As a rule, I stay clear of bands that name themselves with the X & X classification – mostly due to that band Boy & Bear being absolutely mediocre and ruining not only bears, but also ampersands for everyone coming up with a band name. No apologies to anyone who likes Boy & Bear – throw out that headband, go buy a black t-shirt and stop drinking smirnoff cruisers.
Not your average psych bands: catch Adelaide’s Wolf and Cub plus Sydney’s Zeahorse rip up the Newtown Social Club this Saturday (7th June)
But for purposes of needing something to write about for this friday, I checked out this band outta Adelaide called Wolf & Cub. Bracing myself for an onslaught of beardy post-twee and ukelele, I was pleasantly greeted by a low end fuzz, a healthy dose of effects pedals and some distant, ignorable vocals. I smiled, slipping comfortably into a psychedelic haze, as I shut my eyes and reached for a bong that wasn’t there. I work in an office.
My hypothesis was proven wrong: there exists a band named after a vicious forest animal that totally lives up to that viciousness. So if you’re in the Newtown area tomorrow night (7th June), grab yourself a bowl of your ethnic food of choice and head down to the recently refurbished Newtown Social Club to catch Wolf & Cub, supported by the even more punked up and fuzzed out Zeahorse.
Now, there’s a real danger that if you’ve been seeing live music in Sydney that you might be sick of psych bands getting all up in your grill. This is totally plausible, and honestly it’s happened to me. By the third phased out, delayed to infinity, slow motion instrumental breakdown, there is no doubt you’ll start questioning why you’re bothering to sit through all this.
While there is no shortage of self indulgent psychedelic breakdowns in Wolf & Cub’s catalogue, there is also a fair amount of awesome, high voltage, indie rock with a vintage of about 2009. Songs like I Need More and What More Can I Say exist in that time period just before psychedelia permeated the market – fuzzy, effected yet still groovy, upbeat and still saturated with the final death throes of classical 00’s garage rock revival.
Furthermore, Zeahorse, who will be supporting the Adelaideans, like to get down with punking it up. From the unstoppable autobahn-rock of Sulphur to the mid album bangers of Tugboat and Familiar Faeces off their 2013 release Pools, Zeahorse are a psych band that will keep you interested at all hours of the day.
FIND OUT MORE
▲ NEWTOWN SOCIAL CLUB ▲ WOLF & CUB ▲ ZEAHORSE
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