It would be fair to say that the newly rebranded D.I.D are at a bit of a crossroads. Having enjoyed lots of Radio 1 airplay and a Top 50 album with their 2012 debut All Our Favourite Stories, the band are on the threshold of releasing their second album with all the potential - and risk - that entails.
For fans, the anticipation of a new record has been growing for months as has the frustration with a lack of anything tangible. The band debuted new song Hotel online last year but other than a few low-key gigs a new album still seems as if it could be some way away. When it arrives, of course, it could catapult the Nottingham five piece to stardom. And, having now heard a fair amount of new material over the course of a handful of local gigs, any lack of success certainly won't be for the quality of the songwriting.
Alongside some old favourites an excited Rescue Rooms crowd were treated to a showcase of fresh material including one or two songs we'd never heard before. Hotel's filthy guitar riff gets better and better with every listen while it would be a major surprise if the superb Killer Whale doesn't become both an airplay staple and their first chart hit.
For me, one of the main reasons to enjoy D.I.D is because they can slip from one style to another as easily as putting on a new jacket. In an eighty minute set they leapt from joyous saxophone based indie - on Young - via lighter-waving anthems to full-on rock guitar. If you had walked in during Proud of Me, left and reappeared during the instrumental crescendo of River Jordan you'd think it was a different band, such is the variety of style.
Of course this huge strength may also end up being the band's undoing. In the modern day it's easy to have success as a one-trick pony and being difficult to pigeonhole in a genre has done for bigger artists than D.I.D. While I and lots of other fans like all their output, it strikes me that they have yet to truly find their real groove - or perhaps they are reluctant to nail their colours to one particular mast.
Given the choice, I think the band would elect to go down a dirty, rock guitar path and I think this is sometimes what suits them best. While they are one of the best bands I've seen at knocking out a harmonious, anthemic pop song (a great rendition of Do The Right Thing illustrated that perfectly) it's perhaps time for D.I.D to choose a path and stick to it.
All in all, another excellent D.I.D gig has just whetted the appetite further for their long awaited second album. I still have high hopes that it will give the lads the success they deserve, and, having heavily invested in three huge D.I.D letters - looking oddly as if they had been carved from Ed Miliband's 'Edstone' - so do they.
D.I.D played at Rescue Rooms on Tuesday 12 May 2015.
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