Peach Pit delights at Concorde 2

PEACH PIT

TO see one of your favourite bands for the first time is a feeling like no other, and mix that with the feeling of being at a gig for the first time since multiple lockdowns and restrictions over the years, and you have a highly anticipated gig. Standing in a crowd with people who love a band as much as I do was almost nostalgic. It had been so long since I had been to a gig like that- it was almost unfamiliar. Canadian indie-pop band Peach Pit were the perfect group to throw me back into gig life, a band I have loved since I was around seventeen years old. I was ecstatic to see live for the first time.

The air of Concorde 2 was filled with excitement and giddiness as we waited for the band to come onstage, impatiently waiting as their entrance song ‘Going Up The Country’ by Canned Heat began to blare out of the speakers; a song that sums up Peach Pit perfectly with its goofy nature that plasters a smile on one’s face. The atmosphere shifts as soon as Peach Pit appear. Gone were the giddy smiles and chats, immediately replaced with loud screams as the band went into their first song ‘Brian’s Movie’, a country-twang infused indie track from their sophomore album ‘You and Your Friends’. The atmosphere of the room is fuelled by the band themselves as they jump around, with rhythm guitarist and vocalist, Neil Smith, thrashing his long hair all over the place as he conducts his signature headbang dancing- guitarist, Chris Vanderkooy, was a highlight of the overall performance, however. His relationship with his audience is immense, always including them in moments of songs that are not specifically intended for singing, creating an incredibly interactive experience throughout the whole gig during his guitar solos by climbing onto barricades, throwing guitar picks into the crowd.

While the band’s onstage presence and energy were indeed off the scales, it is hard to say the same for the crowd. Vocal as they were, there was a lack of physical energy than expected from a Peach Pit concert. As a Northerner, who has a soft spot for energetic shows that include jumping around and moshing, it could be said that the crowd at Concorde 2 was somewhat lacklustre in terms of physical energy.

This does not mean, however, that the gig itself was disappointing, quite the opposite, I would say that this gig was one of the best I’d ever witnessed. With their nostalgic anthems such as self titled EP track ‘Peach Pit’, and their debut album’s singles ‘Drop the Guillotine’ and ‘Alrighty Aphrodite’ within their set, long-term fans were appropriately fed. Mix this with songs like ‘Give Up Baby Go’ from their most recent album ‘From 2 to 3’, released earlier this year, and the appropriate balance of slower songs such as ‘Everything About You’, and the result is a truly immense performance.

Peach Pit were a truly impressive band to witness live, to see one of my favourite bands that I’ve loved since I was a teenager was a genuine honour, and while the crowd’s energy was somewhat lacking, the gig overall was a true enjoyment. A true testament to how entertaining Peach Pit are as a band, and a unit to be reckoned with.

SAM FENDER SAM FENDER SAM FENDER SAM FENDER

at Brighton Center

A BAND OF GEORDIES! SONGS ABOUT ALDI!

WHEN in a sweaty venue, a crowd screams “ [We]Were Far Too Scared To Hit Him” but they “Would Hit Him In A Heartbeat Now!”- It could only be a Sam Fender gig. Fender has blown up quite a bit in the past year, what with the title track from his 2nd album Seventeen Going Under causing quite a bit of a stir on Tiktok and winning best Alternative/Rock act at the Brits- it’s fair to say he’s on his way to national icon status. Even after an emergency dental appointment (which he mentioned between songs, as well as stating he was still a bit out of it) he still managed to pull off one hell of a gig at the Brighton Centre.

The support act, Goat Girl, were a “stand and watch” sort of affair, but with swirly synths and titles like “Sad Cowboy” and “Jazz (In The Supermarket)” it didn’t make them any less intriguing.

Later, when Sam and his band bound onto the stage with the opener “Will We Talk” from his first album, they were met with high energy singalongs which carried on throughout the night with songs like “Saturday” and “Seventeen Going Under”. The standing pitch soon transformed into full on mosh pit mania for “Spice” and “Howdon Aldi Death Queue” (cue screams of “GET OFF THE METRO NOW!” in the strongest geordie accent you’ve ever heard) as they played back to back.

There were some mellow moments in the set too, songs such as “Dead Boys”, “Spit Of You” and the absolute sobfest of an album closer “The Dying

Words by Cerys Hubbard

Light” made an appearance on the setlist, providing an emotional gut punch (and pockets full of confetti) to the packed out arena. Despite being described as “The Little One” of the tour, it certainly didn’t feel like it.

The Setlist:

Will We Talk Getting Started Dead Boys Mantra Better Of Me The Borders Spice Howdon Aldi Death Queue Get You Down Spit Of You Play God The Leveller The Dying Light Saturday Seventeen Going Under Hypersonic Missiles

Credit: Nick Suchak

KID KAPICHI

20 MINUTES. A BRIGHTON BUS STOP. AND A “WORLD EXCLUSIVE” WITH BRITAIN’S BEST NEW PUNK BAND. YES, IT’S THE LONG-AWAITED INTERVIEW WITH HASTINGS’S HEAVYWEIGHTS KID KAPICHI. “ANYTHING GOES MATE”, THEY TELL BRIGHTON TEMPO.

Words by Ben Left

“TELL me what you’re wearing, so I can spot you when we come out”, says Kid Kapichi’s Jack Wilson over the phone. “A Sex Pistols t-shirt”, I reply. “Nice”, he responds knowingly. And so goes my first (not quite) in-person interaction with Kapichi’s snarling singer, who turns out to be anything but when he’s not behind a microphone. I’m waiting outside Chalk, usually one of Brighton’s top nightclubs, tonight providing the stage for Kid Kapichi to make their debut- and headline- appearance at renowned new music festival The Great Escape.

Tonight’s performance has been on the cards for a while, the band tell me. “We’ve waited a long time to do our Great Escape debut, we always said we’d wait for the right time to do it and this really feels like it you know”, explains guitarist Ben Beetham. “To be honest with you, we were booked to do it just before covid in a much, much smaller venue”, Wilson adds. “We lined up our dominoes’ in that time, you know what I mean?”. I do indeed. In the past two years of corona-induced lockdowns, Kid Kapichi have written, recorded and released their debut album This Time Next Year, reached number six in the official UK independent charts, attracted critical acclaim from publications including NME and Kerrang! , and enjoyed a very successful, allbut sold out UK tour. They started 2022 by releasing their latest breathtaking banger New England- a

furious rebuttal of the Nationality & Borders Bill, and everything it represents- and supporting Nothing K But Thieves across Europe, as well as a certain Liam Gallagher at the iconic Royal Albert Hall. Only last week (at the time of interview) they performed to crowds of nearly 1000 people at Camden’s historic Electric Ballroom, something they still haven’t quite got over. Everywhere they look, exciting opportunities are starting to arise. But, as the band reveal, it’s the result of 7 years’ worth of hard work, perfecting their craft both in and out of the studio. “It started when I was at college”, recalls Wilson as we settle into the conversation, sitting at an empty bus stop opposite Chalk. It’s the only quiet place we can find on a boiling Saturday afternoon, with all the pubs rammed due to some significant football match. “I had to do a gig, and I was like shit, how do I do that?” he remembers. “I knew George (MacDonald, drummer) cause I went to school with George”- “and me and Eddie (Lewis, bassist) played together when we were like 12 years old”, adds the aforementioned percussionist. “And then I knew Ben as well, from partying, and was like let’s do it sort of thing”, Wilson explains. And so, as the result of a college project, the most exciting punk four-piece since The Clash came to be. “The band hasn’t really been Kid Kapichi as people know it for that length of time, but us as a collective have been playing together since that college project… there’s been that connection for a long time”. It shows. The four of them are clearly firm friends, joking around between questions, looking relaxed and happy to be there. They laugh when I point out the benefits of having a band name no one else does: “That’s it, no one can pronounce it, and no one can spell it! Liam Gallagher literally called us Kid Apachi, I was like fair enough, you don’t correct Liam Gallagher”, smiles Wilson.” But where does the name come from, and does it mean anything? “At one of our first gigs there was this young boy that come up, he just kept talking to us, kept saying ‘Kapichi, Kapichi, Kapichi’. We were looking for a name at the time, and then the next day we just decided “Kid Kapichi, that’s a sick name for a band”, recalls Beetham. “Cool innit? Has no meaning but it’s a cool vibe. It came from the universe man.” If that last sentence sounds a bit hippie-ish, don’t fear, Kid Kapichi are ferocious, no-frills rockers whose songs are loud, fast and angry. But when I ask them whether they would describe themseves as punk, they’re not quite sure how to answer. “Do you know what it’s a fucking good question, cause I never know like, when I get asked ‘what’s your thing’, I feel like you just have to let everyone else decided what you are”, contemplates Wilson. “I would say at heart we’re punk, maybe that’s not the best way to describe how we sound but our attitude”, adds Lewis. “It’s a modern version of punk- you can get fucking rappers and grime artists that are punk, d’you know what I mean? It’s more an ethos and more an attitude”. The band are more certain about the importance of the social-political problems that they rally against when it comes to the success of bands like theirs. “Well, we said when it was the election, if the Conservatives got booted out we’d have nothing to write about, but there’s so much bollocks going on right now that it’s a never ending gold mine of shit to write about”, Wilson reveals. “I often think about that; what would we do if things were glorious? But