESS (ATO)

As the echoed trap beats on album mid-point ‘midnight sun’ give way to a gentle guitar riff reminiscent of mid-‘00s acoustic emo, it secures Nilüfer Yanya’s unique sound. Having explored a massive range of styles on her ambitious 2019 debut opus, ‘PAINLESS’ finds Nilüfer distilling her music to a considered blend of alternative R&B, as much influenced by her soulful contemporaries as by garage rockers and grunge aficionados. The blend is evident in the rock and roll swagger of ‘L/R’, the unrelenting pace of ‘the dealer’, and the Nirvana-esque guitars of ‘chase me‘. This refined sound gives Nilüfer the confidence to dismantle the walls offered by her previous record’s concept, instead finding a narrative in the multiple facets of pain. Gone is wider social commentary, now homing in on the universal experiences of loss, loneliness, and self-repair. Paired with more concentrated sonics, it plays out as deeply introspective and personal. Its comparable ease is represented in the album’s title, both an abstract call to welcome and accept pain, and a knowing nod to how quickly these songs fell into place. It’s this ease that underpins a record that reaches past the confines of bedroom pop without losing any of its magic. Beyond what has come before, ‘PAINLESS’ feels like a true representation of its creator, simultaneously delicate, fierce, vulnerable and fiery. (Ben Tipple) LISTEN: ‘midnight sun’

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BODEGA Broken Equipment (What’s Your Rupture?)

Brooklynites BODEGA sounded like a scrappier Arcade Fire when they emerged in 2018, satirising consumerism and technology via jagged post-punk. Their semi-ironic takes on hustle culture were as intellectual and funny as they were great to dance to. ‘Broken Equipment’, the band’s second LP, feels like a natural successor to ‘Endless Scroll’. It’s more confident, a little sexier. It also finds the outfit playing mostly the same old tricks as last time, for mixed results. A highlight straight out the door, ‘Doers’ sounds like it’s been crushed under immense pressure to form a diamond, a double-edged ode to New York with an ear worm chorus and cutting, observational lyrics: “I have an app that reads econ theory by pillow while I sleep,” Ben Hozie announces, warbled synths blaring around him like sirens in a busy street. The fist-pumping ‘NYC (Disambiguation)’ has more than a hint of ‘Rebellion (Lies)’ about it, but they make it their own, again thanks to some outstanding lyrics that summarise their hometown’s history, stone forts all the way up to “plastic phones, police and sugar.” 'Pillar On the Bridge of You’ meanwhile conjures a fizzy ‘80s sound akin to The Cult, elevating BODEGA's often sparse production to incandescent heights. 'Broken Equipment’ might have been better suited as an EP, though, as the band start to run out of steam towards the end. There’s no need for ‘All Past Lovers’ to drag on for four minutes, while closer ‘After Jane’ doesn't quite reach previous album ballad 'Charlie''s bar in terms of respective album slow songs. The band are a brilliant conduit for their Big Apple forebears; flecks of Strokes, Yeahs, and Soundsystems line their abrasive tones like stickers on a dive bar bathroom mirror, and their ready-made presentation of late-capitalist mundanity is their own unique stamp for the history books, pretentious in the best ways. It’s just funny that a group who posit themselves as avant-garde haven’t changed their thematic formula all that much from one album to the next. (Alex Cabré) LISTEN: ‘Doers’

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Albums

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Charlotte Adigéry & Bolis Pupul Topical Dancer (DEEWEE)

There’s a delicious quality to Charlotte Adigéry’s vocal when she’s dropping one of many - so, so many - witty lyrical asides across ‘Topical Dancer’. And for the girls that get it, the pinnacle of these lands in ‘Thank You’, a track in which the singer’s stream-of-consciousness delivery turns to regaling responses to unwanted (and assumed foolish) comments. “And you discovered me, right?” she casually drops. “You’re the Columbus to my America.” Of course, it’s all done atop a squelchy synth; both Charlotte and Bolis Pupul have long been favourites of Belgian pop pioneers Soulwax’s DEEWEE stable, and it’s clear throughout just why they’re kindred spirits. Across the record, to-the-point statements are matched impeccably in both intensity and tone by club-ready beats in a manner that gives their message the space to breathe, and immediacy to make it stick. There’s direct; “Go back to your country where you belong / Siri, can you tell me where I belong?” posits Charlotte in ‘Blenda’, repeating “I look like them, but not to them / I sound like you but not to you.” ‘Esperanto’ asks many a hypothetical: “Are you as offended when nobody’s watching?” ‘It Hit Me’ has Charlotte recalling her first cat-calling at 13. ‘Ceci n’est pas un cliché’ meanwhile has the pair playing with dance staples; its funky bass soundtracking a list of hackneyed lyrics, its chorus (“You’re as cold as ice / I wanna make you feel real nice”) both trite and impossibly catchy. ‘HAHA’ meanwhile uses the singer’s literal laugh as a glitchy, percussive sample to curious effect. To call ‘Topical Dancer’ pure fun feels to diminish the real sentiment behind the lyrics; to pigeonhole it as wholly political does down the infectiousness that runs through its core. Maybe it’ll just make Europe’s clubbers feel a little more righteous now they’re back on the dancefloor? Either way it’s a win. (Bella Martin) LISTEN: ‘Blenda’

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CMAT

If My Wife New I’d Be Dead (AWAL)

Considering her sweepinglycoiffed, tassels ’n’ rhinestones aesthetic, perhaps the most surprising thing about country pop jokester CMAT’s debut is that a fair whack of the grammaticallyperplexing ‘If My Wife New I’d Be Dead’ isn’t nearly as country as you might imagine. Though it opens with a paean to escaping to Nashville and closes with a yeehaw-worthy one-two of self-explanatory previous single ‘I Wanna Be A Cowboy, Baby!’ and the twanging, acoustic string plucks of ‘I’d Want U’, there’s plenty nestled in between that pulls from shimmering pop (‘No More Virgos’), American indie (‘Every Bottle (Is My Boyfriend)’) and plenty more besides. It’s a smart move that means ‘If My Wife New…’ feels like a more well-rounded, modern proposition than one solely indebted to the oldest style going could suggest. While CMAT’s love of soaring, dusty melodies and heart-on-sleeve emoting is evident, she’s also a keenly specific storyteller, musings over adulterous film directors on ‘Peter Bogdanovich’ and throwing in references to Bacardi Breezers and Marian Keyes on ‘I Don’t Really Care For You’. It all works together, amping up the winking, cheeky side of country whilst also showing CMAT to be an artist enthralled by the genre but not beholden to it. (Lisa Wright) LISTEN: ‘I Don’t Really Care For You’

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HO99O9 SKIN (DTA)

Using the ingredients of hip hop, industrial and hardcore punk, New Jersey’s HO99O9 are here to create something truly ugly. This second album is a cacophony of hissing synths, thudding guitars and furious scream-raps drenched in EQ: harsh and guttural, with little space to breathe. In fact, with his usual distinctive stamp barely able to be felt, the notion that Travis Barker produced this seems absurd when the likes of the scuzzy ‘THE WORLD, THE FLESH, THE DEVIL’ and the snapping, snarling ‘LOWER THAN SCUM’ sound this gloriously nasty. While a record like this could sound overwrought and unpleasantly ultra-processed in the wrong artist's hands, Yeti Bones and theOGM carry off the forcefulness of their sound with style, coming off as assured rather than trying. The only fault that could be levelled at ‘SKIN’ is its tendency to induce whiplash. ‘BITE MY FACE’ jerks from an icy cool industrial sound (featuring an excellent guest turn from Slipknot’s Corey Taylor) into a slow R&B bridge and back again in a confusing rather than creative fashion and ‘SKINHEAD’ throws so much paint at the canvas that the resulting art sounds muddled. That said, HO99O9 get it right far more frequently than not. This record remains incomparable to anything else being made right now. (Emma Wilkes) LISTEN: 'LOWER THAN SCUM’

Art Attack

“Art, imagery and a message all go hand in hand. We wanted to go with a cover that could match our emotions and energy, stand the test of time - not just an image put together, sketched or referenced… but our actual face and self. We’re into the next chapter of HO99O9 - everything from here on out is elevated and new, and we felt Jesse Draxler could bring our ideas alive.”

Placebo Never Let Me Go (SO Recordings)

To say that this is Placebo’s first studio album in nine years feels strange; it doesn’t feel as if they ever went away. Indeed, the past decade has encompassed, for the band, a greatest hits compilation (‘A Place for Us to Dream’), a covers EP (‘Life’s What You Make It’) and near-constant touring between 2012 and 2018, with the latter years of that period dedicated to a greatest hits tour to celebrate their 20th anniversary that took them to arenas around the world and saw frontman Brian Molko break his long-held promise to never play one of their biggest hits, ‘Pure Morning’, ever again; cheekily, they opened most shows with it. This follow-up to 2013’s ‘Loud Like Love’ strongly suggests that, by the time they reconvened to work on new material for the first time ever as a two-piece, they had had quite enough of looking backwards. This is an eccentric record, maybe more in line with 2000’s ‘Black Market Music’ than anything they’ve made since. This is sometimes to the album’s benefit; opener ‘Forever Chemicals’, as well as ‘Hugz’ and ‘Twin Demons’, represent seamless blends of guitars and electronics. Elsewhere, there’s soft drama on ‘This Is What You Wanted’ and brooding menace one ‘Surrounded by Spies’. ‘Never Let Me Go’ is lyrically fascinated by the modern world, and while Brian’s grasp on it has become more nuanced than on the clanging ‘Too Many Friends’ in 2013, he seldom comes off as a firebrand, either. After years of reflection, this is a steady steep back towards the future. (Joe Goggins) LISTEN: ‘Forever Chemicals’

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Jenny Hval Classic Objects (4AD)

“There was a painter in my first studio space,” Jenny Hval recalls on the title track of ‘Classic Objects’. “I remember she used to attach her own hair to her paintings.” Delivered with a conversational tone that runs throughout this eighth studio album, it holds up a mirror to Jenny’s pairing of the abstract and the personal. Much like the physical incorporation of the painter’s body into their work, ‘Classic Objects’ places personal experience front and centre, yet envelops it in a conceptual bubble. Not new to turning private developments into works of art, here Jenny adopts a new level of candour. Inspired by the lack of artistry during the pandemic, ‘Classic Objects’ is the response to a question asked by many over the past two years: Who am I? The answer lies throughout several personal stories, each recounted with a matter-of-factness at odds with the otherworldly sound. On standout ‘American Coffee’, a tale of global exploration is momentarily replaced by French philosophy, leading to a disarmingly abrupt finish. The album’s two epic set pieces close with natural sounds that directly contradict the tangible nature of the story at hand. ‘Cemetery Of Splendour’ concludes with a spoken list of objects, painting a haunting picture of the balance of the natural world and humanity. It all accompanies a sound that harks at traditionalism and modernity, driven by Jenny’s distinctive soft vocals. Yet what on previous records had created something ethereal and untouchable here generates something altogether more physical and tactile. ‘Classic Objects’ walks the line between art and humanity, between nature and fabrication, between the real and the conceptual. It’s the audible equivalent of a painting affixed with human hair. (Ben Tipple) LISTEN: ‘American Coffee’

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Little Boots

Tomorrow’s Yesterdays (On Repeat) With her last album dropping seven years ago, Victoria Hesketh’s journey under the Little Boots banner has been one of infrequent, yet ever-changing fashion since landing accolades with ‘Hands’ back in 2009. The clash of disco and electronica that topped tastemaker charts just over a decade ago remains a mainstay of the Blackpool native’s work, a growing latitude seen on her previous two records finding space to unfold on ‘Tomorrow’s Yesterdays’. The glitterball glow of ‘Silver Balloons’ and Moloko-leaning ‘Landline’ capture this enduring flex, nudging alongside the ‘80s pop-nodding ‘Crying On The Inside’ and ‘Out Out’ - relying on the electro bombast that helped garner early acclaim. Chicesque tones dominate on the club-ready ‘Heavenly’, a ‘70s dancefloor banger that aligns with her involvement in the upcoming ABBA live production. Victoria zeros in on a happy medium state between the ‘90s house tendencies of ‘Working Girl’ and the straight-up synth-pop of her breakthrough years, finding strength in the Saint Etienne-riffing ‘Nothing Ever Changes’ - eclipsing the muzak-framed pace of ‘Deborah’ and a conspicuously low-key title track. Little Boots is perhaps at her most relaxed on her latest, dipping between moods with a devil-may-care nostalgia that delivers on its sequin-glinting, platform-shoed modus operandi. (Chris Hamilton-Peach) LISTEN: ‘Nothing Ever Changes’

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Mattiel Georgia Gothic (Heavenly)

Those new to Mattiel have the opportunity to put two and two together and make five when it comes to this third album; between the title of ‘Georgia Gothic’ and the fact that it was largely conceived in a remote woodland cabin in the north of the two-piece’s home state, it would be easy to go in expecting something moody, raw, exposed and folky. Instead, within seconds of the opening track, that notion is immediately snuffed out. “He came and met me in the bathroom, a little like a younger Jeff Goldblum,” chirps Mattiel Brown over scuzzy guitars and a driving beat on a song named after Hollywood’s favourite eccentric, setting the tone for what is in fact a charming, witty indie pop album. Taut hooks and melodies characterise ‘Jeff Goldblum’, ‘Lighthouse’ and ‘You Can Have It All’, but ‘Georgia Gothic’ turns out to be a fairly versatile work, with ‘Cultural Criminal’ defined by its bluesy stomp and ‘Blood in the Yolk’ an exercise in smoky drama that provides Brown with the opportunity for a show-stopping vocal turn. Not everything comes off - ‘Boomerang’ is hugely scattershot both sonically and lyrically - while ‘Subterranean Shut-In Blues’ swings for classic ‘60s pop and misses - but the decision for Brown and collaborator Jonah Swiller to finally make a record together in the same room, after two remotely composed past releases, has largely paid dividends. (Joe Goggins) LISTEN: ‘Blood In The Yolk’

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Alex Cameron Oxy Music (Secretly Canadian)

Alex Cameron’s penchant for unlikely pop material continues on ‘Oxy Music’, where he finds inspiration for satirical yet sympathetic character studies from within the American opioid crisis. Without trading off his signature sense of humour, he tackles tales of drug addiction and disillusionment with a welcome amount of care and as a result it’s perhaps his most sympathetic work to date; his knack for infectious choruses like those on ‘Prescription Refill’ and lead single ‘Sara-Jo’ are complimented by moments of genuine pathos on ‘Dead Eyes’ and ‘K-Hole’. Though if his well-oiled formula of warm guitar leads, slick saxophone runs and glowing ‘80s-style synths hasn’t enamoured you before, then ‘Oxy Music’ won’t do much to change that. Sonic detours are sparse, coming in the form of a Lloyd Vines rap verse on ‘Cancel Culture’ and an unexpectedly playful duet with Sleaford Mods frontman Jason Williamson on the title track. Its steady pace and relatively tame nature (by his standards) means it might not be his most immediately striking release, but it’s still testament to his talent as an astute alt-pop songwriter. (Ryan Bell) LISTEN: ‘Prescription Refill’

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Q&A Her first album in five years; working with ABBA (yes that ABBA); Victoria Hesketh fills Ims Taylor in on what’s new in Little Boots’ world.

This is the first album you’ve produced yourself! What was that like? It’s one of the first times I’ve fully stepped up, and now I’ve done it, I don’t know why I put it off! I think it was just a lot of impostor syndrome. When I got signed in 2007, it was that old major label world where in order to make a hit or even a good record, you have to go in a dark room with an older man and he’ll show you how to make a good pop song. Most pop music was made in dark rooms with old dudes! And that’s not the people who go dancing to pop music, who cry to pop music and love to pop music… So yeah, doing it was really refreshing and really empowering. Any challenges to it? Well, I’m not a naturally good mixer. I can’t sit and talk about EQ and snare drum for half an hour! It bores the hell out of me! But you have to trust your ears, I’ve always had a real DIY way of doing things, and that’s what people loved about my first record [2008’s ‘Hands’], and half of that I wrote in my mum’s garage! Owning that - you

don’t need to be ashamed of that. That’s what gives it personality!

We’ve got to talk about ABBA. What’s it been like working with some of the greatest pop musicians of all time? I’m not allowed to say anything… except I’m definitely having the time of my life! I’d started writing ‘Tomorrow’s Yesterdays’ before, but then spending time in the studio with Benny [Andersson] and Bjorn [Ulvaeus] and just seeing Benny break down songs and talk about them, and hearing all the parts of these amazing pop songs, definitely inspired me. Some songs I wrote fresh, some I went back to the old ideas and unpicked, really trying to put the songwriting at the centre of things. I’d be like, ‘What would Benny do? How can I push myself up another notch?’ It’s inspired me to be bold in pop music – especially these days, because pop is cool again, but in an understated way. Not too OTT – but ABBA is OTT! So it’s given me a new confidence to reclaim that pure pop space.

New Single out March 15th on Dance To The Radio

THE TYNE

OUT NOW

ON SLAM DUNK RECORDS

DEBUT SINGLE

JESSICA

OUT NOW ON SLAM DUNK RECORDS 57

RECO MMEN DED Missed the boat on some the best albums from the last couple of months? Don’t worry, we’ve got you covered.

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Shamir Heterosexuality

The prolific songwriter’s vital latest deconstructs social norms through a powerful freedom of selfexpression.

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Big Thief Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe In You

It might be a mouthful of a title, but the folk-rockers’ fifth finds them at the peak of their powers.

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Bakar

Nobody’s Home (Black Butter)

While 2018’s mixtape ‘Badkid’ garnered some acclaim, it was the following year’s ‘Will You Be My Yellow?’ EP that really marked a breakthrough for Bakar, the North Londoner earning a sleeper hit with its single ‘Hell N Back’. It’s clear from ‘Nobody’s Home’ that the intervening years have enabled the Camden creative to hone his message. On this debut full-length, he oscillates between the personal and political in an exploration of identity. On ‘Not From Here’, he’s “Barely a citizen / Still pleading my innocence” while on ‘Free’, is a “futuristic immigrant.” No two songs sound the same here, as Bakar borrows from indie rock and alternative pop, hip hop and gospel. Take ‘Ginger Pubes’ for example, an impassioned snarl of frustration and self-deprecation as he almost screams at its climax. In contrast, the smooth ‘Riot’ has him backed by choral chants of “Be free.” The experimental ‘Build Me A Way’ wraps up a record of profound emotional expression, evoking both a spiritual and artistic journey as Bakar sings “I’m on my way.” Between his emotive vocal delivery and brutally honest lyricism, Bakar has produced an impressive and accomplished debut, well worth the wait. (Sarah Taylor) LISTEN: ‘Build Me A Way’

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Peach Pit From 2 To 3 (Columbia)

Peach Pit remain a slightly enigmatic proposition. The Vancouver outfit saw their eponymous debut single go viral in 2016, with a YouTube view count well into the tens of millions, despite the fact that its breezy indie rock hardly fit the template for what tends to constitute a viral hit. Uneven first album, ‘Being So Normal’, swiftly followed, and while follow-up full-length, ‘You and Your Friends’, fell bigger and bolder, you can’t help but shake the sense that they’ve never quite managed to capture the same lightning in a bottle as they did with that track, which felt like the band in microcosm in just under five minutes. Now, they return with a third album, ‘From 2 to 3’, the title of which is telling. According to frontman Neil Smith, the record was written in the small hours, in a hushed manner so as not to wake the neighbours. While we return to regular volume for the recordings themselves, these initial moves seem to have paid dividends; with the gradual clockwise turning of the dial, these songs come to life in terms of warmth and richness, imbuing tracks like opener ‘Up Granville’ and the pretty ‘Last Days of Lonesome’ with the kind of character often missing from the last two albums. (Joe Goggins) LISTEN: ‘Last Days of Lonesome'

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Wallows

Tell Me That It’s Over (Atlantic) Wallows have long balanced their effortlessly sunny indie-pop with brooding, angst-fuelled moments, and ‘Tell Me That It’s Over’ is a vibrant example of this concept. Scattered with squeaky licks, buoyant 808s and spacious texture, the record bounds with personality. ‘Hard to Believe’ and ‘Hurts Me’ tap into the endearing pull of vocalist Dylan Minnette’s vocoder sway, with a distinct synthwave backbone that brings momentum to both tracks. A tableau of a high school talent show is presented in ‘Marvelous’ while Wallows’ token hooks can be found on ‘Hurt Me’. The unexpected noise rock proportions of ‘Permanent Price’ teeter into the avant-garde, layering the bombast of ‘Oompa’ with lucent layered harmonies, and the grunge throw-down dynamics of ‘Missing Out’ pair Wallows’ indie DNA with a late-‘90s rock influence. The record circulates themes of insecurity freely, with the retrospective know-how of a mid-20s man lamenting failed relationships. “I’d never give up on you, but you gave up on me, and that’s what I get for falling in love,” Dylan claims. ‘Tell Me That It’s Over’ is a superlative ode to vulnerability, permitting these indie wallflowers to flourish in technicolour. (Alisdair Grice) LISTEN: ‘Hurt Me’

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The Ninth Wave

Heavy Like A Headache (Distiller)

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Rolo Tomassi Where Myth Becomes Memory

The now-Transatlantic rock outfit find yet more beauty in chaos on their sixth full-length outing.

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It’s an odd decision to announce a split ahead of a record release; it makes the first listen a bittersweet one for fans, a curious one for outsiders. It’s impossible, essentially, not to read more into what’s on show; as if something about the record itself is why they chose now to disband. And with The Ninth Wave’s second full-length, and (for now) last, it seems as if the group weren’t fully together on what kind of band they were. Where 2020’s ‘Happy Days!’ EP had The Horrors’ Faris Badwan hone their synth-led pop into definitively dark territory, there’s no real thread to tie most of ‘Heavy Like A Headache’ together fully. For while standout ‘These Depopulate Hours’ fizzes with what has made the Glasgow group so inviting in the past - a bubbling menace underpinning everything thanks to a screaming synth - and ‘What Makes You A Man’ employs curious sounds to back its ‘80s influences, it’s not matched by what’s found elsewhere. Because for the most part, it’s ‘80s-indebted synth pop that’s aiming for daytime radio but doesn’t have the immediacy. ‘Everything Will Be Fine’ pines for The 1975’s glistening big pop vibe, but lacks personality. ‘Heron on the Water’ evokes the post-Interpol mid-00s wave of vaguely new wave one-hit-wonders, and while ‘Pivotal’ has Haydn Park Patterson finally find the Robert Smith it feels as if he’s been straining for in his voice until that point, there’s still none of the darkness. Not just a bittersweet listen, a confusing one as well. (Louisa Dixon) LISTEN: ‘These Depopulate Hours’

Albums 

Eades

Delusion Spree (Heist Or Hit) This may be Eades’ debut album, but what they’ve maintained from their back catalogue - the summery gang vocals of ‘Backseat Politic’, the title track and opener ‘Reno’ - is elevated by the aspects of their sound they’ve developed further. The brooding build of ‘Saying Forever’, is one of the sharpest examples of Eades’ blending of their many facets. Rather than packing everything into one, they strip back the sunshine and deliver something equally as bubbly through more concentrated instrumentation. And then they slip into ‘Voodoo Doll’, which by comparison is practically a ballad – it fits and yet it doesn’t, delightfully, hooked like a chain-link to the previous track by the odd new-wave texture. On ‘Delusion Spree’ Eades are exploring as much as they’re introducing, and it’s expertly done. (Ims Taylor) LISTEN: ‘Saying Forever’

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Camp Cope

Running With The Hurricane (Run For Cover) “The only way out is up” utters the compelling voice of Camp Cope’s Georgia Maq on title track ‘Running With The Hurricane’, laying the bedrock for a third studio album that toys with how we as humans ‘cope’ post-trauma. Dialling back their often punk influenced fury, it offers a more gentle presence, combining anecdotal musings with a love letter to the band’s home town of Melbourne. Georgia postulates but doesn’t ramble. She ceremoniously addresses sleeping in her car, her warmth in vulnerability and desire to play the tambourine in a firmly reflective manner, not looking for an outpouring of sympathy but simply recognition. ‘One Wink At A Time’ and ‘Say The Line’ see her lace her voice with Adrianne Lenker warbles, loosely capturing notes before leaning into their intonation and reasserting the pace of each track. ‘Running With The Hurricane’ is a silky layer of folk atop a punk skeleton, taking the raw vocal talent and floating dynamics of folk and combining it with the sharp cadence and urgency of earlier Camp Cope material. Even closer ‘Sing Your Heart Out’ swells from a delicate love song into a compelling, spirited rock number, underpinned by the soft hum of crunchy guitars and fortified bass grooves. Distinct, crooning and softly beautiful, ‘Running With The Hurricane’ captures a snapshot of intimacy, thriving friendships and a profound understanding of the human condition. (Alisdair Grice) LISTEN: ’Say The Line’

The Mysterines Reeling (Fiction)

The debut album from Liverpool’s The Mysterines is the sound of a band pushing through the undergrowth in reach of the sun. Despite their relative newness, some of their grungy garage-rock bangers feel like postcards from their future, more famous selves: the ingeniously-titled ‘Life’s A Bitch (But I Like It So Much)’, for example, possesses the sort of shout-alongs that are primed for festival fields. Their knack for melody is one of their greatest strengths, particularly when combined with frontwoman Lia Metcalfe’s husky tones, and the likes of the gritty swagger of ‘In My Head’ showcase this beautifully. They’ve even perfected the acoustic ballad, with late album highlight ‘Still Call You Home’ boasting a rawness and jaggedness to its sound that songs in a similar vein rarely achieve. In other moments, they still feel a little green, such as in the mid-paced one-two of ‘Dangerous’ and ‘On The Run’, which sound a little more like your favourite local band rather than festival headliners in the making, and which need a little more oomph for them to truly soar. Though not a flawless effort, musically speaking, this band’s baby teeth are not far off falling out. (Emma Wilkes) LISTEN: ‘Life’s A Bitch (But I Like It So Much)’

Q&A More personal, more varied in sound, and more “them’’ than ever. Georgia Maq tells Ims Taylor about Camp Cope’s route to ‘Running With The Hurricane’.

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Set It Off Elsewhere (Fearless)

Pining to join the elevated legacies of pop-punk-turned-pop heroes Fall Out Boy and Panic! At The Disco, Tampa three-piece Set It Off have been left in the dust, still producing the same saccharine, over-produced material that has long lost its boyish charm. Adopting the tacky neon vibrancies of the mid-00s nu-rave aesthetic (while still missing the mark), ‘Elsewhere’ tells the roundabout tale of vocalist Cody Carson’s personal grievances with all the conviction of roadkill; akin to a repetitive pastiche of ‘Danger Days’-era My Chemical Romance. ‘Projector’ is a particular low-point: “So light me up, my little projector / And eat me up like Hannibal Lecter”. Cody’s abrasive giggling and chatter saturates each track with a pseudo-relatability that is masked underneath hollow lyrics that openly vents about his minor first world irritations. Vanity created this record, and will likely destroy it. ‘Dangerous’ is an out-of-place two minute club track possessing the worst lyrics on the entire record: “This one’s for the misfits, and all the people on your shit list.” It genuinely seems like they couldn’t extend the idea further so they just ended the track. As Cody recites dryly on ‘Skeleton’, this is indeed “where it all went wrong.” ‘Elsewhere’ feels like you’re stuck on the spinning teacups at the local circus, complete with clowns dishing out overused idioms and laughing manically as you rotate yourself into a candyfloss-induced stupor. (Alisdair Grice)

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A lot has happened in Camp Camp Cope since we last spoke – how’s the journey been? SO much stuff has happened! ‘How To Socialise And Make Friends’ came out, we’ve toured heaps, I live alone now which I love… I have two cats, Spatula and Adidas… But I actually think ‘How To Socialise...’ is kind of shit! The songs are good, but I really associate it with stress and sickness. I was struggling a lot, we put a lot of pressure on ourselves! But then in the middle of 2020 I went mad and started making a pop album that no one’s ever gonna hear, and in doing that I learnt how to produce, I learnt how to arrange, I learnt how to write backing vocal parts and harmonies, and then with ‘Running With The Hurricane’ I just got to apply everything I’ve learned! I got really creative. That must have been really freeing – what do we hear of that on the record? I decided I wanna play acoustic guitar on every track, because I hate the sound of just an electric guitar, I wanna play piano because I’m really good at piano, and I wanted to write more vocal parts. I wasn’t making an album that could be perfectly recreated live. I’m actually looking forward to [adapting them], because it keeps us learning and playing and that’s a very cool thing.

The album has some very cool collabs featured – tell us about them! In my head I heard a trumpet line, and I was just like… ‘Well who do we know who plays trumpet?!’ And Tommo [Sarah Thompson, drums] is really good friends with Courtney Barnett, and she was like, ‘If you want us to do anything on the album, let us know!’ And then, ‘Sing Your Heart Out’ at the end, that song actually came about because Simon Little [Frightened Rabbit] sent me this line on piano, and I was like ‘Oh my god, I’m gonna make a song about this’. It's super special, because Frightened Rabbit are my favourite band in the entire world. A few years ago, about six months or so after Scott had died, I got an Instagram DM from Simon saying ‘Hey, you don’t know me but I play in Frightened Rabbit, I just wanted to let you know that me and Scott listened to Camp Cope one of the last times we hung out and he had a lot of nice things to say about it’. I’d just gotten off a plane in LAX and I just burst into tears. That band is so special, and me and Simon just developed a friendship after that. He's an incredible person and an incredible musician, and he’ll send me these little recordings from time to time and I’ll try and make something out of them.

Albums

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Babeheaven

Ibibio Sound Machine

Sink Into Me (Believe)

West London duo Babeheaven (aka Nancy Andersen and James Travis) have laundered the trip hop-heavy lo-fi of their 2020 debut ‘Home For Now’ for slicker, balmier second outing ‘Sink Into Me’. Conceived with three new members, it reaps the rewards of spending considerable fine-tuning time in the studio. Much like the capital’s genre-fluid forebears Westerman or Nilüfer Yanya, Babeheaven middle that imprecise Venn diagram where R&B cuddles with trip hop, flirts with pop, burlesques with lounging psych. Opener ‘French One’ sets the emollient tone - a song about a car crash that remains dramatic without being tense, propulsive but never unsettling. Cruising lead single ‘The Hours’ meanwhile coasts colourfully like something from a Jane Weaver LP. Even the more shadowy moments, like ‘No Breakfast’ warm the soul like a healing soak in bath salts. Aside from the silky backbeats cotton-wooling ’Sink Into Me’ so breezily, Nancy Andersen’s gossamer vocals provide a stand-out quality here. Proffering intimate lyrics on private grief and personal growth (‘Erase’ finds inspiration in the lifecycle of a moth) with the most gorgeously purified vocal shimmer; it’s the cherry that tops this most satisfying of releases, destined to be set on repeat. (Elvis Thirlwell) LISTEN: ‘The Hours’

Absolute (behind the) scenes! In the studio with Babeheaven as they recorded ‘Sink Into Me’. Before I transform into Big Dress Public Nancy.

(Merge)

The fourth full length from London-based groovemeisters Ibibio Sound Machine offers a titanic showdown between various cultural forces, and lets us in on the explosive results. Firing together traditional West African rhythms of Cameroon and the Nigerian Ibibio language - the native tongue of vocalist and co-founder Eno Williams - with forward-facing electronic fulminations, an inspired hybridity is born. And it’s one which ‘Electricity’ feeds on lavishly. Produced by acclaimed synthpoppers Hot Chip, the record creeps and sizzles with their circuit-board infusions to layer an added eeriness upon Ibibio’s Afrofuturist vision. Take apotropaic opener ‘Protection From Evil’: it implies some mean and malevolent monster, which Ibibio set out to overpower with the vivacity of their vibe alone. The track renders shattering glass sheets via modulated synthesis to inspire these danceable yet foreboding dungeons of groove. Most of the subsequent tracks adhere to this compelling dynamic: ‘Casio (Yak Nda Nda)’ broods like something Soccer96 might conjure, while ‘17 18 19’ delivers ‘Electricity’’s most irresistibly funky moment. There’s also a few refreshing turns and twists along the way. A pair of Grace Jones-esque sojourns to ‘80s clubland (‘All That you Want’; ‘Wanna See Your Face Again’), or the sumptuously beautiful melodies of ‘Afo Ken Doko Mien’ mix up what is a blitzing disco-ball of a record. (Elvis Thirlwell) LISTEN: ‘Protection From Evil’

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DITZ

The Great Regression (Alcopop!)

Jamie working on synth parts for the album. One of the most fun things is adding little layers and synth melodies after the main part of the song is done. Is it just us or does every studio have this rug?

Luca in the studio with our producer Simon, getting ready to record his guitar part for ‘Make me Wanna’.

Electricity

DITZ could have become a better-than-average jangly indie band if they wanted – at least, that’s what the joyfully bright guitar introducing opening track ‘Clocks’ seems to want you to believe. Yet just as you get comfortable, a low, doomy death knell of a riff sounds out of nowhere, pleasantly disorientating, and everything suddenly becomes way, way more exciting. Then again, it’s hardly reasonable to expect mediocrity from a breakout band who dare to close their debut album with a seven-and-a-half-minute song, the darkly simmering post-punk opus ‘No Thanks I’m Full’, that passes by in what feels like half the time. Indeed, ‘The Great Regression’’s bravest moments reap the most rewards, and coincidentally, it’s where their identity feels strongest. ‘Ded Wurst’ is a greebo’s dancefloor dream, where jagged synths glitter between bursts of disgustingly deep guitar, while ‘Hehe’ delivers a mighty finishing move with a sludgy, weighty outro. There’s still a little greenness here and there – the Royal Blood-esque ‘Summer Of The Shark’ lacks a little individuality, for example – but in the position that DITZ have put themselves in, there are a lot of places for them to push the boat. (Emma Wilkes) LISTEN: ‘Ded Wurst’

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The Lazy Eyes SongBook (Lunatic)

There are going to be obvious points of comparison for any new Australian psych band to live up to at this particular moment in time - Tame Impala and King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard being just a couple of the more obvious ones - but if pressures of that variety weighed upon The Lazy Eyes during the making of this debut album, you’d never know. In fact, the world that the Sydney four-piece have conjured up on ‘SongBook’ sounds like one entirely free of care. The whole thing is tremendously woozy, taking its cues both from psych-pop - the trippier side of The Beach Boys is in the undertow - and psych-rock, with the group by no means averse to the odd noodling guitar solo. It’s a record that winds its way through the pantheon of the genre at its own pace; we’re on the home straight before a true prog jam shows up, in the shape of ‘Where’s My Brain???’, with the band happy to wander off down whichever stylistic avenue takes their fancy, whether that be the noisy sludge of ‘Fuzz Jam’ or, on the standout ‘Hippo’, gloriously mellow, blissed-out dream pop. ‘SongBook’ is a debut that suggests The Lazy Eyes have the guile to forge their own roads in a genre not currently experiencing a dearth of talent. (Joe Goggins) LISTEN: ‘Where’s My Brain???’

EPs, etc

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Priestgate

Eyes Closed For The Winter (Lucky Number)

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BENEE Lychee (Republic)

Where 2020 debut album ‘Hey U X’ saw BENEE gather an impressive guest list (Lily Allen, Gus Dapperton, Bakar) to pepper her bedroom pop with outside influences, the seven-track ‘Lychee’ sees the New Zealander showing off a sound that’s distinctly her own. Sure, you can readily place her somewhere between the lackadaisical chill of The Japanese House and Biig Piig’s leftfield pop, but there’s a clear personality that runs through this EP. ‘Soft Side’ bristles with a clubby undercurrent, while ‘Make You Sick’ opens with a wonderful juxtaposition of softly-sung vocals and the mantra “I’m a bad bitch”. It’s a similar scene on ‘Hurt You, Gus’ where her sugary-sweet delivery and the song’s shuffling playground beat team up to belie its message. The pick of the bunch, however, is ‘Never Ending’, where ‘90s alt-rock guitars are subtly updated via a ‘20s alt-pop filter, paired with hip hop rhythms and the singer’s typically heart-onsleeve lyrics for a low-key anthemic track. (Bella Martin) LISTEN: ‘Never Ending’

Priestgate’s rising star owes as much to the blurrable boundaries of modern indie as to clearer cut new wave architecture; the Yorkshire-hailing gloom-pop purveyors tread a fine line between both worlds - lending a liminality to their debut EP, midway between The Horrors and Lust For Youth. Nailed down with drawling credibility, the five-piece hold their own amongst a slew of crooning post-punk bedfellows - Rob Schofield’s sonorous tones locked between careening guitar hooks and understated synth touches, flicking between the spirited and sepulchral in knee jerk elasticity. This finds its strength via the Robert Smith-esque leer of ‘Bedtime Story’ and ‘Eyes Closed For The Winter’’s ghostly glare – the bittersweet, all too brief ‘By The Door’ proving the main attraction in this marriage of looping riffs and echoed refrains. The outfit strut between intimate and aloof with a raffish sincerity that injects life into wellworn genre moves, a dose of dry-iced melancholia. (Chris Hamilton-Peach) LISTEN: ‘By The Door’

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Sprints A Modern Job (Nice Swan)

Impassioned, purposeful, and personal: Sprints’ latest delves into identity, crisis, the political, and the societal by leaning not into each one of those things, but the points where the Venn diagrams overlap. Across six tracks that span the ups and downs of the emotional spectrum of someone digging around trying to find themselves, the Dublin gang neatly package existential panic into a buzzy, punchy musical box. Summed up aptly by Karla Chubb’s vocals on opener ‘How The Story Goes’, Sprints are often flippant, sometimes sarcastically matter-of-fact, before devolving into desperate emotional peaks and then snapping back almost spookily to composure. Insistent instrumentals back up lyrical themes, churning relentlessly underneath pleading lyrics on the frenetic ‘Modern Life’ and ‘I’m In A Band’. ‘A Modern Job’ is certainly - sometimes painfully - evocative. (Ims Taylor) LISTEN: ‘Modern Life’

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Island Of Love Songs Of Love (Third Man)

This first-for-most look into Island of Love’s world might be a mere twelve minutes, or four songs’ worth, but we’re told it took Third Man head honcho Ben Swank just thirty seconds of live performance to offer the Londoners their deal. Fuzzy almost to a fault, it’s scrappy, distorted, rough around the edges indie; if it transpired they’d found the group via a long-lost crate of college rock sealed in the late ‘80s instead of hovering around the capital’s punk and hardcore scenes, it would shock nobody. The first two tracks are the winners here, both the EP title track and opener ‘At Home’ sneaking some gloriously ‘50s-indebted melodies and, shocker!, a pop hook - under layers of hazy guitars. (Bella Martin) LISTEN: ‘At Home’

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daine

Quantum Jumping (Warner Australia / Atlantic)

For an artist who made her name casually blending hyper-pop, emo and electropunk, ‘Quantum Jumping’ makes for an intriguing listen: we find daine exercising uncharacteristic restraint, reeling herself in to focus on one facet of her sound. Nothing here ever quite hits the concentration of noise showcased on earlier singles: something which could feel like a loss if it didn’t seem so intentional. Instead, the record slow-burns along, reaching into dark ambience (‘glitter’, ‘new ground’) and dizzying density (‘idc’). Her storytelling remains striking, and her production sharp and evocative, everything crafted purposefully, and showing formidable focus for someone so new. (Ims Taylor) LISTEN: ‘new ground’

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EPs, etc

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Dog Unit

Turn Right And Right Again (Brace Yourself)

Rule Of Six’, the opening number from London-based quartet Dog Unit’s second EP, takes the jagged post-punk that’s become so ubiquitous over the last few years, makes it a little more sprightly in places, but thanks to the outfit’s instrumental nature doesn’t come complete with a cloying Mark E Smith impression. The rest of ‘Turn Right And Right Again’ is of the vast, sprawling nature that such groups tend to favour; what they eschew vocally, they embrace in length. ‘Absolute Unit’ meanders along with a lost ‘70s FM radio solo before turning full classic rock come the five-minute mark; ‘Pyramid Scheme’ is quieter still before it crashes towards the epic almost halfway through its nine-plus minute length. Lyric-less rock is as Marmite as they come, but for those who favour a slither of expansive post-rock on their metaphorical musical toast, there’s plenty here to get excited for. (Louisa Dixon) LISTEN: ‘Absolute Unit’

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Folly Group Human And Kind

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Central Cee 23 (Central Cee)

“I listen a lot but I don’t speak much,” Central Cee posits on ‘Khabib’, eluding to the reason his bars have caught so much attention since the sleeper hit ‘Loading’ caught the UK rap scene in its headlights. For one of the hottest names right now, Cench is carefully reflective on ‘23’. The mixtape concerns Cench’s come up and the relationships he has developed in that time. His pop culture awareness on ‘23’ is veritable, with both ‘Khabib’ and ‘Ungrateful’ looking back at his beginnings, and the derailing contrast of the life he was living a mere few years ago. ‘Straight Back To It’ is a deep dive into the rapper's mindset. The aptly-named trap banger ‘Eurovision’ is his 'Bohemian Rhapsody', or perhaps more his own Euro-centric XXL Freshman Class, featuring a cornucopia of rappers from the continent(including Spain's Morad, plus Italians Baby Gang and Rondodasosa) dishing bars in their mother tongues, emphasising Central Cee's far-reaching impact. Although his dextrous flow is spirited on the buoyant ‘Retail Therapy’ and ‘Air Bnb’, latter tracks ‘No Pain’ and ‘Terminal 5’ suffer from late-album fatigue. Both come in at under two minutes and feel like indistinct filler; half-formed ideas peppered with unmemorable beats. However, the PinkPantheress-sampling ‘Obsessed With You’ is an impressive combination of eerie garage and Cee’s more meditative bars, redeeming the album end with fresh ideas and a novel collaboration. Central Cee is concerned about one thing on ‘23’, and it is himself. He is in a curious state of constant self-assessment. His identity is in constant flux, making for a revealing and honest listen from one of the mosthyped artists of 2022 so far. (Alisdair Grice) LISTEN: ‘Straight Back To It’

(Technicolour)

Such have been the fertile grounds of the UK’s post-punk devotees of the last few years, that around last summer’s ‘Awake And Hungry’, Folly Group could easily have been one of a handful of other acts, part of the steady line of angry young men taking over the country’s toilet venues one disgruntled mumble at a time. Thankfully, there’s enough on follow-up EP - and first release via their new home of Ninja Tune imprint Technicolour - to suggest this lot won’t be left behind in 2021 like a steadily warming pint at the back of Brixton Windmill. Of course, funk and disco have been bedfellows of post-punk since its inception, and ‘I Raise You (The Price Of Your Head)’ adopts a bassline of the former with the kind of twinkly synth Blondie would’ve made great use of with infectious results. Opener ‘Faint of Hearts’ has call-and-response vocals Alex Kapranos wouldn’t turn his nose up at, while the spacious title track sounds like Mike Skinner going stream-ofconsciousness over Ultravox’s seminal ‘Vienna’. It’s where they’ll look next that’s exciting, though. (Bella Martin) LISTEN: ‘I Raise You (The Price Of Your Head)’

Coming Up

When is sprechgesang without sprechgesang? ‘The

SUNFLOWER BEAN HEADFUL OF SUGAR The New Yorkers’ third is about “the joy that comes with letting go of everything you thought mattered.” Out 6th May.

ORVILLE PECK BRONCO Saddle up! The camouflaged country crooner’s second fulllength lands on 8th April.

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Viji Cali

(Dirty Hit)

Whether timed to coincide with the coming of spring or not, ‘Cali’ finds Viji’s soft-pop wares somewhat echoing the first buds of the season’s floral awakening. Largely bedroom pop with a studio sheen, the six-track release showcases an artist still finding her feet. There are echoes of the kind of heart-on-sleeve lyricism that takes its cues from ‘00s emo - but Viji’s laid-back delivery doesn’t quite put the message across. Similarly, while opener ‘Not Enough’ makes use of otherwise pleasingly grungy guitars, they’re inserted in a seemingly ad-hoc, aesthetic manner rather than echoing any thematic angst on show. It’s really when stripped of on-trend sonics say, the deliciously spacey title track, or slick pop of ‘Feel It’, where we get an idea of where Viji might find herself most believable. (Louisa Dixon) LISTEN: ‘Cali’

VINCE STAPLES RAMONA PARK BROKE MY HEART Thankfully this isn’t some grand gesture to a longlost love from the rapper; Ramona Park is a place in Vince’s native LA.

JENNYLEE - HEART TAX Not content with completing a new Warpaint record, bassist Jenny Lee Lindberg has a new solo effort on the way, out 23rd April.

BROCKHAMPTON Brixton Academy, London. Photos: Burak Cingi.

our years ago, Brockhampton bounded onto the stage at London’s KOKO, making their UK debut with two shows that sold out in seconds. A defining moment for the flourishing collective, it still stands in fans’ memories as a 'you should have been there' moment. In the years that followed, the group would return to London multiple times, most notably recording their fourth full-length ‘iridescence’ at Abbey Road. With their ties with the capital fully cemented, the boys return to London tonight for what was originally meant to be the final leg of an all-conquering European tour, but instead stands as one of their last ever shows. Cancelling their whole European trip - apart from these shows in Brixton, which had sold out way back in 2019 - the performances were always primed to be an emotional affair. “It’s bittersweet!” founder and de-facto leader Kevin

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Abstract tells the buzzing crowd, after kicking the evening off with explosive opening track ‘BUZZCUT’. “Sad face.” But any fears of a sombre night are immediately dispelled, as Kevin and co. give their self-proclaimed “best boyband since One Direction” a triumphant and celebratory send-off. Brockhampton were never gonna go out with anything but a bang, were they? Kicking off with a series of ‘Saturation’ trilogy bangers, they get the crowd going with ‘STAR’, ‘GOLD’, ‘JUNKY’ and ‘ZIPPER’. Mosh pits erupt as soon as the iconic opening beats of ‘QUEER’ blast out, and sing-alongs echo

throughout the whole venue as the crowd try to match the notes of Joba’s chorus on ‘FACE’. ‘SISTER’ is brought to a brief stop as the band, rightfully, halt the music to allow a fan to exit from the crowd with the help of security, urging the hyped-up audience to look after one another before they dive back into ‘1999 WILDFIRE’. With rappers Merlyn Wood and Matt Champion high-kicking and leaping across the stage throughout, the group’s energy is as infectious as ever. Meanwhile, ‘iridescence’ cut ‘J’OUVERT’ sees Joba continually proving his vocal prowess as he screams into the mic, while bearface’s magnetic ‘DISTRICT’ chorus gets the whole crowd waving their hands in the air. Their ‘GINGER’ era gets a euphoric introduction with the arrival of viral hit ‘SUGAR’ before Dom McLennon provides a fiery verse on the vibey ‘BOY BYE’. By the time latest album ‘ROADRUNNER: NEW LIGHT, NEW MACHINE’ gets its outing with banger ‘DON’T SHOOT UP THE PARTY’, there’s not a single

SETLIST:

Live

BUZZCUT STAR GOLD FACE GUMMY QUEER JUNKY SWEET BLEACH RENTAL ZIPPER SISTER 1999 WILDFIRE WEIGHT NEW ORLEANS DISTRICT J'OUVERT SUGAR BOY BYE WHAT'S THE OCCASION? BANKROLL SEX DON'T SHOOT UP THE PARTY SUMMER Encore: BOOGIE

person in the room not wanting the evening to last forever. As the night nears its end, emotions start to reach the surface as bearface steps forward to perform an emotional rendition of ‘SATURATION II’ closer ‘SUMMER’. With the group heading off the stage to chants of “ONE MORE SONG!”, the band, speaking into their mics from backstage, tell the crowd how much they mean to them. In turn, they also thank Kevin for making it all happen. Enough to make even the most stoic stan shed a slight tear, the band return to see out this celebratory evening in the only way they possibly could - with an electric, pyrotechnicfuelled encore of undisputed banger ‘BOOGIE’. It’s a triumphant ending to a career-spanning set that proves just why Brockhampton will go down as game-changers. Rewriting the rules of what it is to be a rap band, they may actually have been the “best boy band since One Direction” too. (Elly Watson)

IT’S YOUR ROUND

A big inter-band pub quiz of sorts, we’ll be grilling your faves one by one. Now brought to you via Zoom!

THIS MONTH: VIJI Where: At home in London. Drink: Oat milk latte.

General Knowledge

SPECIALIST SUBJECT: The OC

What is the name of the comic book that Zach and Seth create? Oh my god… I watched The OC in the first lockdown, it’s been two years! Fuck, I can’t remember. It’s called Atomic County. Oh yeah! Because Orange County!

What did Seth name his boat? Summer. It’s slightly longer… Summer Breeze? Yes!

What song is playing when Marissa dies? ‘Hallelujah’. Correct. Fun fact, it’s also Imogen Heap’s version. I remember when I rewatched it I was like, ‘thank fuck’. Marissa is so annoying!

What is the name of Summer’s favourite TV show? I have no idea. It’s The Valley. Of course!

What group sings the iconic OC theme song, ‘California’? Phantom Planet! And it’s a tune! Correct - and it is!

3/5

What nuts are used in marzipan? Almonds? Yes! I’m pumped, I can do this!

What is the capital city of Westeros in Game of Thrones? Fuck. Give me a minute, I’ve watched it all and I loved it. Oh, King’s Landing! Yep. I love that that’s general knowledge…

What is David Bowie’s real name? Starman? Ziggy Stardust? I actually really don’t know… It’s David Jones. I think he’s so much of a character, I’ve just never questioned it!

What are the five colours of the Olympic rings? This is gonna be a wild guess… Yellow, red, blue, green and black? That was a very good guess, you’re right!

Who wrote Dracula? I don’t know! The vampire in Transylvania? Fuck knows! It was Bram Stoker. I mean, I had no chance with that.

FINAL SCORE:

3/5

6/10

Verdict: “I’m very glad I now know David Bowie’s real name, and I’m going to start rewatching The OC again. It’s time.” 66 DIYMAG.COM

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DIY

23-24 April 2022

Various Venues, London E2 DIY & OVAL SPACE PRESENTS...

DIY

SAT 23rd APRIL

Various Venues, London E2

DIY

SUN 24th APRIL

MASTER PEACE in conversation with

in conversation with

Gimp mask construction & life advice with

in conversation with

CARO d CHRISSI DELILAH HOLLIDAY FRÄULEIN KEG LIME GARDEN MELLAH conversation MILOin CLARE PIGLET PRIMA with QUEEN REGRESSIVE LEFT ROSIE ALENA SCROUNGE SPOORT SWIM SCHOOL VIJI YAYA BEY

MASTER PEACE

in conversation with

Plus workshops, talks, DIY’s big charity raffle and more! TICKETS ON SALE NOW DAY:£27.50 WEEKEND:£45(+BF) diyalive.com

BABY DAVE BEIGE BANQUET CARO d CHRISSI DELILAH CHILLI JESSON DOG UNIT HOLLIDAY FRÄULEIN FAMOUS GROVE HUMAN INTEREST KEG LIME GARDEN MELLAH JESSICA WINTER LEGSS MALADY MILO CLARE PIGLET PRIMA QUEEN MISO EXTRA NUKULUK REGRESSIVE LEFT ROSIE ALENA PANIC SHACK SAM AKPRO SCROUNGE SPOORT SWIM SCHOOL SPRINTS VLURE VIJI YAYA BEY Plus workshops, talks, DIY’s big charity raffle and more! TICKETS ON SALE NOW DAY:£27.50 WEEKEND:£45(+BF)

diyalive.com

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