I’m in the middle of the floor, chatting to a slightly overweight guy with a beard. We’re surrounded by a veritable mountain of musical equipment, the majority of which is drums. The guy’s positively bubbling with enthusiasm and doesn’t seem remotely self-conscious despite the fact he’s wearing only his boxer shorts, and it’s only later that this strikes me as remotely strange.
There’s a very good reason for this: the guy I’m chatting to is ‘Sly’ (or Matt), and his performance art / improv act, the puntastically-named Sly and the Family Drone have just wrought havoc at the Brudenell in Leeds. Usually a three-piece, the fact their drummer was unable to make it wasn’t going to be an obstacle to them blowing minds and speakers as a two-piece. Performing slap in the middle of the room, they crank out dirty analogue tape noise while Sly, mic on mouth yells wordlessly into an infinite echo and bashes drums at random.
As the set progresses, drums are dragged to various points of the venue and distributed amongst the audience members, who bang along to, er, the beat of their own drum. Each time he re-emerges, Sly has one less garment of clothing on his person, and the set culminates with him atop their precariously-rigged speaker stack frantically wringing every last drop of feedback from their portable mixer in just his undercrackers.
Sonically, comparisons to Throbbing Gristle and Prurient aren’t entirely out of place, and sit alongside their own cited reference points which include Black Dice, Shit & Shine and Crash Worship . It’s the performance element that really makes them a one-off, the audience participation being pleasurable and entertaining, awkward and confrontational all at the same time. Bewildering and brilliant: a must-see act if ever there was one.
Having been immediately hooked by the brace of brilliant singles Post War Glamour Girls released last year, I was revved up for seeing them live, and will admit that I’d set my expectations high. The first thing that strikes me about seeing the band in the flesh (so to speak: unlike Sly they’re all fully clothed) is how young they are, which throws the accomplished sound of their releases to date into even sharper relief. They’re also on the geekier side of unremarkable to look at, their unassuming appearance belying their offbeat and abrasively-edged sonic stylings.
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James begins with an apology of sorts, commenting that Post War Glamour Girls would seem pretty middle of the road in comparison to the opening act. Fortunately, as they very quickly proved, that’s one thing they could never be. Hell, they open the set with ‘Spitting Pearls’. It’s a bold move. For any other band it would have been a serious case of shooting their load and ensuring the rest of the set could only disappoint. The delicate chiming subtlety soon gives way to an explosive crescendo, James’ howling creosote-gargling vocal sounds like Tom Waits with someone stamping on his feet.
But these guys have a whole set bursting with songs of equal quality. Alice’s sweetly melodic vocals provide the perfect counterpoint to James’ brawling bottom-of-the-boots hollering, and even the chaotic blasts of noise where the two guitars duel for supremacy which punctuate the softer sections are pinned together with solid percussion and low-slung strolling basslines. ‘Suburban Barbarian’ and ‘Ode to Harry Dean’ are dispensed with the utmost proficiency and an infectious energy alongside new material, some of which is scheduled to appear on an EP very soon. They close with a ripping ‘Anchor’.
There’s no way Gannets can top the two acts I’ve seen so I decide to leave on a high. Bands don’t come much hotter – or cooler – than Post War Glamour Girls. They’re not only spitting pearls, but generally spilling with an embarrassment of riches, and 2012 could well be their year.
Post War Glamour Girls Online
Sly & the Family Drone Online
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