What we’ve been listening to…Treeboy and Arc, Autosuggestion, Deadletter, Gaylips, Spilt, Belishas, Mildred Maude, Sprints, Stuck, KEG

By Jon Milton

July ends (this year is going quick isn’t it?) with a flurry of quality tunes to usher us into the summer as sweaty gigs start to become a reality again. Was it really two years ago that I saw those fine fellows from Leeds, Treeboy and Arc play at the Shacklewell Arms? It would appear so, and they had been quiet on the new music front too until this month. We wrote of their new single ‘Role Models’ (taken from their forthcoming EP ‘Life Preserver’) in our last round up, and they’ve just released ‘Logistical Nightmare’ with the full EP to follow next week. Logistical Nightmare is another excellent track from the band - taut, angular clean post punk that sounds fresh as a daisy. 

Hull four-piece Autosuggestion gave us their rather majestic first ever studio single ‘Deadpan’ at the start of this month, and today release its melancholy companion ‘A New Slow’. The band formed over a shared love of Iceage and have supported the likes of The Murder Capital (remember them?) since, with forthcoming dates planned alongside fellow post punk/goth rock flag bearers Document.

‘Monday Night Terrors’ the new single from Deadletter, sees the band inject dub and ska into their sound, with elements of Faithless and Madness in amongst their brand of post punk. It’s produced by Theo Verney and lyrically the song sees frontman Zac Lawrence recounting a horrifying bout of nightmares: ‘Monday Night Terrors is a response to a severely terrifying series of early-hours nightmares I experienced. I had three dreams within one another, like three Russian-doll polythene bags wrapped around my head. Upon my perceived awakening from each dream, further horrors occurred, to the point that when I finally awoke, I was unable to tell whether or not I truly was sentient, as the horror continued.”

​Local (to me) noise terrorists Gaylips have been catching the attention of legendary J’s Steve Lamacq and Tom Robinson of late, and they certainly seem to be getting better and better with each new release. Their last single ‘The Future will be Built from Spare Parts’ was a cracker and so is their latest outing ‘The Ballad of Hinksley Road’, with both tracks featuring on their forthcoming second album ‘The Last of the DVD Pirates’. ‘Ballad of…’ is an epic council house punk anthem that celebrates the streets and towns that built the band by all accounts, and as we’ve come to expect from the band, its another no-nonsense, smack you round the chops beast of a tune.

​While we’re talking about noise, you’d be well advised to check out ‘Sex Tape’, the new single from Spilt. I’ve only come across the band recently, but it turns out that after being dormant for a couple of years they’re back now with some of their heaviest tunes, of which this is the first to be released. Sex Tape has attitude and swagger and it rocks.

​Last month saw Belishas digitally release the first instalment of their forthcoming physical single (due out next month) ‘Whispers’, a truly life affirming blast of summer. They’ve followed this up today with the more downbeat and reflective but still thoroughly enjoyable ‘Brother’, which has a few hints of the stereophonics about it. If you’re based down Bristol way, make sure you go and see them play with their mates workfriends on the 4th August at the Louisiana. That should be a cracking gig. 

​If mesmeric psych rock is more your bag, check out ‘Trevena’ the new single from Mildred Maude. It’s the band’s first release on Sonic Cathedral, ten minutes of absolutely heavenly repetition that builds slowly into a wonderful wall of sound.        

​Three songs that came out last Friday but are well worthy of your attention are the new tracks by Sprints, Stuck and KEG. The Sprints ‘How Does The Story Go?’ follows on from their brilliant Manifesto EP that came out earlier this year, KEG’s ‘Heyshaw’ is a sweet debut single. I have little information on the Stuck tune, but I like it!