Sky Larkin + Ace Bushy Striptease + Lime, Hare & Hounds, Birmingham 08/04/14
It’s early and Lime kick off with a short but straight-to-the-heart-of-it set. This three piece wear their sound on their sleeve, and with a certain raucousness reminiscent of It’s a Shame About Ray era Lemonheads, thrash out a pretty raw and unrelenting set in under half an hour. These guys definitely sound stronger when all instruments and dual vocals work together, as some solo work was left wanting. A kind nonchalance underpins the delivery of each song, which is as intriguing as it is noncommittal.
Cutesy and charming, Ace Bushy Striptease look and sound as though they’ve landed straight from an episode of Portlandia; a band whose self-awareness is channeled through their unruly song structures, preferring frenetic vingettes over the familiar verse-chorus-verse. Though they’re missing a member this evening, their lo-fi aesthetic and intermittent shouts from complimentary male and female vocals sit well with the JoFo and Los Campesinos! scene, yet without the acerbic bite and dry wit of the former.
Sky Larkin seem fresh and ready as they begin to promote their latest album Motto (Wichita Records, 2013). They’re playing seven more shows over the next ten days and are eager to set a precedent. The band possesses an enviable, effortless cool, which really helps one focus on the introspective nature of their music. There’s also a bleakness and despondency running through the veins of their work; a kind of matter of factness behind the layers of joy (which is only exemplified in an unexpected but completely apt version of X-Ray Spex’ ‘The Day the World Turned Day-Glo’). Their live sound may draw some vague comparison to bands like Pretty Girls Make Graves or even Suede with North-of-England sensibilities, yet any such likeness is quickly forgotten when you really take in the wholly original voice that Sky Larkin have shaped for themselves. Songs like ‘Treasury’, ‘Matador’, and ‘Frozen Summer’ really evidence their ability to write music which is both intimate and bare, yet so rich and full of complexities too. With episodic song structures; delicate and sublime vocals; and choral guitar sounds that sound as though it were being amplified from the bottom of a distant well, Sky Larkin blend vulnerability with all the intensity and brooding of the North’s post-punk scene. Go and experience this band live to hear the sheer weight of their album. You won’t be disappointed.
