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By Jon Milton In the latest in our series of interviews with new and emerging artists about their plans for 2021, I talk to two bands who released their debut EP’s last year. Document’s first single ‘Pity’ was released just under a year ago and was one of our top 5 tracks of the year. The similarly impressive ‘A Camera Wanders All Night’ EP followed in March, before the pandemic and lockdown abruptly halted their progress. The Palpitations released their debut EP ‘Feed the Poor, Eat the Rich’ in June 2020. Given that the band work as Doctors, it will come as no big surprise that their music largely had to take a back seat last year, as they concentrated on saving lives. Not only saving the lives of their patients either – bassist Nishant (who I interviewed below for the band) and his wife also launched a successful crowdfunded campaign to get the government to take accountability and protect NHS workers which resulted in them revoking the Acute Shortages Guidance which previously meant that healthcare workers were encouraged to reuse PPE, thereby significantly increasing the risk of transmission. Document What were your highlight(s) of 2020? The biggest highlight for me was finally releasing the EP after what seemed like an eternity of having those songs written and ready to go. In terms of the gigging front, we managed to get in our first show down in London just before this all kicked off, which happened to be a great show. Other than that, I think I speak on behalf of the world when I can say that it was a bleak and restless year that needs to be quickly forgotten about.  Photo by Phoebe Fox When can we expect to hear new music from you in 2021, in digital and physical formats? I would be lying if I said an exact date but we are definitely planning to release more on a regular basis. We have wanted to get in a studio early this year but so far it seems defined by the uncertainty of the times unfortunately. Pandemic permitting, what gigs have you got lined up? We have a socially distanced show organised for our debut in Blackpool on the 20th March and the ever changing date of our Manchester Headline. It's now at Night and Day Cafe on the 8th August, fingers crossed everything may have a touch more normality. Any festival appearances planned? We currently have nothing planned in terms of festivals but I can safely say we would love to be playing all we can. Nothing screams more of a laugh than getting drunk in a field playing and watching bands. What are your hopes for the band in 2021? World domination is always a hope I keep in the back of my mind. Honestly, just to be able to tour around the UK and although increasingly less possible, the EU. I think as a band we want to release more and explore a rather different musical path to bring us away from the old sound and make something completely new. Tragically, at the end of 2020, our drummer Will's dad Rob sadly lost his battle to VEXAS syndrome, a newly discovered disease. There is currently no cure and very little research into the illness, which means many others are suffering in silence. In honour of Rob, who was one of Documents’ number 1 fans from the start, we have decided to release a limited edition t-shirt, which features the lyrics to Rob’s favourite Document song, ‘Pity’. All proceedings will be going straight to Ward 19 at the Royal Victoria Infirmary, who are currently fronting vital research into the VEXAS syndrome. Link below: https://everpress.com/document-for-vexas-charity  The Palpitations What were your highlight(s) of 2020? My first child, the cutest baby girl called Radhika, was born in July 2020. She's kept me great company throughout, she's been our beacon of hope. Radhika (meaning: 'seeker of justice') is developing into a really fun and playful human being, after having been pretty boring for the first three months or so (apols if you're reading this in 2049, Radhika, but by your own admission you will admit that between nappy-changing and crying, you weren't great banter). I have high hopes that her first word will be a swear word. It would be a rare action that makes her mum indescribably angry, while providing me with a laugh that will surely see me through the pandemic. I'm watching plenty of The Thick Of It. Helps broaden her vocabulary... Also, forcing Matt Hancock to improve PPE for NHS staff was a nice win. I think we saved the lives of NHS staff as a result.  When can we expect to hear new music from you in 2021, in digital and physical formats?
We are nearly done recording our next batch of singles - we're ridiculously excited about them. We've been working on these songs for a very, very long time and they are a logical progression of our debut EP, "FEED THE POOR! EAT THE RICH!" I won't put a timeframe on it, because every time we've made plans in the last twelve months, it's kinda, y'know, well...yeah. My baby's the only thing that actually happened on time for us last year! More than just the music, we want to make another batch of The Palpitations' own brand Old Fashioned Hot Sauce'. It was the best thing we did in 2020 (no offence, Radhika). Pandemic permitting, what gigs have you got lined up? As soon as it's safe, we're going to play every single gig. I'm not lying, I mean, every single gig. Monday night in Basingstoke? Gig Tuesday night in Ware? Gig. Wednesday night in Glasgow? Ok, maybe we'll need to sort logistics out and get a luxury van, ideally with plenty of room for a baby...but we'll make it work. Any festival appearances planned? Outdoor gigs have to be the way forward - ventilation is key to reducing transmission, and so I hope there will be a load of open air festivals. Still waiting to hear back from Glastonbury on whether they'll put us on a covid-secure stage - that's a deal-breaker... What are your hopes for the band in 2021? My hopes for 2020 were that we would tour Europe. My hopes for 2021 are that we will all soon get vaccinated. I won't be coy about it, I also hope we get more recognition for our hard work - when interviewers like NMS take time to 'get' us, appreciate our blood, sweat and tears, it really gives us a boost. I hope our fans love our new songs. I hope our music reaches more people who love rock music. The more I listen to our demos, one of our next songs is called "Death To Light" and I think it will be a brilliant anthem for when lockdown ends!
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By Jon Milton We’ve been looking forward to the release of Shame’s second album Drunk Tank Pink ever since lead single Alphabet came out in September last year. Three more excellent singles followed Alphabet in Snow Day, Water in the Well, and just last week Nigel Hitter so the bar was set high. Does it deliver? Yep, it’s a cracker. I really couldn’t see what all the fuss was all about with Shame. Another over-hyped band that failed to deliver. None of the early singles grabbed me, and Songs of Praise still sounds distinctly average to me. Drunk Tank Pink however is a quantum leap forward. I appreciate a lot of people focus on the lyrics, but for me the essence of good music lies with the rhythm section, and the rhythm section here is fantastic. Superbly tight, inventive drums and percussion. Wonderful guitar interplay. Driving bass. Without this the shouty / spoken vocals might grate, but instead they enhance the overall sound. In addition to the fine string of singles mentioned above, we get touches of afrobeat on Born in Luton, frantic post punk on Great Dog, 6/1 and Harsh Degrees, the sublime Station Wagon and Human, for a Minute and the punchy March Day. There is not a single weak track on this album – it’s damn close to perfection. Three other bands with albums soon to land who’ve released new music over the last week or so are Mush, TV Priest and Black Country New Road. Mush’s latest single Seven Trumpets (which features no Trumpets on it) is less frantic than previous singles like Blunt Instruments and Dead Beat but no less impressive, with a real late era Velvet Underground feel about it. TV Priest’s Press Gang is a noisy gem from a band that deserve the headlines (sorry, couldn’t resist) and Black Country New Road’s Track X is another fine tune, that draws heavily from Steve Reich’s Different Trains / Electric Counterpoint work. White Flowers reveal a rather beguiling side to their music with their new EP ‘Within a Dream’. The lead track and You Caught Me were released as digital singles late last year, and are very much what we’ve come to expect from the band, but Blue May and Didn’t Want To Have To Do It are more laid back, jazzy affairs full of warmth and charm. We spoke to the band about their plans for the rest of the year a week or so ago, which you can reads about here. Another band who’ve evolved their sound in a short period of time are Home Counties, whose Modern Yuppies single dropped this week. The band said of the single when we interviewed them last week ‘It’s pretty different to everything on ‘Redevelopment EP’. We couldn’t find a way to get back in the studio as a five-piece so it’s a self-produced home-recording, with drum machines and synths taking the centre over the typical guitar-band setup. ‘Redevelopment EP’ wasn’t a drastic departure from the music we made when we were known as Haze but we’re certainly planning on moving further away from that and being a little more experimental… I think this is a good first taste of what’s to come on our next EP’. It’s a bit of banger too as Radio One would say. You can read our full interview with the band talking about their plans for the year here. Finally, this week is Motorway the new single from Oldham’s Gardenback. I first came across the band on an excellent cassette from Owed Summer that was out last year and this is another great tune from the band, who also have an excellent cassette EP just out via rare vitamin records ‘Modern Living EP’ which is well worth checking out / snapping up. Garage rock is the order of the day here and done rather well. The link is at: Gardenback - Modern Living EP | Gardenback | Rare Vitamin Records (bandcamp.com). By Jon Milton What’s cooking in Brighton for 2021? We spoke with three exciting artists from the city about their music plans for the year. There’s Les Bods, who grabbed our attention with their debut single ‘People’ last year, Laundromat, who released a string of cool tunes that went on to form their Blue and Green EP’s, and Public Body who blew us away with their first single of 2020 ‘Presenteeism’ and kept the bar high for their next three releases too. Les Bods What were your highlights of 2020? Launching our first single ‘People’ was a roaring success with plays and supporters in over 70 countries - Reaching the 10k mark on Spotify. (That was pretty insane for our first release). Secondly, Selling out one of our favourite venues: The Green Door Store with The Howlers back in March. That was actually our last live show we played sadly...  When can we expect to hear new music from you in 2021? Very very soon! We have a long list of releases ready to go for this year. The first single will be out there in the coming months, so keep ears peeled to our socials. Pandemic permitting, what gigs have you got lined up? Due to Panny D, we have decided to focus on our song-writing over the past months rather than book shows. However, we have a live stream February 20th for @Hotboxlivechelmsford (Tune in from 7pm on Vimeo, Facebook, Youtube, Twitch + www.Hotboxlive.co.uk), and we are supporting The Howlers, March 27th @TheRossiBar in Brighton. Any festival appearances planned? We couldn’t wish for anything more than to have festivals resume this year, but we personally don’t think they will be up and running due to safety precausions… However, we would love to get onto Scuff Of The Neck, The Feeling or a circuit similar in 2021. What are your hopes for the band in 2021? We are planning to release a lot of music this year - we've got the materials and we want to use them! We’d love to play a live show again as soon as it's safe, plus we’d all love to start touring again. Our plan is to get onto the festival circuit (Permitting they're happening this year) we hope to be back on the stage and play as many shows as possible in 2021. We have a lot in store for you already this year, we’re excited to continue writing new material and growing our audience. Finally we’d love it for everyone to stay safe, and allow us all to continue doing what we love... Laundromat What were your highlight(s) of 2020? Well it was rad to finally get some tunes out. Real good to work with Brace Yourself, too. The boss-man Ivano is an old pal so it's been great to reconnect - it's nice to have someone to talk about Cobra Kai with. When can we expect to hear new music from you in 2021, in digital and physical formats? Prettyyyyyy bbbllaaaadddyyyyy soooooooon  Pandemic permitting, what gigs have you got lined up? There was talk of Green Man, but I'm not sure to what extent they'll be honouring their offers. Obviously really keen to play a bunch, but who knows anything anymore. Personally I can't imagine there being anything until the end of the year, at the earliest - we'll see. What are your hopes for the band in 2021? I'd like to write a bunch. Songs don't come easy for me (any pals reading will find that funny). It's a real struggle to get through the mental health barriers to be honest, but I am in the process of setting up my home studio to be way more friendly in terms of workflow, so with any luck music will pour out of me like a sparkling rainbow. Public Body What were your highlight(s) of 2020? When can we expect to hear new music from you in 2021, in digital and physical formats? We were approached by the lovely Laurent of Six Tonnes De Chair, so we’ve got a 7” coming out on the 5th March! I believe pre order will be coming in the next month! We also managed to squeeze in a couple days at the studio last year and recorded a new 6 track EP! So we also got that coming out at some point this year too hopefully!  Pandemic permitting, what gigs have you got lined up?
We’ve got a Brighton festival booked in for summer and a couple of other shows booked but that will all be announced soon. Hopefully it all goes ahead What are your hopes for the band in 2021? Well I’m planning to hopefully write a good song for the first time and hopefully play some gigs with all the killer bands that are about atm. make some new friends and drink lagers in a pub!! I need laughs and smiles!! By Jon Milton Continuing our series of articles concentrating on things to look forward to in 2021, I spoke with three more artists about their plans… The Galahads What were your highlights of 2020? Highlights for The Galahads in 2020 were releasing our first four singles starting with ‘I Don’t Like You’ and finishing the year off with ‘Turns To Hate’. We’ve been working on these tracks for a long time so 2020 has been our year in venturing out into the wild world and seeing if people dig them and the reception has been better than we could have ever expected.  New Music 2021? We’ve got a few more tracks lined up along with an EP which we’ll tell you the name of now, ‘The Holy Grail’. We’ve set aside the first half of the year to complete it which will contain five tracks. This will be our first cohesive collection of songs to be released and we cannot wait! Lined up gigs? Keeping optimistic we’re hoping we get a chance to perform our upcoming EP in the second half of the year. If not, we could look at doing another live session like we did with Happy Daze. Either way, whatever we end up doing it’ll be guaranteed to please and satisfy the eyes and ears. Any Festival appearances planned? Perhaps, but that would be telling. Who knows what will happen? Hopes for the band in 2021? Just hope that we continue to build on what we’ve already done, we seem to be going in the right direction so that’s a good sign. Performing live is an obvious one. Just got to keep our fingers and toes crossed that we can at some point because we’re more than ready for it! San Pedro’s Vision Highlights of 2020? Great question! We think it’s really important to stay focused on all the positives and silver linings when things get as tough as they did last year (and continue to be), burying your head in the doom and gloom of the papers and the news isn’t going to do your head any good! We really think that given the circumstances we had quite a productive year; like everybody, we had to battle the whole Covid thing, but we also had our lead singer move on to new pastures. It is definitely a highlight of our year that we found it within us to keep on marching forward after taking those knocks, we really realised something about ourselves, you know? 100% we’ve grown closer as a band for it. Of course, we’ve got Alannah in now and she's really added to the sound we discovered last year – another highlight, which showcased itself in our November 2020 release ‘Subconscious Reflection’. The feedback we got from that EP was so humbling and encouraging that it just made the whole year of struggles worth it, we even managed to strike up a little publishing deal with our man Steve at Klee Music. All in all, we’re happy to say we’ve managed to take a few steps forward on our journey, we’ve pushed on, made new connections, grew closer and built a better view for the future too. Thanks to everyone who listened and supported us!  New Music 2021? We certainly hope so. We pretty much got down to working on new material immediately after finishing up with Subconscious Reflection, but there’s a lot of time and work to go in before we will be happy to release something. That being said, we seem to have found a flow now and things are moving fast; there's a really cool stoner rock vibe with our usual blend of psych in there, we’re looking forward to seeing where that can take us. We also like the whole concept thing so we’re thinking a follow up to the previous EP could be on the cards, perhaps even a physical version this time, but time will tell. Anyway, I’m sure we will be plastering our teaser videos everywhere soon enough, so keep those eyes peeled! Lined up gigs? If all goes to plan, this year will see us play in our first gig in over a year and our best line up yet! Happy Daze have got us booked on to an all-dayer featuring; Kundalini Genie, Confederate Dead, Black Doldrums, Frankie Teardrop Dead and Fuss – unfortunately it was postponed from Halloween 2020 to May this year but it's going to be dope and the wait will definitely be worth it. Other than that, we’ve not got much planned for obvious reasons, hopefully later in the year things are ready to go again, so we can get out there advertise what will then be the two EP’s we’ve released during all this! Any Festival appearances planned? Not right now, no. We were supposed to be playing Threshold last year but that fell through so we’re kind of just hoping to be invited back if and when the next one goes ahead! Hopes for the band in 2021? Just to keep doing what we’re doing really. We don’t want to put too much pressure on ourselves because we know that as individuals' things are a struggle at the moment and the last thing we want is to bring any additional stress to ourselves, it won't do us or the music any good. A nice steady pace in the right direction should get us through the year with another EP released and fingers crossed a bunch more good feedback and listeners! In the mean time we also hope we can get those listens up on our last release so if you haven’t listened to ‘Subconscious Reflection’ yet, why are you still here? Geography of the Moon What were your highlight(s) of 2020? We started the year with a tour of South East Asia, with a Saturday night gig at the excellent Jai Thep Festival in Thailand. so much fun! We released our latest album Fake Flowers Never Die in June. Some of our songs were played on radios around the world, Gideon Coe played Deadbeat Poet on BBC Radio 6, and Vic Galloway played 1984 on BBC Scotland. Also just this week we were in Vic's BBC Radio Scotland - Vic Galloway - 25 Scottish Artists to Watch in 2021  When can we expect to hear new music from you in 2021, in digital and physical formats?
Woah, like...soon? And we're still waiting for the physical LPs of Fake Flowers Never Die Pandemic permitting, what gigs have you got lined up? It's kinda sad but we haven't planned any. We toured solid for the last 3 years so we're gonna use this year to write a new album instead. Any festival appearances planned? Any festivals actually happening? Everything seems to be cancelled again this year :( Although, we're doing Jai Thep again if we can get through the borders. What are your hopes for the band in 2021? As I said, write another album...and then start planning our next tour. By Jon Milton This first week back in January has seen new singles by TV Priest and Shame, a new EP from the Oscillation and the debut album from Lice released, but what about the new music prospects for the rest of the year? We talked to three bands whose output in 2020 was limited to a single each, but have grander plans for 2021. Springfield Elementary What were your highlight(s) of 2020? The biggest highlight has to be the release of our single Doctor, Doctor in June. We were fortunate to be able to record it with Rainy Daze studios back in January and it was difficult planning a video for it once the first lockdown happened. We thought to take advantage of the situation and video what we got up to during the strictest covid restrictions. Brad edited it together and it turned out really well. We were glad we could still be creative together, despite not being able to see each other! Video link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y5Mnc9hlVDo  Photo by Jake Manuell When can we expect to hear new music from you in 2021, in digital and physical formats? We were supposed to be recording an EP in November, but stricter restrictions meant that we had to postpone. We're set to be recording later this month at Airtight Studios in Chorlton. We've had a lot of time together writing songs this last year so expect to hear some songs we haven't performed live yet! Pandemic permitting, what gigs have you got lined up? It's all still a bit up in the air at the moment, we've had a few planned earlier in the year but all were either called off or postponed with no new dates set yet. Any festival appearances planned? We're booked in for YANA fest, which at the moment is set for March 6th across Northern Quarter venues. All profits of this are going towards the Manchester Mind mental health charity. Fingers crossed enough vaccines have been rolled out by then. What are your hopes for the band in 2021? Our main focus is on the EP at the moment and getting that heard by as many people as possible! Once that's all recorded the plan is to make a couple more DIY music videos like we've done with previous singles. Other than that we just want to play to crowds again, we have a lot of new tunes written and ready for that first gig back! The Howlers What were your highlight(s) of 2020? I think we are one of the few bands out there that has managed to keep our head above the rising tide of sh*t our industry has had to deal with this year so I guess that is a big highlight especially in a time when there's not much to really get excited about. We've also had the pleasure of working with some amazing people 'in secret' this year which has been what's kept us going really!  When can we expect to hear new music from you in 2021, in digital and physical formats? Very soon...we have recorded a wealth of material that's all scheduled for release in the first half of 2021, depending when this interview goes out we may have already announced something...and there's lots planned for physical(s) Pandemic permitting, what gigs have you got lined up? We have our UK Tour in March/April Hopefully which may become socially distanced, both our promoters and us are watching the current climate closely, we've got some big plans for 2021, but if you haven't already get a ticket for our UK tour, there's still a few tickets left in some city's Any festival appearances planned? We can't say to much at this stage as we don't know whether most of them will go ahead but we have already been announced for a few in the England & Scotland What are your hopes for the band in 2021? Well if the past 9 months of planning pays off we can get back to doing what we love, that's what its about really, as long as people dig the records then that's good enough for us, there's far to many overly ambitious people in our industry and that just takes all the fun out of what we do, of course we all strive for success but at the end of the day what really matters gets lost in translation sometimes, that's why we never do politics or try to be a 'Pop culture' band it's not who we are, I think people get that as well! Bleach Boy What were your highlight(s) of 2020? We had some fun moments at the start of the year, we played some new places across the UK (Leeds, Stay Fresh Fest). When lock down was announced, we were in the studio recording our new tracks. We were also announced to play some more festivals across Europe, but unfortunately, they have been postponed.  When can we expect to hear new music from you in 2021, in digital and physical formats?
You can expect to hear some new tunes from us ASAP. We have spent a while figuring out where we stand in this pandemic and what the best move is with releasing. We have some ace tracks lined up and our priority right now is just getting them out there. Pandemic permitting, what gigs have you got lined up? Our gigs that were cancelled last year have been rescheduled for 2021, hopefully starting with a headline show in Manchester in February. We were also planning on hitting up some spots in Europe and maybe making it into a European tour. Any festival appearances planned? We are hopefully going to be making some festival appearances this year, including God Save Claremont in France and Right Noise Festival in Copenhagen. What are your hopes for the band in 2021? We are not going to be moving slow. We live for gigs and this pandemic has affected us all. We have heaps of material to get recorded, videos to do and shows to tear up. |
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