Please Please You Presents: Times New Viking / Banjo or Freakout / Missing Kids @ Basement Bar, York. 21st September 2009

Back to the Basement Bar for another quality line up brought to you by the Please Please You crew, this time we have Ohio noise/punk/lo-fi/indie band Times New Viking, one man shoegaze band Banjo or Freakout and Missing Kids who quite aptly I can’t find a thing about pre gig… Now I’ve seen TNV before on the Shred Yr Face tour in a big cavernous hall in Leeds and I really wasn’t impressed it was more of a sedate jangle than an all out invigorating noise fest like their recordings are, saying that I can’t listen to them on record either, to much compressed ear popping sounds. But in a smaller venue I’m hoping they win me over with enough fuzz we’ll see. Who I’m really looking forward to tonight is Banjo or Freakout who I’ve seen once before during a disasters HEALTH gig that ran so late I missed HEALTH as I had to get a train. Despite this Banjo or Freakout won me over with his shoegazy almost one man band set up, him playing keys and guitar with a guy from Gentle Friendly adding percussion in that so hip right now one drum floor tom way… so it’s brilliant to see them in town.

We ended up rolling in a little late so Missing Kids will have to remain a mystery for now unfortunately, but I heard reports that they were very good indeed. So Banjo or Freakout hit the stage with an actual drum kit and drummer this time as well as the floor tom, keys, samplers, loop peddles, guitar and bass all play by the multi-tasking-multi talented Mr Freakout. It was a quality set full of fuzzy shoegazing soundscapes carved out of loops and guitars fed through pedals. There was loads of drum machine work going on through samplers and pads as well as the live drummer. There was one track with super fast drum loops and proper fuzzy sounds on top that just killed it, if I knew the names of any of the songs of any of the bands tonight I would tell you... but dispite seeing both these bands live before I own none of their work. Banjo or Freakout played a hypnotising set and really impressed me, when the debut album drops I’m going to be all over it like a wet flannel.

As I’ve said above Times New Viking didn’t impress me on the Shred Yr Face tour at all but fuck me this was a whole new kettle of fish. They brimmed with energy and noise. The songs were fun and full of life, with a shambolic (in the best possible way) lo-fi, fuzzed out punk attitude. There were riffs and hooks a plenty that completely passed me by last time, it may well be the smaller basement room that held their sound tons better than the epic hall of the Irish Centre. When TNV’s songs hit a groove with the riffs and noise flying around they really killed it, some of the tracks were a bit lacking in groove for me to really get down to but the rapid fire quick succession way they fired through the tracks kept the energy levels high. I’ve no idea what the songs were about, as is their way with obscuring the vocals in fuzz and walls of noise, which they even did with most of the stage banter with the audience. Times new Viking really won me over tonight, I wasn’t ready for that.

http://www.myspace.com/pleasepleaseyoufun

http://www.myspace.com/basementcityscreen

http://www.myspace.com/timesnewviking

http://www.myspace.com/banjoorfreakout

Copy Haho / Lost From Atlas / The Spills @ Basement Bar, York. 3rd September 2009

The Basement Bar in York tonight has a nice line-up not only do we get two fine young bands from our region but the Big Scary Monster signed Copy Haho from Scotland too. Their EP Bred For Skills & Magic has to be up their for my proverbial best all out indie EP of the year award, if it existed anyway… Local lads Lost From Atlas supporting with their mathematical instrumental stylings, but more on them later I’ve got a review of their demo going up on this very blog soon. Before all that though the night opens with a band I’ve not seen before, Wakefield’s indie rockers The Spills.

I settle in with a pint to melodic sounds of The Spills, their sound is somewhere between an indie rock jangle and more a more rocky sound. The track ‘Oh My Days’ was a belter as was the final two of their set, the names of which escape me.

Lost From Atlas brought many fans with them and played a wicked set of tappy indie/post/rock instrumentals with that addictive clean sound that I kind of like to call gleamo. I’ll talk more about this lot at a later date as the demo is very good indeed and it deserves its own post. But they looked like they were enjoying themselves and it was a tight performance with plenty of locked grooves, chops and changes plus many hypnotic moments dispersed with some rock out sessions, I say rock out sessions you wont be getting a circle pit going here and not only because The Basement Bar hasn’t got the room for it. The more I see them the more I enjoy it.

Now for the main event on this quite night in York, Copy Haho as I’ve mentioned before have made one of my favourite all out indie rock ep’s of the year and these Scots easily lived up to that hype in the flesh. On record they have more of a jangle but here there was a raw edge to it all, with plenty of fuzz and noise. This may well have been the room’s fault, it was a bit of a mission to pick the vocals out some of the time but this didn’t detract from the performance for me there was to much energy in the sound to keep my head nodding. There were plenty of highlights including the fantastic ‘Puling Push Ups’, ‘Bad Blood’ and ‘Cutting Out The Bad’. Copy Haho came across as a right laugh as well as proper nice guys it was a pleasure to hear them, thoroughly enjoyable.

http://www.myspace.com/pleasepleaseyoufun

http://www.myspace.com/basementcityscreen

http://www.myspace.com/copyhaho

http://www.myspace.com/lostfromatlas

http://www.myspace.com/bumthespills