Americans The Pleasure Routine bring their UK tour into Nottingham in support of Sundaze who are holding their single release party. We headed down to The Chameleon see if there was anything routine about pleasure.
Opening with the sound effect of thunder and a shaken tambourine, Frankie Teardrop Dead are the dark end of '60s psych - the hippy dream turned to nightmare. It's like a strange but good mix of The Doors, an early '90s psych revival band like The Soup Dragons and Definitely Maybe and the retro sounds of Standing On The Shoulder Of Giants by Oasis (and if you don’t think that Definitely Maybe is a heavy psych album go and listen to it again) The song Colours is a case in point, the backing track wouldn’t have sounded out of place on the Mancunians’ debut, it just needed Carling singing about colours in the sunshiiiiiine. The wall of noise they create also owes more than a passing nod to My Bloody Valentine.
As soon as The Pleasure Routine start, it's obvious that they're from the west coast of the US. It's all American indie/college rock and in another timeline these songs are filling the dancefloor at The Cookie Club. They've also been enjoying their time in Nottingham, giving a quick review of Wollaton Deer Park, "you got some sick deer at the park. They look pretty healthy though and they got antlers for days.” Their songs all sound familiar, a bit like The Black Lips or Surfer blood, but they're all original, which is not always an easy trick to pull off. The final song is introduced as a "slow jam for the ladies" but it isn't really a slow jam at all.
Sundaze are back and they have an admission - it wasn’t really the bassist’s dad at their gig at The Angel a couple of weeks ago. This is their single release party and it must be a special event because Sam, the front man, is wearing matching socks this time! For the first couple of songs there is a light show, which consists of a friend of the band working the fader on the stage lights until he gets bored and decides he’d rather go and have a dance. They seem more comfortable at this, their own gig, than they did at Fuzzbox but that could also be down to the fact that The Chameleon has started selling Buckfast cocktails. The new single T party is played pretty early on and is so energetic that the drummer loses one of his cymbals twice during the song. Just being much more at ease with themsleves makes the gig even better, although there are still some unanswered questions about how Connor, who stepped in at the last minute to play guitar, isn't sweating at all, even though he has a jacket on through the whole gig.
We have a favour to ask
LeftLion is Nottingham’s meeting point for information about what’s going on in our city, from the established organisations to the grassroots. We want to keep what we do free to all to access, but increasingly we are relying on revenue from our readers to continue. Can you spare a few quid each month to support us?
