Live
< Xerox Teens @ The Old Blue Last
words by Gemma Kenyon
pics by
Along with White Heat Records, Young & Lost Club are record label pioneers with their eyes firmly peeled on the up and coming bands who would still be dallying with their DIY instruction kit without them. Set up by the Pyrrah Girls (Nadia and Sara) after the success of their phonographic skills in dives around London, the girls realised if they released the tracks they wanted to play then they were onto a winner. Now they have turned their hands to promoting bands at their clubs nights and have picked up on the byword buzz band for 2007; Xerox Teens. It is testament to the sway of the label and the band themselves that the Old Blue Last is fully packed in what is apparently a slump period for music. With a lack of worthwhile releases during January Loud And Quiet are allowed to get our hands even dirtier than usual and with members of The Horrors and Get Cape.Wear Cape.Fly. propping up the bar, we are in good company.
The set starts off with debut release ‘Chasing your Tail’, which is a resonating chant of the title building up, continuously more frenetic with each damped guitar riff. It teases the crowd to the front of the stage only to emergency stop and dive into the next track.
The Old Blue is infamous for raucous gigs due to its size - so much so that recently the floor began to cave in - but it can also mean that the sound resonates off the ceiling, muffling feedback like it’s caught in an old 1970’s Dolby switch. However, as the Xerox Teens have positioned the percussion to take centre stage the sound is precise and clear. The set-up allows the focus to be on the music rather than the front man and is both bewildering and exciting. With Rich gesticulating in the shadows his vocals jerk from aggressive yelps to droning rumbles, again reminiscent of the Hip Priest himself. He occasionally stops singing to stare at the crowd looking menacing and mysterious, which is exactly when guitarist Danny Fancy screeches and yells the rest of the song. It’s a constant thrill on the senses and we are still only two songs in.
The band quickly move onto favourite’s ‘Darlin’, ‘Favourite Hat’ and ‘Man It’s Hard To Beat A Woman’; songs that mix rockabilly with angular guitars sounding like Devo if they had lived in a grim Northern town. Whilst most bands are nodding towards the so-called urchin bands who have graduated from drama school with A-levels in animatronics, it is refreshing to hear a band with attitude and notable references that they make their own. Since first catching Xerox Teens six months ago the band has tightened their act without losing their fraught and erratic behaviour. Despite the name they attract a mixture of ages from rock appreciators to indie aficionado’s, perhaps due the band themselves looking at the fag end of their twenties. But tonight, as they walk off the stage during the last song, Xerox Teens have shown themselves to be one of the most pedigree post-punk bands to come out of London and the much hyped scene that have given us Faris Rotter.
Originally appeared in volume 1, issue 19 of Loud & Quiet magazine
