A third of the records have already sold through pre-orders so get in early to avoid missing out.
The 3 songs are picking up airplay on BBC 6Music from Gideon Coe and on various stations in the USA. Reviews have been excellent too:
Uncompromising. It’s a word that gets bandied about all too
easily these days along with legend, awesome and amazing. These are words that
have lost their power through over use in the same way that if you read the
word spade enough times it loses all meaning. Spade. Spade. Spade. Spade.
Spade. Spade. Spade. Spade. See? Anyway, this second EP release from
Southend-on-Sea’s Wobbly Lamps confirms that they are a truly uncompromising
band of brothers and one well worth your ear time. From the neo-psychedelic
artwork through the song titles and then to the music, Wobbly Lamps are doing
things their way and anyone who gets in the way, well, they’ll just be
obliterated I would've thought. This EP is limited to a run of 250 7” records
and the opening track of Drella, ‘Never Ever Bloody Anything Ever’, is a
swirling maelstrom of distortion, delay and buzzsaw riffs that the Black Rebel
Motorcycle Club might have come up with if they’d been hanging out with Mark E
Smith 35 years ago. Sure, there are some nice melodies reminiscent of Shadowy
Men On A Shadowy Planet or early Nirvana but it’s the atmosphere that draws you
in. Let’s face it, this is a five minute long A-side with minimal vocals and no
discernible structure but it makes you want to dance like Ian Curtis on a good
day.
On the B-Side comes the more straight-forward ‘Haxan’ (Google
tells me this might be a tribute to a Danish/Swedish silent Horror movie from
1922 and literally translates as ‘the Witches’) which has an immense organ
sound running through it to give the impression of Dracula going a bit grunge
in his old age. There are elements of Rocket From The Crypt and sadly
overlooked Belgian quartet Les Anges to this and it’s flippin’ ace. The other
half of the B-side is dedicated to ‘Gretchin Fetchin’ and sees vocalist Gareth
Thomas on fine form for a man who appears to have swallowed his microphone,
meaning he can only sing in a voice that Bill Hicks’ Goat Boy would have been
proud of. Towards the end of the track there’s a hypnotic breakdown that builds
back up until you can almost hear the band rolling around on the floor and
jumping in to the audience before the venue cut the power. This is music driven
by the utter self belief of five men that what they are doing is good,
important and utterly worth your time. There’s no false modesty or self-doubt
here, just colours nailed to the mast and attitude that screams “If you don’t
like it ....you’re wrong”. Like I said, uncompromising.
This 7'' ep of Wobbly Lamps is the second number for this
company and engleziki circulation is 250 copies. The sound of the guitar is
Wobbly Lamps are fasariozikos is dirty, it's garage, it's pop, it's punk! I
guess if Joy Division were recording garage sounded like this! The never ever
bloody anything ever from the first side is a wild guitar garage / pop song
mercilessly melodic despite the harshness of the sound! In the second part
haxan and gretchin fetchin barrage is have more 70s punk sound, real rollers,
sweep everything while the second, in the end he has a vague relentlessly playing
the organ that sends another dimension song.
"limited to 250. Storming garage rock screaming with
fuzz and attitude. All the way from Southend-on-Sea, Wobbly Lamps' amps never
fall below 11, with distorted vocals recalling the most petulant Billy Childish
moments smothered all over the rockin' proceedings. A-side is a 5 minute
exercise in garage-rock minimalism, while on the flip there's the more
straight-for-the-jugular "Haxan" coupled with "Gretchen
Fetchin"... great stuff".
*****...according to our Mike on Tue 05 Mar, 2013.
The song on the A side ‘Never Ever Bloody Anything Ever’ is a slightly dirgey bit of fuzzpop that made me question whether I had actually remembered to put the speed to 45, with crumbling distorted guitars with a bit of divebombing shoegaze wibble alongside impassioned vocals like Sauna Youth when they’re doing their more Fall-esque bits.
Flip it and ‘Haxan’ is a gritty slice of Misfits-meets-Cramps razorblade theatrics with some really cool sounding saturation on the vocals making it sound extra filthy. Then to close things off ‘Gretchen Fetchin’ is a bit of distorted, slightly surfy rock’n’roll, all hot amps and reverb as if it was recorded in the early ‘60s by some unknown garage combo and left undiscovered for decades. Bands like The Trashmen and The Mummies spring to mind. Overall this single is a bit darker and dirgier than the last one but just as ace. I really want to hear an LP from this band now! It’s about time a UK band stepped up and had a proper crack at that garage rock they’re so good at over the pond.
The WOBBLY LAMPS from Sarfend in the UK come back with their
latest offering from the Polyvinyl Craftsmen label. It’s their second 7″ EP
titled Drella and it takes things to an even noisier level than we heard
before.
It’s been about a half a year since we encountered the
Wobbly Lamps debut 7″ and since then it sounds like they’ve hit their stride.
On Drella the band comes through with even more noisy viciousness than we heard
before, evidenced immediately in the clangorous introduction of “Never Ever
Bloody Anything Ever”. They follow through with melodic guitar shards and soulful,
blown-out vocals, driving the song straight into metallic oblivion as the noisy
textures burst through the roof. Halfway through the track they suddenly change
gears for a build-up of grandiose proportions, but they never lose their cool
in the process. They follow it up with the dark and dire sounding “Haxan”,
leading the way with a nasty weave of dense, grungy guitars and frenzied
vocals, creating a wave of ominous energy to thicken the air.
Take a few minutes to check out these blistering songs right
below, and if that’s not enough you may want to go check out their debut 7″
while you’re at it.
