FESTIVAL NEWS: It’s ‘Four Nations Friday’ at Steelhouse
Steelhouse Festival has announced the full bill for its opening night, on Friday 26 July.
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Author: UberAdmin
Snake Bite Whisky – ‘This Side Of Hell’ (Pavement Entertainment)
Now, Monk would never be one to advocate mixing your drinks, and especially not in the same glass, but Australia’s Snake Bite Whisky do indeed present a heady brew, as DQ and he found out when they first encountered them at last year’s HRH Sleaze festival. So impressive were they when they headlined the second stage that I was compelled to describe their performance as “off the radar, never mind the hook”: ever since, he has been thirsting to hear more. So, you can imagine his delight when frontman Jay R Sleaze winged their debut full-lengther all the way from the suvern hemisphere all the way to the UR inbox to brighten up an otherwise depressing ball-freezing January…
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Pedro The Lion – ‘Phoenix’ (Big Scary Monsters/Polyvinyl)
‘Phoenix’ is a particularly notable release in the narrative of Pedro The Lion. While also being the first full-length since 2004’s cult favourite, ‘Achilles’ Heel’, it marks the end of David Bazan’s pilgrimage as a solo act, returning to the project that first made his name in the late nineties, and won many hearts over with its signature emo-laden, lo-fi alternative rock – or slowcore, if you will. Incidentally, this is the first Pedro release since David’s publicly announced disenchantment with the faith that was shared by so many of his early listeners.
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Evergrey – ‘The Atlantic’ (AFM)
Like all good progressive albums, ‘The Atlantic’ is big, pompous and melodramatic. It’s an hour of pristine Gothic histrionics that demands you set up a professional lighting rig at home; listening to it without lasers shooting everywhere and smoke machines billowing out thick clouds would be selling this record short. It’s also well-crafted, engrossing and one of Evergrey’s finest works in ages. It’s strong enough to attract Emerson, Lake And Palmer loving prog-aficionados at the same time as their Wacken-attending offspring and is a nice return to form for this seasoned act.
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Avatar/The Mahones/Dylan Walshe – Glasgow, The Garage – 16 January 2019
Our residden panda went into this show not knowing the first two bands, and only knowing a couple of songs from Avatar, but, as she was leaving, she was adding everyone’s songs to my playlist. It was also the first night of tour, so you knew that these bands were going to give their absolute everything to kick it all off the best they could.
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