WATCH: BCOS RSNS – ‘(First On At The) Buffalo Bar’

A catchy and absorbing debut single, ‘(First On At The) Buffalo Bar‘ by BCOS RSNS is a deceptively upbeat love letter to a precarious live music scene. A bouncy rhythm blending with cheery keys and fuzzy guitar riffs captures the liveliness and excitement of being at the kind of gig that makes it worth paying London prices for a pint.

The verses recount fond memories of the kind of weird and wonderful acts that find the space to perform in small venues willing to take a punt on something different, and anyone who knows and loves a local venue with a cramped stage and an eclectic-bordering-on-chaotic rotation of performers will recognise at least some of the images conjured in this track. The bright chorus repeats “I wanna be first on at the Buffalo Bar” with an infectious enthusiasm that makes you want to take your weird idea and go play there too. The riff beneath is an absolute earworm that will have you humming that chorus for a long time.

Regretful repeated lines come in towards the end that give the song an all too familiar sense of heartbreak; the simple change to the lyrics, with almost no shift in the music subverts the happy experiences into just memories. The sense of nostalgia is nice, but the loss of such a gem to the live music scene is tragic, and that feeling evokes the loss of many, many incredible community spaces lost to the ravages of late stage capitalism. It tinges those stories with sadness that even the most busy, vibrant cities can’t keep their best small venues afloat.

‘(First On At The) Buffalo Bar’ expertly captures the existential anxiety of seeing a scene you love to be a part of crumble away before your eyes, as a brutal economy and an increasing disregard for the arts rip holes in the fabric of the DIY community.

BCOS RSNS have chosen their debut perfectly. Given the presence the band have in the DIY scene in London, as familiar faces at all the best gigs both on stage and supporting from the crowd, this track really represents their authentic personality as well as introducing their sound to people further afield hearing them for the first time.

BCOS RSNS, the eponymous debut album from the band, is out on 22nd May, and you can celebrate the release with them live at The Cavendish Arms on 25th May.

Kirstie Summers
@ActuallyKurt

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LISTEN: Daughter – ‘Arise, Daughters Of Marsha’

The debut release from transgender black metal project Daughter, ‘Arise, Daughters of Marsha’ is a battle cry summoning the global community to stand up for trans rights. The track begins with a scream that acts as Daughter’s mission statement, not just with this single but the full upcoming EP. Vocalist and songwriter “Deadname” aims to channel the trauma of the trans experience in contemporary society through the brutal, aching sound of black metal.

The lyrics are delivered in a guttural scream that feels like it has been ripped violently from her throat. Shrieking guitars and rapid drums echo the feeling in the vocals, without compromising on the absorbing quality of the beat or the melodic riffs. An almost military-sounding rhythm adds a looming sense of dread to the track, compounded by the ominous wailing stings.

In this song, Deadname allows herself to cast aside the composure with which she, as a trans woman, is expected to carry herself with at all times in public; to act as a representative of her community against the vitriol of transphobic commentators. Instead, this track is raw and honest and seethes with the pain and rage that come as an extremely understandable reaction to the treatment of trans people right now, as news stories of transphobic attacks are increasingly, tragically frequent.

Savage riffs and blasting beats ramp up to a churning storm of music, until it ends by sampling some massively poignant lines from Sylvia Rivera’s ‘Y’all Better Quiet Down‘ speech from 1973, in which she exposes the hypocrisy of trans-exclusionary queer people. She reminds the world how much abuse trans women have historically faced when standing up for queer liberation only to be shunned by other members of their own community. “You all treat me this way? What the fuck’s wrong with you all?” The fact that these words are still so powerfully relevant more than fifty years later, with “charities” claiming to support the queer community but explicitly and unashamedly excluding trans people, gives this track a sucker-punch finish that leaves you unable to ignore the importance of the conversation Daughter generates with this poignant and necessary debut.

Kirstie Summers
@ActuallyKurt

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FIVE FAVOURITES: NEXT TO NADA

London-based noise makers NEXT TO NADA have been busy cutting their teeth on the city’s live circuit for the past twelve months. Formed of Leah Francesca (L. Francesca) Liddle, Thom (Tom) Oliver (Revitt), Georgie Bogle (Gigi Ruckus) and Jason Davies; together they create grinding, punk-infused anthems that reflect on the pent up frustrations of everyday life.

NEXT TO NADA will be self-releasing their upcoming EP, WHINE // MOTHS, on the 15th March, and they’ll celebrating their new record with gigs at The Finsbury Pub in Manor House on 13th April, and at the Dublin Castle in Camden on 30th May.

We think one of the best ways to get to know a band is by asking what music inspired them to write in the first place. We caught up with bassist L. Francesca to ask about their “Five Favourites” – five tracks that have inspired their songwriting techniques. Check out her choices below and scroll down to listen to NEXT TO NADA’S latest single ‘Whine, Lips’ at the end of this post…

1. Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds – ‘Hiding All Away’
I’ve not been a Catholic for a while, but I’ve got a real thing for songs that make me feel like I’m back in the pews. What actually goes on in Nick Cave’s songs is so straightforwardly rock and roll – angsty, sexy, cocksure – but in execution it sounds like it’s coming straight from Mount Sinai or Golgotha. Gospel choirs and everything! I will never forget hearing that almighty ‘There Is a War Coming’ in the outro for the first time. And yet it’s all rooted in the blues, in the same way The Stooges or Captain Beefheart were, it’s not trying to elevate its genre, just push it to its absolute limits. And for a track that’s so steeped in both high culture and low culture there’s such an intoxicating lack of self-deprecation; there’s no sense that Cave’s worried about coming across as pretentious or preachy. And I find that inspiring, I really do. I’m a melodramatic person, and nobody legitimizes melodrama like Nick Cave.

2. The Yeah Yeah Yeahs – ‘Dull Life’
I think it’s funny that “Pop Punk” is a specific genre, but the term could describe so much. I mean, isn’t that what New Wave is? Just taken as adjectives, nothing embodies “Pop Punk” to me like ‘Dull Life’ does. It’s hook after hook, but it’s dangerous and thrilling and it goes about being both in a really clever, imaginative way. They aren’t pop hooks, exactly; they’re written for riffs, not beats, but they manage to do what pop hooks do. I especially love the second verse, where you’ve got Karen O multitracking melodic singing over distant screams of the same lyrics – I want to do that on one of our songs at some point. NEXT TO NADA initially was way more Britpop influenced and got a lot heavier over time, but we still care about hooks and melodies, it’s just about making those work in the context of a heavy rock band. That’s something the Yeah Yeah Yeahs really understand.

3. Joanna Newsom – ‘Sapokanikan’
As far as I’m concerned, Joanna Newsom is the greatest lyricist of all time. Her imagery, her metaphors, even her rhyme-schemes are always so complicated and must box her into so many corners. But she always manages to write her way out of it, and leads the song on this merry chase through so many meanings and implications; I refuse to believe she was aware of all of them when she started writing. It’s so easy as a songwriter to compromise your structure by ignoring it for a bit in order to make sure you’re saying things right, but I think that that’s a mistake, because you discover so much by rising to your own challenges. I also love how geeky ‘Sapokanikan’ is, it’s full of references to American history and geography, and it’s such a great feeling to hear someone sing about something you’ve only ever read about in dry educational contexts and think… oh shit, that can be a metaphor!

4. Fugazi – ‘Bed For the Scraping’
The main way I write basslines is with a trick I call “lines and then coloring”. I start off with a jump of root note to octave to set the chord, and then “colour it in” with a bit of melody before landing back on the root in the next bar. That came from here. I’ve never wanted my bass to be the lead instrument, but I don’t really see myself as rhythm, either, I’m more like the guitars’ backing vocalist; I’m playing a melodic instrument but I have to step lightly with it, because everything I do sets the harmony. And Joe Lally is so good at working within that restriction. He barely ever follows the guitar in ‘Bed for the Scraping’ but as great as the bass hook is, it’s never just for itself. Plus he’s working with two guitarists, like I have to; he knows he can’t add too much on top, but he knows what space in the middle of things he’s been given, and how to use every inch of it. It’s amazing.

5. Hop Along – ‘Sister Cities’
I play in a real loud rock band but I think I have a very singer-songwriter-ish way of writing songs; it starts with lyrics, not riffs. Hop Along’s whole Painted Shut album is such a great reference point for that sort of thing because it sounds like you took an Elliott Smith record and wired it to some jumper cables. It’s a real gnarly album in a lot of places, and ‘Sister Cities’ is a highlight for riffs and solos, but even then they’re never leading the story, they’re just helping tell it. And the sound is so versatile. It could be a Dinosaur Jr song, but there are also songs on the album that feel like Phoebe Bridgers, and they still all sound like Hop Along. Also – Frances Quinlan has the most amazing voice I’ve ever heard. I can’t really say it’s an influence, cause the first year of me learning to sing was mostly spent accepting that I’ll never sound like they do, but covering this song on my old Squier strat during lockdown is where I started with all this.

Thanks to Leah for sharing her favourites with us!
Listen to ‘Whine, Lips’ by NEXT TO NADA below

Follow NEXT TO NADA on Spotify, bandcamp, Facebook & Instagram

Photo Credit: Elspey Photography

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LIVE (Photos): Cherym @ Paper Dress Vintage, 24.02.2024

Having just released their debut album, Take It Or Leave It, last month via Alcopop! Records, Northern Irish trio Cherym have been big faves of ours since I first fell in love with them playing Paper Dress Vintage back in 2021. And I was lucky enough to re-live this experience last Saturday as they returned to the venue, delivering an even more wonderful set to an even bigger and adoring crowd. Fizzing with all the colourful punk-pop energy we’ve come to know and love, whilst offering fierce reflections on gender inequality and violence against women, as well as their own lived experiences as Gen Z queer folk, both the album and their live set continue to cement Cherym as one of the most exciting bands around at the moment. And I fully expect to be seeing and hearing lots more of them throughout 2024 – find out more here.

As well as immersing ourselves in their captivating raging joy at the gig last week, we were lucky enough to have a quick chat with Hannah and Alannah from the band about the tour and the new album. See our photos of the night, including excellent support from new faves Brutalligators and Hamburg’s Get Jealous, and snippets from the interview below…

Hannah: “The tour has been really, really good – we sold out our first ever Manchester headline show which was really exciting, and we also sold out our London show which is incredible. For me, it just sort of confirmed there has been a growth for the band and that more people are starting to hear our music which is amazing, and it’s a really exciting thing that’s starting to happen. We’re currently just back from the Netherlands which was really cool, there were loads of people we got to see that we haven’t met before that we’ve seen online and stuff. It was just really exciting.”

Hannah: “We wanted this album to be our truth. We wanted to be unapologetically ourselves, and I feel like that’s what we stuck by. People always used to label us as being a political band based primarily off the fact that we were all femme presenting people. We were all women and non-binary people within the band, and we were all also queer, but we never outwardly said we were a political band, we just got labelled as such. So I think with this record we were like, ‘you know what, we’ll give you political’. We have songs like ‘Alpha Beta Sigma‘ that’s very reflective of everything that’s been happening, like the atrocities of the church back home, and songs like ‘The Thing About Them’ which is about Nyree’s experience as a non-binary person, and we just wanted to speak our truth on a lot of issues.”

Alannah: “The fans have been really supportive. The new fans especially have really grasped onto the album and it’s been really lovely to see that we’ve connected with so many people. The fans that have stuck by us for a really long time have really resonated with it as well. A lot of our fans tend to be one of two people – old punk rockers who feel nostalgic about the new punk scene, and then the other side is younger fans who can relate to the lyricism and style of music that we play. When we were teenagers we really had nobody to look up to, or if there were they would be hidden between all the mainstream artists who were white men. It’s kind of nice that we’ve been able to showcase queer punk because we all come from different backgrounds, and it’s nice to see younger fans identify with that.”

Alannah: “I think our festival season is going to be really interesting this year with the new album out in the world. We’re hoping to go abroad this time again when it comes to festivals, some bigger and better things — climbing up that ladder -, which we’re really excited for. There may be some announcements coming soon too…

Hannah: “Yeah new adventures in new territories! Next for us is the Enter Shikari shows in Ireland, so we’ve got two shows in Dublin and we’ve got a show in Belfast as well, which is just insane because we’ve all been fans of this band from when we were teenagers, so to be selected to be one of the support acts for this tour is incredible. And we’re playing with Meryl Streek as well, which is going to be amazing – we love Meryl and we love his music and everything he stands for, so it’s going to be really cool.”

Alannah: “We also have something exciting in the bag that we recently announced… Our cover of Doja Cat’s ‘Boss Bitch’ which is coming out on International Women’s Day, so we’re really excited to see the reception for that! We’re also doing German dates with Get Jealous and we’re also playing again in Germany later this year with The Undertones – I think that’s all we can say without getting in trouble for now!”

Get Jealous:

Brutalligators:

Massive thanks to Hannah and Alannah from Cherym for chatting to us, and putting on such a wonderful show at Paper Dress Vintage last weekend! Take It Or Leave It, the new debut album from Cherym, is out now via Alcopop! Records – order here.

Photo Credit: Paul Dawes / @GRNDglass

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