Something Special

Facing a three-way clash on the Saturday afternoon at the recent End of the Road festival, I used Luke Rhinehart's The Dice Man method of making a choice and ended up seeing all of Bill Ryder-Jones, most of Nadine Shah but none of DUDS. I bitterly regretted missing out on the Mancunian band, whose 2016 EPs, Unfit For Work and Wet Reduction, I had heard on Marc Riley's show. However, on returning from the festival I found out they were playing in Brighton in a mere few weeks, so all was not lost.

That date rolled around last night and I went off to the Green Door Store expecting to hear the quirky guitars and skittering post-punk rhythms of their previous output. I was not disappointed: there was clear evidence in their sound of angular bands like early XTC and Scritti Politti; but what I was not expecting was how dynamic their stage performance would be and how their music seems to have moved on in the past 12 months. To begin with, they have expanded from a band of four to a seven-piece, incorporating vocals, two guitars, bass, drums, percussion, trumpet and cornet; also, they massed on the tiny stage all dressed in identical dark grey short sleeve shirts and trousers, making them seem like a gang and creating an imposing presence; and the sheer ferocity of the playing took the breath away.

With the expansion of the band, DUDS' sound has developed into a full-on dissonant No Wave experience. Incredibly tight, the bass, drums and percussion were a rhythmic assault and the discordant guitars and blasting brass gave no let-up: with no song longer than a couple of minutes, their brief and relentless - and encoreless set - left the audience exhausted and in no doubt they had witnessed something special.

They finished with No Remark, the opening track of their just-released album, Of A Nature Or Degree (12 tracks, 23 minutes). I picked up a copy at the merch stall afterwards and, chatting to the band, it came as no surprise that their music is characterised by short bursts of rhythmical energy when they cited The Contortions, Blurt and Wire as influences.

Of A Nature Or Degree is out now on Castle Face Records.

Wild Abandon

When Sussex Sedition was a physical fanzine written by people other than just me, we had only one editorial policy: all pieces were to be celebratory; there was enough of the negative written word in the world, we decided, and we strived to only be positive. Continuing on my own with this blog, that has been difficult when it comes to politics but in the case of music it has been easier to toe the line: on the rare occasion I have been to a bad gig, I have simply not reviewed it, despite the still-burning desire to share my thoughts on a Jenny Hval performance in Brighton a couple of years ago. That said, I went to Thee Oh Sees gig at the De La Warr Pavilion in Bexhill last night not expecting to write a review.

I have struggled for the past year to share the enthusiasm of friends, music writers and 6 Music presenters to understand the band’s appeal. I am as one with Marc Riley on most things but when I hear Thee Oh Sees on his radio show it sounds as though it is 1973 all over again – like punk never happened. I am immediately transported back to a time when my sister’s boyfriend lived at our house and would blast out his awful King Crimson and Van der Graaf Generator LPs. “You have to see Thee Oh Sees live to fully appreciate them” was the standard response to my complaints and so, when the band’s quickly sold-out Brighton show was transferred to my favourite local venue, I and a couple of other sceptics snapped up some tickets. In truth, I went to bury Thee Oh Sees, not to praise them.

However, even before the Californian band began their set last night, I knew that I was going to have to eat my words. With two drummers front and centre of the stage flanked by leader John Dwyer on guitar and vocals and Tim Hellman on bass, I could feel my sternum weakening when they were only going through their last minute sound level checks. When they began proper, it was an all-out punk rock assault; the energy was ferocious and there was an atmosphere of wild abandon that prompted crowd surfing, the like of which I have never seen before at the De La Warr.

With Dan Rincon and !!!’s Paul Quattrone the dual drummers, this was the line-up that made 2016’s two albums, the band’s 17th and 18th in a 20-year existence, A Weird Exits and An Odd Entrances. What was surprising last night was there was barely a hint of the heavy prog overtones I had heard in their recorded output; instead, it was like Nuggets played by Johnny Moped with a hint of Warsaw and late Stone Roses thrown in. Dwyer used his strapped-high see-through guitar like a machine gun and, in a red and black striped jumper and cut-down jeans, looked like he was menacing the rest of the band to keep up with him.

It was a brilliant no-nonsense performance although, with little between-songs interaction, I have no idea what tracks they played; but as the 75-minutes without encore came to a close, my sympathy was with the drummers who were just showing the faintest signs of fatiguing at the merciless pace. Leaving the venue as converts, we hit the fresh air outside only to realise that the atmosphere and pace had also driven on our drinking at a similarly frenetic tempo.