Sonic Mouth lives The Hi-Fi Low Life

And What Will Be Left Of Them?

The Hi-Fi Low Life

After a hiccough of EPs, relentless touring of the toilet circuit both at home and abroad and a change in their line up – AWWBLOT have finally got their album finished and launched courtesy of the nice people at PopArt London. Sonic Mouth cracked open a six pack of Special Brew, popped Danny Dyer’s Deadliest Men onto mute and kicked back into a battered old armchair to listen to what they had managed to serve up.

AWWBLOT, for those not familiar with their work, are a melee of dirty pop and shouty punk - each song nurtured carefully up from the roots of a pop song, flourishing into a mighty Oak of debauched noise. Their sound harks back to the days of DIY punk, but unlike a band of badly dressed, mohawked thugs, these modern-day Midlands brutes can deliver a well-written song – good enough to satisfy both the sweaty gig monkey and the reserved music hack.

Themes run throughout the 13 track gamble pretty consistently – tight, punchy and splashing drums in equal measure compliment melodic bass riffs to form the lifeblood of most of the pop morsels. The synths and keys wax and wane into and out of prevalence as the record goes on, but definitely add an important facet to the band’s sound – ensuring this record doesn’t slip away in a chasm of pop/punk mediocrity.

Pop punk, by its nature, has an instant accessibility and therefore a potential shelf life even shorter than a pot of Lidl crème fraîche. However the singings of Pete Adams and Lucy Harvey-Wells go a long way to ensuring a hefty degree of longevity exists throughout the album. The vocal equivalent of Bonny and Clyde; they run riot through their songs, chasing harmonies like criminals fleeing the fat fist of the law; sporadically exploding into violent tirades to form catchy choruses which are destined to be ringing around your brainspace for days to come.

[The melancholic footnote to this uncharacteristic fleet of praise being Harvey-Wells has now been replaced by Heather Wilson in AWWBLOT’s ranks – but I’ll bet my prozzy purse on her bringing just as much lyrical punch to the party]

Adams’ vocals [imagine the noises coming from a cheap hotel room in which a drunken sleazy uncle is trying to hump a howler monkey] somehow against all expectations, compliment Harvey-Wells’ infinitely more serene pop-punk warbles. And in what is one of the most unlikely marriages since Dale Winton camped up the aisle with Nell McAndrew; their two respective vocal tracts give, for my meagre money, the biggest appeal to Hi Fi Low Life.

Like a Zorbing John Prescott, the record is well rounded - boasting both anthemic gut-busting punk outings – ‘Kids in America’ being this humble reviewer’s favourite – and more subtle offerings such as ‘Jesus’. Now log on to your interweb and find out which hovel in your local area has been brave enough to welcome the AWWBLOT circus to town.

Go on then. Go see them.

THE RIFLES ON TARGET by Greg Hall

Wednesday March 18 at the Camden Roundhouse

With the recent release of their second album ‘The Great Escape’, The Rifles are on tour in the U.K. and Europe. Sonic Mouth caught them on stage at the stylish Camden Roundhouse...

Another night, another gig. Whatever stamina supplements the Chingford four-piece are putting in their tea it wouldn’t go amiss on the NHS. If the country were ran like this band tour then the throes of a bourgeois revolution would be on our hands. The bureaucrats would be obliterated. Trains and buses would always run on time. As for waiting lists and queues? Well they would be as rare as buying a CD from a record store.

Consistency has certainly bred class for The Rifles who unloaded a solid show onto a savage audience at The Roundhouse. The jaunty garage rock act sound very much like a contemporary incarnation of The Jam mixed with the earthy sound of early Oasis. The jangly guitars from lead singer Joel Stoker and lead guitarist Lucus Crowther combined with the succinct snarling rhythm section had the audience hooked.

It wasn’t a classic crowd nor a sell out, but their well-honed showmanship transmitted from the off when epic opener ‘Science in Violence’ kick started proceedings. It was less of a case of ‘we are the mods’ and more ‘we are the mob’ from those in attendance. Lung-busting moshing, crowd surfing and this humble scribe going home covered in other people’s blood may sound like a good old fashioned night out. However it all felt a little flat, the usual camaraderie between folk at a Rifles gig must have evaporated with the steam of sweat filling the venue.

The acerbic atmosphere didn’t detract from the band’s performance who, led by iconic front man Stoker, undoubtedly flourish better on stage than in the studio. Singing in a similar style to The Kinks’ Ray Davies but with an eerie hint of Dennis Waterman (yes, the ginger bloke from The Sweeney), Stoker’s cockney twanged vocals were full of punch and flowed effortlessly over the band’s tight arrangements.

With a sound that is quintessentially English, the quartet delivered a charming repertoire of energetic anthems such as ‘Romeo and Julie’ and ‘The Great Escape’ and heartfelt acoustic adventures like the superb, ‘Narrow Minded Social Club.’

If you haven’t seen The Rifles you may wonder a couple of things. For starters are they original? No way. Are they experimental? Not really. They're certainly not visionaries. Then again they don't intend to be. The experience they give you is wrapped up in mod rock nostalgia, and to their credit they execute it with edgy electricity.

Ultimately they look destined for cult status. Loved by Paul Weller but relatively unknown in the public eye, if they emerged on the music scene during the Britpop phenomena of the mid 1990s, the bigwigs at the NME et al would surely have championed them to the upper echelons of mainstream affection. Johnny Cash sang in his signature song ‘Man in Black’ about the ‘victim of the times’; well that sums up The Rifles. To many they may be lost in translation, but on the night the East Londoners were worth every penny of the admission price.

www.myspace.com/therifles

O. Wow or O. Dear? It's O. Children

O. Children – Barden’s Boudoir, Dalston
Saturday 7 March 2009

It seems that most music journalists have undergone a lobotomy of late, leaving receptors capable only of picking up high basslines, intermittent guitar hooks and baritone vocals delivering lyrics verging on the suicidal. Or does everyone really just sound like Joy Division?

So what do O. Children sound like? Think of a band from Manchester. Think 1977. Think dead singer. Think alcoholic bass player who beats the shit out of Mrs Merton. Got it yet?

If it’s any consolation the first thing that I scribbled down was ‘Joy Division on a yacht/Duran Duran doing The Chameleons’, although this could have had something to do with their Miami Vice attire, conforming to the American theme of this ‘Snap, Crackle & Pop’ night at Barden’s.

Speaking of yachts - O. Children’s journey to buzz-band city central hasn’t all been plain sailing, as although they’re revered by the ‘Shoxton and Whoreditch’ Vice reading sarcasmoes, members of O. Children have previously anchored under the delightful moniker ‘Bono Must Die’. Under that guise their esoteric punkisms were ultimately - for want of a better phrase - a bit shit. Now rechristened and recharged, O. Children are now repackaged as the future of music … albeit perhaps three decades too late.

That’s not to say that O. Children don’t have any unique selling points. They look amazing. Frontman Tobias is just that, a frontman. All eight feet of him exude mystery and confidence as he parades around the stages seemingly growing taller by the second, his sunglasses and high-top hairstyle riding the MC Hammer wave all the way to the beach house.

Breaking with convention, O. Children’s lyrics also belie the evil that seeps from their instruments. If one could decipher Tobias’ thick drawl you might find that he’s not singing about isolation, atmosphere or interzones, he’s singing a song called ‘Ace Breasts’. Sample lyric, “Ace breasts in the back of my mind, ace breasts from the front and behind.”

Oh children, what to make of O. Children? To be honest – it was like watching a serial killer having a wank - I’m utterly confused.

Sonic Mouth catches up with Jon Marquis - Indie DJ extraordinaire

It’s Grimmer Up North

Imagine this … You up sticks and move to New Cross and it’s – shock horror – more upmarket then whence you came. Where would you have to come from to warrant that? A tyre fire in a scrap yard? The planet AIDS? No. Try east Lancashire. Try Burnley. You’re there.

We are currently in conversation someone who made this move, someone who, despite growing up in Burnley, possesses an accent not impeded by inaudible post-cotton mill, pseudo-luddite-inflected duh or indeed a vocabulary with the sophistication of a bottle fight. The man is Jon Marquis, AKA DJ Jon Du Nord, and we think he’s a bit cool.



Shirking his northern roots, Jon has managed to plant himself firmly into South-East soil taking in such comparative glamour spots as Catford and Deptford along the way. Living in London for “between eight or nine years” Jon still wears his northern accent, and claret and blue football scarf with pride. We ask him about the differences between Burnley and London, hoping to God that there are some: “I went from paying £30 a week rent to paying £85” explains Jon candidly between drags of his roll-up cigarette, “Burnley is a pretty shit place to live.” At less than £5 a day rent, I think the property market would concur.



Arriving to study at Goldsmiths, it didn’t take Jon long to become encapsulated by the live music scene, although Jon admits that living in this neck of the woods doesn’t guarantee an entirely palatable sonic experience. In fact, such was the musical poverty Marquis began to fantasise about starting a club night, and it wasn’t long before his sordid fantasy of up-and-coming bands bashing out barely coherent sets, became a soaking-wet bedsheet reeking of reality.

The clubnight, devised on a drunken evening out in the Glasshouse Stores on Brewers Lane, was christened ‘Uberstompf’ - “We wanted a Germanic sounding name”, admits Marquis. The venue, The Tatty Bogle Club, hidden behind Carnaby Street, was chosen on a number of stringent criteria: “It was a non-exclusive members club”, “it could hold about 150 people”, and most importantly “you could get two bottles of Estonian Beer for £3.” The club ran for just under a year boasting such alumni as Blood Red Shoes, Monday Club Factory Floor, Wolfie and the now sadly defunct Doublejo(n)ngrey.

After the club imploded, due to problems with the venue: “It’s now a mobile phone shop” – Jon failed to rid himself of the intoxicating buzz of DJing, and was occasionally to be found behind the decks at Soho mainstay White Heat, and more recently Noise! Noise! Noise! at Catch in Shoreditch. Marquis is still an advocate of DIY culture, and holds hope that the credit crunch will shock some venues into rekindling their initial flirtation with clubnights. Like any decent indie mentor, he’s keen to pass on advice and encouragement to anyone looking to bypass the “scene” and create their own thrills: “It’s pretty fucking simple,” he concedes, “First you need to find a venue. Don’t worry about it being the coolest place in the world; it’s your job to create the kudos, just focus on location. You could have the best-looking venue and the best bands in the world, but if it’s in the middle of fucking Crystal Palace no-one’s going to turn up are they? … Finally, harvest Myspace and get bands fresh out of the box, before they ‘make it’. That way they’re cheap and they’re not too shit yet.”

On the subject of bands, and with 2009 still in its infancy, it would be rude not to ask for some hipster tips to ‘wow-pow-now’ our friends with. After an initial look of disdain, Marquis submits and reels off a few names to keep us happy: “Telepathe, Pre-Gyratory System, The Soft Pack, The Fall, HEALTH … and of course Sonic Youth.” Phew. It is about time those young upstarts in Sonic Youth got a look-in ain’t it? Anyway … Moving away from his tastes, and onto the tastes of his clientele, we ask if there are any staples in his DJ set that are guaranteed to generate a bit of movement on the dancefloor? “Loads!” enthuses Marquis, before giving a list of songs that have probably never troubled a radio station, nor perhaps a generic indie-disco near you (ever): “Sonic Youth – ‘Ca Plaine pour moi’, Elastica – ‘Stutter’, Clinic –‘Walking With Thee’, Gang Gang Dance – ‘1st Communion’ and Telepathe – ‘Chrome's On It’.”

Well … if that sounds like your proverbial cup of tea, you can join Jon and his friend Rajinder at Noise! Noise! Noise! which takes place at Catch in Shoreditch each and every month. If you’re a lazy, agoraphobic slob, with no decent shoes, you can get involved at www.myspace.com/noisex3. Ciao.