Although attractiveness is subjective, ArcTanGent happens to be situated in an official Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty – and if you visit it and look around, you’d probably agree with the government’s judgment for once. As for the music you can expect to experience at the UK’s most respected prog, math, and post-everything festival, it may serve a very specific niche, but the fans who love the styles in question tend to Read more…
2000 Trees 2018 was easily one of the best festivals I’ve ever been to. Year after year, the Trees team have consistently worked to build and improve on everything they’ve achieved – and by this point, 2000 Trees has a practically unrivalled reputation amongst fans of British underground music.
This past weekend, one of the UK music scene’s greatest institutions exceeded all expectations Read more…
In the world of underground music, popular opinion doesn’t count for much – but when everyone in the underground agrees on something unanimously, it’s worth sitting up and paying attention. This isn’t a world where spray-tanned mannequins rush to shill for whichever corporations are Read more…
As much as I enjoy post-rock and instrumental music, it’s easy to lose patience with outfits too easily labelled as “tremolo-picking bands”. A cliché already done to death a decade ago, such bands treat that high-speed technique as a compositional crutch – and turn otherwise promising songs into Read more…
With festival season fast approaching, 2000 Trees (12-14 July) and ArcTanGent (16-18 August) are set to host some of the best alternative acts in the world right now. From At The Drive In, Twin Atlantic, and Enter Shikari to And So I Watch You From Afar, Glassjaw, and Shellac – to mention the headliners alone – both lineups are guaranteed to satisfy any reasonable rock fan.
Meanwhile in Shoreditch, I got chatting to James Scarlett, co-founder of and booker for both 2000 Trees and ArcTanGent Read more…
Giraffes? Giraffes! have, hands down, the best band name of all time.
Those two words also help highlight the fact that this duo are far from ordinary. With a name like Giraffes? Giraffes! you’re hardly going to expect Read more…
UPDATE: TMMP has been reborn! This video has the full story:
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Sometimes words get in the way when you’re trying to say something. Emotion is preverbal, whether we’re dealing with joy, anger, grief, bliss, or depression. We feel something – then we express it somehow.
Russian Circles’ back catalogue is perfect proof of the fact that you don’t need to be lyrically verbose in order to make a statement or pose a question. These guys are masters of moving listeners without actually telling them to move. Listening to Guidance, it’s hard not to be struck by the fact that music alone can speak volumes Read more…
Bear Makes Ninja are more than just a badass band name.
These guys have been making waves in the post-/math-rock world for a fair few years now, and Shenanagrams is guaranteed to plant the Bear Makes Ninja flag firmly in that niche’s bedrock. If you’re of the mind to criticise Bear Makes Ninja’s musicianship, you’re a fuckwit; this album offers many a glorious, grandeur-fuelled moment that will bring big grins to the faces of math-oriented musos across Read more…
If mind-blowing instrumental math-rock is your musical delicacy of choice, meet Poly-Math – if you haven’t already. They’re currently sitting on one hell of a debut mini-album, which is called Melencolia, was reviewed here for your delectation, and contains three ultra-intense epics that will have you scratching your head in wonderment for months to come.
Here, Poly-Math bassist Joe Branton talks about Melencolia‘s presently-missing fourth track, the joys of instrumental music, and why Poly-Math are on the lookout for the world’s biggest inflatable bananas… Read more…
Poly-Math are fast becoming Names in the British math- / post-rock underground, and rightly so. 2015’s Reptile churned a fair few minds and pricked up many an ear – and now, Poly-Math’s debut mini-album Melencolia is set to take them up a level.
Look at the running times for each of Melencolia’s three tracks Read more…