Recorded in Montreal, the album was produced by the band alongside Nygel Asselin, Daniel Legace, and Jim Eno. Its release will be surrounded by a handful of UK live shows including two performances at the Glastonbury Festival, and a headline show at Village Underground in London.

To celebrate the new release and tour we have a pair of tickets to the band’s Manchester show at the fantastic Deaf Institute, and not only that, but also a copy of the album to give away to one lucky reader. Just leave your name in the comments box below and we’ll put your name in our top hat and pick a winner on Sunday 29th of June.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c_yengUrkaU

Half Moon Run Live Dates

25th June – Village Underground, London

26th June – The Haunt, Brighton

28th June – Glastonbury Festival

29th June – Glastonbury Festival

2nd July – The Deaf Institute, Manchester

18th July – Latitude Festival, Suffolk

21st July – Longitude Festival, Dublin

18th August – Green Man Festival, Brecon Beacons

23rd August – Reading Festival, Reading

24th August – Leeds Festival, Leeds

‘Dark Eyes’ Tracklisting

Full Circle

Call Me In The Afternoon

No More Losing The War

She Wants To Know

Need It, Give Up

Judgement

Unofferable

Drug You

Nerve

Fire Escape

21 Gun Salute

www.halfmoonrun.com

Thrill Jockey Labelmate Dan Friel will be supporting on all UK dates as well, bringing his unique blend of hyper-kinetic electronic pop to our ears.

If this news doesn’t whet your appetite, then just watch the incredible video of Brian playing in his attic and doing what he does best… beating the hell out of his drum-kit (and adding to his broken drumstick collection!).

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YxSi4a0Ygk8

BLACK PUS EUROPEAN DATES:

Wed Sep 18th Amsterdam, The Netherlands – OCCII

Thu Sep 19th Tilburg, The Netherlands – Extase (Incubate Festival)

Fri Sep 20th Bristol, UK – Exchange  w/ support from Dan Friel

Sat Sep 21st Birmingham, UK – Wagon & Horses w/ support from Dan Friel

Sun Sep 22nd Leeds, UK – Brudenell Social Club  w/ support from Dan Friel

Mon Sep 23rd London, UK – Tufnell Park Dome w/ support from Dan Friel

Wed Sep 25th Hamburg, Germany – Hafenklang

Fri Sep 27th Oslo, Norway – Revolver

Sun Sep 29th Copenhagen, Denmark – Jazzhouse

Tue Oct 1st Berlin, Germany – Urban Spree

Wed  Oct 2nd Prague, Czech Republic – Klub 007

Thu Oct 3rd Graz, Austria – Forum Stadtpark

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PELmTI9DiEs

Ores and Minerals is a sprawling eccentric opus, self produced by the band this summer in various makeshift Hackney, UK studios.

The album draws from a much broader palette than the band’s debut; utilizing repetitive loops and samples, playing up a rhythm section that could walk into any recording session by The Fall and feel comfortable, honing an expansive loose guitar sound and all the while retaining that unmistakable knack with melody. It’s a really exciting and refreshingly original record.

Founding member Mike Lindsey has described this album saying, “It’s our sci-fi folk rock album”, which, although it may sound peculiar, is a fair assessment. The level of skill and variety of sounds and instruments allows Turbines to meander from one genre to another. Combining electro, pop, chillout, acoustic with vocal harmonies that are close to a whisper. It ranges from being beautifully simplistic to complexities that many bands will never master.

The opening track ‘Once’ is sweet and upbeat despite the lyrics, “Sing before your lifetime’s over”. It is presented in such a way that there is nothing sad or no feeling of loss. Instead, it evokes live life to the full feelings.

‘Trip Trap’ makes use of some really unique sounds and is close to being a lullaby or a playground rhyme. It has that ‘plinky plonky’, borderline cheesy sound to the verses after its subdued electro beginnings.

Track seven, ‘So Far From Here’, is a stand out track. It is beautiful, ducking and diving between genres, tempos, instrumentation, always keeping you guessing, wondering where it will go next. Like watching a story unravel on the screen in front of you, this is a flipbook of storyline. The vocals fit together perfectly, like they were one voice, made for each other. The synergy between every layer is fantastic.

They have created an experimental album, yet it has more direction, ambition and focus then most. It’s as if they knew where they wanted to end up, but didn’t plan the route there resulting in a spontaneous journey through landscapes filled with guitars, synths and whispers.

Listening to this album reminds me of a children’s story book. If you fell asleep to this your dreams would be full of magic and wonder. This could quite easily have been a self-indulgent, artsy album, but I feel Tunng are walking on the right side of that thin line. It’s happy, mature, intelligent and accessible. It makes for a great listen, especially when the sun is shining.

Other than two London dates for mid-July, Tunng will be out on tour in October this year. 

Release Date 17/06/2013 (Full Time Hobby)

Maybe it’s the three day recovery from Parklife Weekender, but inside I hardly feel top for tonight’s Fresh & Onlys gig, a band who have been on my list of who to see live for quite a while now…so I have to power through. And is it me or has Soup Kitchen done a little… rearranging? I’ll say it’s probably all for the better this place has a mini makeover. Hardly recognizing which venue I’m in, the hazy basement is full of, let’s just say, my kind of people. We walk in halfway through a set by Sex Hands, a band I’ve only just been introduced to and they are absolutely slaying it on stage. Having not given myself enough time to catch their whole set, you can guarantee a full report for July 6th’s support with Temple Songs at Band On The Wall.

“We’re from San Francisco, California, your brother city. I mean, sister city?” says Fresh & Onlys frontman Tim Cohen from the stage as he declares “If you be the girl, I’ll be the boy”. Whatever that innuendo that means, it strikes a chord with this humble Wednesday night crowd and earns a few laughs. The Fresh & Onlys tip off their set with the beachy ‘20 Days and 20 Nights’ and sugar coated pop single ‘Yes Or No’, both tunes plucked from the track list of their newest effort Long Slow Dance.

Songs dedicated to the babes of California like the très romantique ‘Dream Girls’ has Cohen batting his eyelashes and swaying his guitar like a young pup in love, while the  introduction to the drum heavy ‘Hummingbird’ involves a lengthy little chat to the crowd about the joys of living in the country.  From the first few songs of the set, it is evident that The Fresh & Onlys have swept the dirt from their old sound under the rug and since cleaned up from the infectious west coast rangler album Grey-Eyed Girls. And although tonight the band are crutching heavily on their new album, they still find a way to unravel a few favourite tracks from 2010’s Play It Strange, playing both ‘Until The End Of Time’ and ‘Fascinated’. Surfing through a healthy thirteen song set, the audience picks up on the crooning vocals in the effortlessly produced ‘Presence Of Mind’ which border closely to Stephin Merritt of The Magnetic Fields family. I have to say, I feel at home with fellow North American West-Coasters around – they all say “man” and “dude” as much as I do and for once, I’m not the odd one out. God Bless America, yeah? Thought so.

Musically, The Fresh & Onlys deliver that familiar warm and cosy garage rock  that has been blooming like wildflowers throughout California for decades. I’ve pegged the bubblegum burst of ‘Euphoria’ as one of their stronger songs of the night, as it’s that perfect type of honest romantic punk rock at best. A handful of tonight’s tracks off  Long Slow Dance are more on the mainstream side of garage rock – still catchy, just more fine tuned than some of their hits like ‘Waterfall’ and ‘Summer Of Love’, a ballad which might have added a well needed ray of sunshine on Manchester tonight. All in all, I say we could use a few more California boys in the UK, wouldn’t you say?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iWUnUGXJqn4

Jay Taylor, Manchester
Director, Classic Slum promotions | Gig booker, The Ruby Lounge | Ex-Musician | Lovely chap
RECENT GIGS: Marnie Stern, Liam Frost, The Besnard Lakes, Terakaft, Come, Chrysta Bell
THE WAVE: A tried and tested, no-nonsense guide for new bands & budding promoters; Manchester’s musical offer; gig etiquette; that Simon Cowell guy and why what’s next for Classic Slum doesn’t include a bowling alley, but a post-punk, supergroup.

THE BEGINNINGS
I was a professional musician for a while. When that proved an unreliable source of income, you have a choice; either get any job or you find something in the secondary or tertiary circle about being a musician.
I paid attention when I was a musician; I understood what a press officer did, how studios, publishers, managements, agencies and promoters worked, so I did a bunch of those things. I wrote about music, recorded a few bands, promoted a bit. Then slowly but surely, one rose to the surface and that was putting on rock and roll bands.

MANCHESTER MUSIC CITY

The transformation of Manchester’s musical landscape over the last 10 years
The big change is more venues. I took over running Night & Day in 2002; there weren’t many small venues. There was Roadhouse, Star & Garter, The Retro Bar…Now, you’ve got The Deaf Institute, Soup Kitchen and all those other places; kind-of copying Night & Day’s template. Night & Day should be given credit for showing how great a small rock and roll venue can be. It’s structured brilliantly, even though it was chaotic and weird. I loved working there.
Not only are there more venues, there’s more people putting shows on in spaces that weren’t traditionally venues, shows in churches, cafes, basements… If something won’t fit here [The Ruby Lounge], the agent or management want something different or there’s something here in the diary already, we’d rather put it on somewhere else. Most things in other venues tend to be what we really want to put on.

The city’s music venues
We’re really spoilt.  You can play a tiny little shop and right at the other end, you’ve got the City of Manchester stadium.
Venue’s? It’s just a bunch of bricks. The acts that play are what’s going to draw people, it’s not a bar, it’s a place that hosts things. It’s not about décor, it’s a utilitarian space with a thing at one end and hopefully, that thing’s going to be magical. The thing on stage is the main thing, you should just be glued to it, it doesn’t really matter how great the drapes are.

The gaps in Manchester’s musical offering
We’ve got places for emerging bands to play, but we haven’t always had the amount of space for them to rehearse. It needs someone who wants to do it. But what do you get, loads of bands paying 50 quid for two hours? Hats off to those people who persevere with those places.

SO YOU WANT TO BE A PROMOTER…

The realities of life as a Promoter
I’m sure that there’s plenty of people who like to romanticise their promoter role, they like their brand as big as the name of the bands on their posters. You’re an administrator; let’s make no bones about it.  The run up is poster printing, cost projections, chasing press, making sure national ads have gone in, organising ladder ads, Facebook ads. But it’s to an end, and if you care about the end, you crack on.
By the time you get to the show, ideally all the work’s done and you are reaping the cultural benefits, the excitement of it and hopefully the financial benefits.

Advice for new Promoters on the block
Start off really small, find a space that works, put on a friend’s band that you care about and maybe co-promote with those bands. Maybe not even use venues; find some interesting spaces, learn as you go along. Ask questions, pester people. If a young promoter wants to come and sit down with me, yeah, come round here, it doesn’t bother me, it’s not a secret.

Make sure that you are on top of the finances. Don’t just hope that enough people are going to turn up on the door to pay for the venue, the band, money you owe other people, posters and yourself. It’s better to have a successful night that wipes its face, then over pitch yourself.

Pitching for a gig
There’s a lot of people promoting in Manchester. You’re not always aware that there are other people pitching for things. So, that comes down to how you sell what you’re going to do to the agent. Vagaries about how that job’s done are going to start to disappear when you start talking numbers. Money is going to be the thing that decides it.

How the internet changed how the Promoter job’s done
It’s much easier. You can trace how something’s working. It is data that you can see which of things you are paying for is working. Back then, you assumed by ticket sales. But it’s much more of a promoter being an administrator, administrating that Twitter feed, administrating the email databases…
It’s also cheaper, it used to be really expensive, you were using stamps, you had to advertise in papers more often…

How the web’s changing how musicians get the word out
The whole digital thing has made things easier for bands with no money to contact venues, to send them music and information. It’s used to be poor bands burning CD’s, putting it in an envelope and sticking a stamp on it and doing it over and over.
Everyone sneers at MySpace, but it was dream for me. I was getting 30-40 CD’s some days. It was a lot of work going through these. There was this thing that some 16 year old didn’t have to spend money on, it was a free website. The moment MySpace appeared, all those CD’s just vanished. Good riddance to them.

The career-advisor side of being a Promoter
The bands that are just starting out, who want to support someone, or just want a gesture of faith from a promoter, those people ask what you think and you tell them.
I tend to be pretty encouraging. The fact that someone’s formed a band, that has rehearsed and created something, whatever the quality of it, and whatever I think…that’s a brilliant thing in itself. I was a musician; I know how good it feels to be in a band, to do shows and to be part of that energy exchange.

Being nice to newcomers and that bloke from XFactor
You get sent things that aren’t ready, terrible, out of tune, ill prepared, derivative…but I’m never going to be snooty about it. I think all those people give a shit. If they didn’t, they wouldn’t be sending it out. It would be pretty mean spirited to give those people a hard time.
It’s like a small version of Simon Cowell. Those people give a shit enough to queue up all day long, be put in front of these millionaires and a bunch of cameras. Those people, however misguided, give a shit. My sympathies with those competitions, is entirely with the contestants, not that fucko at the table. He’s not an enthusiast. If you’re into music, the arts and culture you’re an enthusiast. He seems like he doesn’t give a shit about anything that’s got beauty.

The televised Fast Track to Fame vs the Conventional Path
I’m not sniffy about it. It’s as valid a route as the traditional route which is as perilous and fraught. You may end up in an office, in front of a Senior Exec having the shit ripped out of you, or your demo, I don’t think they are that dissimilar. It does imply that the rock and roll world is more pure and caring and has a nurturing approach to young bands and it’s not the case.
I’m not buying that ‘pop world – evil’ / ‘indie world – pure’ because it’s bullshit. It’s just as aggressive and just as horrible and full of just as many horrible fuckers like Simon Cowell.

ADVICE FOR UP & COMING MUSICAL SUPERSTARS

How to secure that hallowed gig
Make sure that your art, is as good as you can possibly make it and persevere. I don’t think you should play week in, week out. It’s better to do one great show than 10 shit ones. Avoid those four-band, local showcase bills like the plague. You’re with three other bands that don’t sound anything like you and no-one cares about. A promoter will say ‘you’re going to be playing to ¾ of a crowd that aren’t your own’. It’s not the case; everyone’s fan base turns up, watches their friends and fucks off again. It’s better to hold out and if you can’t find anything from a promoter, do it yourself.

Win new fans at your gigs…
Make use of the people there. Don’t go and sit in the dressing room. If you are a musician, you’re a communicator. It’s supposed to be this thing that goes backwards and forwards, a conversation. Why would you not want to, after the show, carry on that conversation?
If you haven’t got merchandise, wander around with a clipboard going ‘Can I have your email address?’ Just hustle. Because down the road there’s going to be someone hustling harder.

…Then build up a fan base beyond your own doorsteps
Don’t tour until you are ready and create a buzz in your home town.

“The buzz” according to Jay…
A&R people phone me and ask ‘What’s happening? What’s cool?’ If there’s good news about a band in Manchester, that news will get to London way quicker than they can. What’s the point in doing ten dates, dotted around the country, six or seven of which will be utterly soul destroying; no-one will be there, [they’ll be] bad pay, bad accommodation, onerous deals…
If you get to the point where you can pull 300 people in your hometown and everyone’s getting excited about, someone, somewhere is going to go ‘Fucking hell, what’s happening in Manchester?’ I don’t think you need to keep going round the cities.

Get on tour without an Agent or Promoter
If you are going to tour and haven’t got anyone to book you, find bands around the country that you can gig swap with. I have friends who just did a four band bill tour. The basis was the four cities that the bands were from. It worked and it wiped its face, it made money.

GIG GOERS, LISTEN UP

Audience members, take note; Support the Support please.
Culturally people don’t like to turn up to see support band, because people are fucking stupid about when you are supposed to turn up to a show. I saw Nirvana support people; it was a good idea to turn up early that day.
I always want to get in dead early to see everything. I never understood that mind-set of people turning up to gig at 9.25, when the headline act’s on a 9.30. Some support bands are terrible. Sometimes, I saw things that were miles better than the headliners.

THE FUTURE

Upcoming Classic Slum greatness…
Melt Yourself Down, they’re my favourite band in the UK at the moment. They are like an indie world music band, but fast. They sound like one of those post-punk bands, there’s some electronica in there as well. They have a guy from Transglobal Underground, from Zun Zun Egui, from PolarBear … it’s like a ‘super-group’ really, but not as shit as the word super-group. They are just sensational.

Plans to expand the Classic Slum empire: burger joints, bowling alleys….perhaps.
Do you mean a bowling alley in the same way Manchester invented the burger? It’s almost like there weren’t burgers before gourmet burgers. I hate the idea of high-end bowling, it’s a working class pastime bowling. To make it some kind of highfalutin pastime, cocktails and stuff… seems mental to me. I’d rather go to Parrs Wood.

http://ClassicSlum.tumblr.com
www.The RubyLounge.com

With over 40,000 tickets sold, Parklife’s fourth year is off to a big headed start. Headlining acts such as Plan B, Example, Disclosure, TNGHT and Johnny Marr have certainly helped ticket sales sore to new heights, bringing an official start to the British summer in style..but can the festival live up to its high expectations with a new venue and an even bigger crowd? Massive tents will soak in hoards of young and impressionable festival goers during the remaining days of a week- long Manchester heat wave so let’s see how it all pans out…

Day one kicks off in an hour-long queue on Miller street to collect prepaid tickets for the Parklife coach. Wrapping itself around the buildings on the edge of the Northern Quarter, hundreds of Coachella inspired festival enthusiasts are pre-drinking on the pavement, eagerly waiting to grab their pink wristbands and get this show on the road. I ask a few Parklifers who they are giddy about watching since there seems to be so many different acts on over the weekend: “I’m excited to watch The Maccabees because I’ve been listening to them a lot lately. Plan B too – he’s a good rapper mixing jazz and R&B and a good singer surprisingly” says Michael Johnson with a cheeky grin on his face. And who is festival newcomer Bob Diggle looking forward to? “I’m excited to see Disclosure later tonight and also Danny Brown tomorrow. I’ve never been to Parklife but I’ve been to Warehouse Project where there’s always a really good vibe with some good acts on. It’s the sort of thing where even if you haven’t heard of any of the acts you can still have a really good time.”

Arrival to Heaton Park involves yet another massive queue, which for me turns out to be the wrong area for press, making me walk half way around the lake in the blistering heat. After losing my mates for a solid two hours in an absolute dead zone for network signal, I trudge around the park to get into that “festival mood”. Kicked up dust, wellies, sun burns, dead cider bottles and ultra skanky show-your-ass-cheeks shorts are all I can see so far, and I can tell in the distance that the tents are already jam packed with crowds. Somewhere Baauer is without a doubt performing his trademark ‘Harlem Shake’ while The Temper Trap grab a half-baked crowd at the Main Stage with their one hit wonder ‘Sweet Disposition.’ Third year in a row Parklifer Alexandra Wrigley tells me what she loves most about this festival so far: “Everyone is here for the same reasons. They just want to have a really good time and party. It’s a really good hedonistic type of atmosphere.” “It’s great, people are coming together for more than one genre” Michael Pattison chimes in.

All in all, Saturday afternoon has been a haze and plus, there ought to be a Lost and Found box for missing friends.  It’s too hot to walk around and the line ups for everything have been absolutely aggravating. The festival only begins to pick up during Four Tet, followed by headline act Disclosure in which the reception from fans is top. “I can’t get over it,” says Michael Pattison, “It brought the whole tent together and everyone was dancing, hugging and just going mad.” I wondered how the album compared to the live set and if he pulled it off, “It matched the album well but it was just more loud and raw and almost better than record.”

For those who stayed up all night at Parklife’s after parties which were scattered around various venues in Manchester, Sunday begins on a sluggish note. Thousands of hangovers and rosy shoulders have labeled round 2 as the almighty ‘chill-out day’. Arrival at the festival just after 4pm sees us waltz into Benga in The Ape Tent where one fan isn’t impressed with an act. “I had pretty high expectations” says Trevor Biermann, a fan who has travelled from Wigan for the weekend’s festival. “I thought it was going to be  live. It was a basic DJ set and he played Daniel Bedingfield which just killed it. It just didn’t fit in at all for me personally.” And what could he have done different, I wondered?  “I think he could have started off with a few of his own tracks to get everyone going and then go into a few better ones…”

Despite a disappointing start to the day for some, Sunday’s highlight includes a blow out set from guitarist Johnny Marr in an effort that surprises even the oldest of Smiths fans. New tracks such as ‘The Messenger’ and ‘New Town Velocity’ give off that old school Marr flavour, twisting out that vintage zest with a handful of classic Smiths tunes. Fans of all ages sing along to ‘There Is A Light That Never Goes Out’, the lyrics of “If a double decker bus crashes into us” dripping off their tongues in awe of this Manc in the flesh. It all comes to the most perfectly placed close as Marr dedicates ‘How Soon Is Now’ to his hometown, erupting the crowd into one big ‘lighters up’ breath of fresh air sing-a-long. It is all too much to handle, thinking I’d never get to experience one of my favourite Smiths tunes live, by any member of the band. “That was absolutely fantastic” one Marr fan shouts after the gig. “I haven’t seen a crowd get that excited all weekend.”

Trecking towards trap heroes TNGHT’s set, the tent swells up faster than beer refills as the audience is ready to end the weekend on a high note (cough, no pun intended). Mad tracks like ‘Bugg’n’ and the quirky snatches of ‘Goooo’ kick off the end of a fab weekend, with the dropping bass in Hudson Mohawke’s solo effort ‘Chimes’ making everyone aware who owns the night.

Sunday being arguably the better of the two days, I leave Parklife in good spirits, and glad that I took a chance on a festival I knew nothing about and music I had never heard.
Considering the festival has grown in size since years previous, I’m disappointed that I couldn’t see everything. It’s just not possible though – you’re being torn in different directions by your friends who have such different tastes in music. You can’t see everyone. Jess Thompson had something to say about the festival’s big change from Platt Fields to the massive Heaton Park. “I think the whole fun of it last year was that you could walk to everything easily because it was a lot smaller and there weren’t as many people – it’s definitely over sold this year and I don’t think that I’d come back again”. Was it really that bad, I ask? “I’ve had fun with my friends and stuff but I just think for me it’s time for a new festival.”

Manchester had it good this weekend. A beautiful two days full of music, friends, alcohol and memories. Would I go back? Sure. But next time, I’ll be a little more prepared. For those of you intrigued to check out Parklife 2014, here’s some advice from some of our readers:

“Pre-book your coach tickets! Saves you at least a fiver and the stress of wondering if you’ll get a ticket. Also, pre-book a taxi home. It was hell trying to get home after midnight” – Brit Jean

“Set off early so you don’t have to queue up for the bus, and don’t go to the main bar – go to the bars in the tents because they’re less crowded” – Bob Diggle

“Less people, more staff and don’t have Example playing” – Michael Pattison

“Bring baby wipes, an extra pair of socks incase it rains and also…. you can fit half a litre of any alcohol into a full size pack of Capri Sun” – Alexandra Wrigley

There you have it folks. You heard it here first.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ydZUb8q6KIs

Featured photograph by Brit Jean, article photography by David McFarlane. For more photos from Parklife 2013 check out http://dmcfphotography.com/sets/30/

“This is the first time I’ve played the Night & Day while it’s still been day,” jokes Glass Ankle frontman, Greg Jackson, in what turns out to be the highlight of the duo’s set.

Greg’s clipped vocals aren’t a million miles away from Paul Heaton’s, but as each song competes with the last in a quest to be the most anodyne of the evening, this plus point is rendered almost null and void. In their defence, they are a member down, with holidaying percussionist Chika being temporarily replaced by a few unobtrusive whooshes of a synth, but even the otherwise inanimate giant moose head above the sound desk lets out a distracted huff long before the end.

Bundled up in a sweatshirt at least three sizes too big for him, Scriber (aka, Cardiff-based songsmith, Joshua Price) has the appearance of a girl lounging around the house in her boyfriend’s favourite top. He positions himself at 90º to the hardy few in the audience, accompanied by a guitar, laptop and a quartet of red bike lights propped up by the monitors; a lovely, simple touch which adds more ambience than a few LEDs have any earthly right to.

His weary croak on ‘Bethlehem’ sets the tone for a stark, honest performance which lies somewhere between Dan Michaelson and Sam Amidon, and carries right the way through to closer, ‘Thunder’, complete with it’s suitably stormy sound effects.

Also from the Welsh capital, Among Brothers have the rare luxury of plenty of room for their seven-strong horde in the Night & Day’s spacious environs, including Lewis Griffith’s whopper of a tenor trombone, although he sensibly tucks himself out of harm’s way to the left.

A barrage of ideas marry with the relentless energy of frontman, Alex Comana to produce vivid offspring like ‘I Do Not Believe’, new single ‘Jollica’, and ‘Keep’, which inescapably brings to mind Anathallo at their hand-clapping, foot-stomping, thigh-slapping best.

Their seemingly limitless invention and sheer quality of the material deserves a much bigger crowd, international adulation even – ‘Sam, Isaiah And The Wolf’ sends a greater shudder down your spine than being forced to watch someone repeatedly munch on a woolly jumper -  yet as things stand, the promoter paid them while they were still on stage in Glasgow last night. Regardless of the numbers, Among Brothers are a triumph.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RJpbuj7keM0

So without further ado, let’s crack on with another introduction, in which Silent Radio’s Simon Poole recommends THE WATCHMAKERS for your audible delectation.

*****

I remember these guys getting a lot of press space and air-play when they released their debut Growing Pains in late 2010. They convinced me to fork out a tenner to go and see them on a couple of occasions, and I thought they w, eren’t half bad, if a little unoriginal, but still a decent soundtrack for a boozy night out. Three years, however, is a long time nowadays for a band trying to break through, and they may have missed a chance.

Nature Nurture starts off with ‘Arizona Waiting’, a good if not unspectacular opener with the customary soft/loud dynamics and key change break down. Second song ‘Derail’ has a catchy melody and fits right into the 90s sound that the band seems to want to portray. The only down point on the track is that, when it slows down for a second, Matt should hold that tempo for a while longer as my heart was almost captured; I began to feel his pain as he kept singing, “You’re only bringing me down”.

‘Peninsula’ brings the rock and roll and distorted vocals back to the fore. Foo Fighters/Nirvana would be a lazy comparison, but that’s exactly what these guys preach, the loud soft/dynamics that soundtracked many lives throughout the 90s and early noughties. ‘Heather’ is an ode to a heart breaker, while ‘Summer Girl’ provides us with lines like, “Yeah I’ve been at work, I’ve been working all day, working all day so I can get paid, I met a girl” etc etc, which sums up the lyrical extent of the album – Matt and co prefer to speak using Drop D tunings and muted power chords.

‘White T-shirt and Jeans’ has a whiff of Weezer and customary feedback, while ‘The Way We Came’ is an acoustic slow burner with a nice interlude. Matt invites the listener to go back the way they came where we made a pact to stay the same. ‘Start Again’ packs a few punches and will get the kids bouncing around, as will closer and title track ‘Nature Nurture’ with its simple and effect chorus, which sees Matt screaming out “Nature Nurture” continuously. The album comes to an abrupt stop after 30 seconds of the sound of Mike banging away by himself.

They do what they do pretty well, and if you’re into that sound then these guys will certainly float your boat. After supporting the likes of Feeder and Cage The Elephant following the release of Growing Pains, I can’t see past the notion that they will continue to be a more than decent support band. But, unless they bring more to their game, they will struggle to fill that headlining spot.

Release Date 17/06/2013 (So Recordings)