STRANGEFORMS FESTIVAL – DOING IT FOR THEMSELVES SINCE 2014
PART TWO – The Brudenell Days
In which our dry-humoured hero inexplicably forgets 2018, endures the limbo of the “Plague Years”, and makes it to the promised land of Brudenell and Post-Rock Pieminster!
Hi. Me again. Did you read the first part of my StrangeForms story? No? Well, go back and do that first. I’ll wait.
Ready? OK.
We’ve left WHARF CHAMBERS behind now, and have moved up the hill to the BRUDENELL SOCIAL CLUB, for reasons which you WILL have read by now. By a stroke of luck, the walk to the venue from my favourite hotel takes almost exactly the same time as before, just in the opposite direction. Only uphill1. It’s a much more modern kind of place – brick and timber, single storey, flat roof. Looks pretty much exactly as you would expect a 1950s social club to look. Layout inside in nice and neat. There are two gig spaces, only one of which – the bigger one2– we will be using, and a separate lounge/bar area. Good big stage in the corner in front of a generous standing area, with a raised level at the back where the bar and merch tables are. Bars do a decent range of beers ’n’ stuff, a mix of pub standards and some local craft brews, at not-stupid prices. Sadly, no gingery death cider. PIEMINSTER pies in the lounge, but they are VERY popular and you might have to wait ages for one. We are, however, right next door to the magnificent ABU BAKR supermarket, where you can purchase a range of fine curries , samosas and snacks3 which you can take away and consume at the tables outside the venue. If you want to, of course. It’s not compulsory.
As I mentioned previously, I miss the first Brudenell fest, for reasons that still escape me. Looking back at the 2018 line-up, it appears not to have been a major departure from the old format, with a fairly standard mix of post and math. Outliers include the most excellent cellist JO QUAIL, drum maestro ADAM BETTS and mathcore heroes ROLO TOMASSI. Regulars include VASA, POLY-MATH, and ALPHA MALE TEA PARTY. I’m particularly annoyed about missing TALONS and TACOMA NARROWS BRIDGE DISASTER. Anyway, we’ll skip right on to 2019.
Actually, before we go on, I’d like to mention ticket prices. This year, 2019, we get 18 bands for ONLY £21.00, and that is stupidly cheap by any measure. This has been a regular StrangeForms feature since the beginning, when it was only, if I recall, £15.00 for the weekend. Somehow, I don’t think Stewart is doing this to make money.
Apologies for the interruption. Back to the meaty stuff.
This year sees a slight broadening of the brief, with an upswing in the metal content of the fest. We start gently, though, with the welcome reappearance of favourites, the folking lovely4 TOMORROW WE SAIL, who are just as good as they ever were.
And now for something completely different. A couple of AXES in their other band, sci-fi stoner instrumentalists DUSTEROID, who sound exactly as their name would imply and are very good indeed. But where’s the math?
Ah, here we go! None other than my pals from Edinburgh, the ridiculously cheerful VASQUEZ, back on stage after a lengthy hiatus. If you ever wondered what a grin would sound like if it were a band, then Vasquez is just that. They may be a little rusty, but I find it very easy to forgive them, because they are just so much fun. Next up, fellow Scots, post-prog alt-rockers HALO TORA – some of whom are now in up ’n’ coming post-metal combo BENEATH A STEEL SKY, who you should check out immediately.
Things get intense now with the first – but not last – SF appearance of the angry and uncompromisingly political melodic hardcore of ITHACA. They’re the very epitome of everything Donald Trump will come to hate – feminist, socialist, anti-racist, etc. One might call them ‘woke’, but I’m not sure if that word has been coined – or corrupted – yet. They’re fierce.
We head off into Europe now, and FALL OF MESSIAH, who you should all know by now, are next, doing their excellent French post-screamo thing very well indeed, followed by the math noise pyrotechnics of Oslo’s AIMING FOR ENRIKE, who do ridiculous things with a drum kit, a guitar and very many pedals. I had been told, by Vasa’s John Niblock, that these Norwegians were dead good, and he was right. They are.
Two to go, and we get the day’s second blast of noisy politics, and a second strong female voice, courtesy of the ferocious post-hardcore of SVALBARD. Impressive stuff, with lots to say regarding misogyny/violence against women, something we all need to pay more heed to.
It’s late and I’m knackered, too tired to last much beyond a couple of songs from VENNART. It’s odd, I liked Mike Vennart in OCEANSIZE, and I like what he’s been doing recently with EMPIRE STATE BASTARD, but I just can’t get on with this project. Too ‘prog rock’ for me, I think, although he seems to go down well with the crowd.
I’m off. See you tomorrow for
Day 2.
I need to remind myself here that I’m not supposed to be reviewing every band / every day / every year, and just providing an overview of the history of the fest, otherwise we’ll be here forever. And nobody wants that. I shall try to be a bit briefer going forward.
Openers TALL TALKER, returnees from 2016, are talented, no doubt, but there’s too much jazzy noodling for me. I prefer my math with extra FUN, like yesterday’s Vasquez, or Alpha Male Tea Party. But, then, Stewart hasn’t booked bands just to please me5. But pleased I am with UPCDOWNC, a band I‘ve been following for years. They’ve evolved over time from their post-rock roots, morphing at times into a raging sludge-beast, or doing soundtrack stuff, but they’ve never been boring. And today they’re crushing.
Back in 2017, the gloomy goth songstress6 A A WILLIAMS is a very new phenomenon, and this is, I think, only her second ever show. She has been getting a LOT of attention, and will go on to be a BIG THING, but today she suffers from some niggly technical problems and a very talky audience. It’s hard to decide whether the hype is justified right now. Time will tell.
Insane noise rockers CATTLE, up next, abandon the stage and set up on the floor, two drum kits and a slab of things with knobs on for the ‘singer’ to shout at. They are utterly ferocious, and I can’t quite understand how what they do is possible.
Back to the math with BODY HOUND again, who seem a bit more tuneful this year. Less widdly. And then something that might be called ‘emo-math’ from itoldyouiwouldeatyou whose awkward name is the thing that annoys me least about them. My notes at the time read ‘lots of emo-whinge about not being able to get a girlfriend. Bad teenage poetry set to music’ Oh dear. Sorry lads.
But then, oh yes, we have PIJN. Pijn are spectacular. Glorious. Post-metal of the highest order. They’ve expanded since the last time I saw them, now with added cello and, more unexpectedly, lap steel guitar, and they are just the best thing, ever. I like Pijn.
GALLOPS were last here in 2017, and they’ll be back in 2024 and, as always they are excellent with their hefty dance-math. Techno for post-rock people.
Finally, just like last night, I’m not hugely into the headliner, so I only hang on for a couple of songs from THE PHYSICS HOUSE BAND. I hate saxophones7, and there is way too much jazzy parping and squonking involved for my tastes, no matter how well performed it may be.
SF19 done, then. I do like the post and math stuff, but it’s nice to see a bit more variety creeping in. That’s a theme which will continue in the future, but things are about to shudder to an abrupt halt. For we are about to enter THE PLAGUE YEARS. . .
It’s 2020, and everything goes tits up. Nothing is happening, all venues are closed.. Will StrangeForms ever be back? Seems like a dumb question now, obviously it’ll be back, but we don’t know that in 2020. Even if it DOES come back, will we have to wear masks and stand at arm’s length from the next guy?
2021. Still nothing.
2022. . . and we’re back! I turn up with a vax certificate, a mask and a recent negative Covid test, none of which are needed. Thank all the gods! We’re finally done with this bloody plague.
Stewart and the team have put together what is, arguably, the best line-up so far – no offence to those who have gone before. We have the triumphant return of post-rock royalty, MAYBESHEWILL, headlining the Saturday, a day which features exciting new kids CLT DRP and PUPIL SLICER, both making big waves in the rock pond, and both of whom are very good indeed in their own very different ways. MOUNTAIN CALLER bring us the proggy post-metal; KKETT are a bundle of camp joy, like a math-rock SCISSOR SISTERS.
Elsewhere, we get the infectious math-pop of ORCHARDS, the jazz-math of SUFFER LIKE G DID8, the punky screamo of CHALK HANDS, and the ever-reliable POLY-MATH (now sporting a keyboard player and a saxophonist, who surprises me enormously by not being horrible). It seems to me that there is a higher ratio of non-standard, straight white-male band members here this year, and I ask Stewart if this is a deliberate policy. ‘No,’ he says, ‘I just book the bands I like.’ Just a happy co-incidence, then. Deliberate or not, this is something to be encouraged.
Sunday starts with lower-case math rock from a-tota-so, formed from the remains of old favourites ALRIGHT THE CAPTAIN and aided, as is their wont, by various guest vocalists – in this case some bloke whose name I can’t remember and ELLIE GODWIN from the very excellent indie-grunge kids NO VIOLET, who will be along later. ALPHA MALE TEA PARTY are back again, as are AXES, but it’s all fresh-faced new kids for the rest of the day. HIDDEN MOTHERS and SUGAR HORSE provide the hefty stuff, noise-rockers MUMS are bonkers, and LAKES offer a bit of emo-pop light relief. Headliners are JOHNNY FOREIGNER, who describe themselves as ‘pop-punk, and who am I to argue? They’ve been absent from the scene for a decade, it seems, and are, perhaps, a bit rough around the edges. Nobody minds, though.
If I’m forced at gunpoint to declare a favourite from the weekend, I’d have to say, after long and deep deliberation9 , it’s SUGAR HORSE. They describe themselves as ‘decidedly average’. They are wrong. Their appearance alone makes this StrangeForms line-up one of the best. Back after Covid with, as they say, a bang.
2023 sees a further broadening of the genre content, with something of a surge in shoe-gazey stuff, and some properly thunderous Metal, and whatever it is that THE GURU GURU do.
But before we get into that, I have to mention the gig in the pub next door on the Friday night, which is billed, perhaps informally, as a warm-up for the main event. There’s a local post-hardcore kinda band called NEW WOUNDS playing in the ROYAL PARK CELLARS just the other side of the supermarket, and they are joined by a trio of bands from Edinburgh – UNDERVOLT, CODESPEAKER and VOID OF LIGHT. I know all of these very well, so I HAVE to drop in to say hello. They don’t know that I’ll be there, and the double-takes when they see me are priceless. And they are all dead good.
Next day, I ask the chap from SLAB if his band is the same sludgy metal Slab that I saw years ago in Edinburgh. No, he says, not that Slab, with an expression that suggest this is not the first time he has been asked that question. THIS Slab plays solid, hefty post-rock, and they are a good start to a Saturday during which we will meet some very odd bands.
Bristol art-rockers SANG FROID are odd only in that they are very hard to find on the interweb. Turns out that the cheeky scamps have changed their name to SANS Froid. Oddly10 enough, they’re followed by another name changer. This time it’s DEAD BIRD who, possibly wisely, will change their name to AS LIVING ARROWS, but who will continue to play their emo/post-hardcore thing rather well.
It’s bouncy math-pop next, from FES, who are remarkably cheerful despite coming from Peterborough11, and then it’s the first Irish import of the weekend. GOD ALONE are, I think, inhuman. They do some kind of turbo-charged dance/math, a bit like ASIWYFA with a major caffeine overdose. I have no idea how they do what they do. They make VASA look a tad restrained, although Niblock still wins the gurning contest. Or he would do if there was one. Which there isn’t.
THE ST. PIERRE SNAKE INVASION (I want to say TSPSI, but I might accidentally call the cat…)are one of those bands who are just not to be classified. From Bristol, the do some kid of edgy, arty, noisy math-core/alt-rock thing, and the bass player wears the most spectacularly awful suit of the weekend. Equally undefinable, but considerably more Belgian, are THE GURU GURU, who feature a pyjama-clad sin…wait. I was going to say ‘singer, but I’ll go for ‘vocalist’ instead. Angular and theatrical, they do what they do and I’m left scratching my head in some kind of bewilderment, wondering if he EVER found his rum.
We end the day with ‘punk troubador’ JAMIE LENMAN, who has what may be the finest moustache of the weekend, but he doesn’t have a bass player. He used to be in hard-rockers REUBEN, y’know.
Sunday, and the shoe-gaze is strong today, with openers HOAMIN from Bradford (who impress me so much I buy their record on Bandcamp when I get home), Birmingham’s GREYWAVE, and the remarkably bouncy SLOW CRUSH from Belgium. In amongst those we have the gothy cold-wave of LA RISSA (largely invisible in the smoke and gloomy lighting), the apocalyptic industrial/electronica of FAKEYOURDEATH and what is probably a one-off reappearance of slightly rusty, local post-metal heroes ENVOYS. Drum wizard ADAM BETTS is back again, in his COLOSSAL SQUID12 guise, followed by the ludicrously entertaining Irish math-rock duo BICURIOUS who appear to be fronted by some kind of hyperactive stick-insect. Seriously, there must be something in the water over in Eire. And then, finally, there’s the Metal. And it doesn’t get much more metal than the mighty CONJURER, who are catastrophically loud and hugely impressive. This is metal how it should be done. It would be hard for anybody to follow Conjurer, so they don’t. . . and that’s the show over for this year.
2024. Only one year to go before StrangeForms history turns into StrangeForms future, and it’s something of a roller-coaster, with high bits and low bits, newcomers and familiar faces; one band I’ve been hassling Stewart to book for ages, one I hope to never see again, and one surprise highlight.
The day begins with the gorgeous emotional math-pop of LOVE RARELY, whom I like a great deal, before that band I’ve been annoying Stewart about since forever. Not sure if they’re post-metal or heavy post-rock but, whatever they are, they are DIN OF CELESTIAL BIRDS and they are mighty fine. I chat briefly with them afterwards and they give me a shiny sticker, which is nice. Worth the wait? Absolutely.
Then it’s PLEIADES – NOT the djent Pleiades from Massachusetts, nor the post-rock one from Taiwan, but the ‘post-something’ one from Manchester. I’ve just seen them recently in Edinburgh, and am more than happy to see them again.
Moving swiftly on, we have the quite odd experimental guitar/drum duo DEMCATS, who haven’t played together for a while, I think, and seem to be having a hard time remembering exactly what it is they do. Or maybe they always sound like that. A blast of noisy indie/punk next from OTHER HALF from Norwich, who are great fun, and then it’s one of the StrangeForms’ house bands, FALL OF MESSIAH, who do the same thing they always do, and do it very nicely. Despite the guitarist on the left playing with, apparently, a broken neck. Probably against doctor’s orders, I’d guess, but they’re French and they don’t follow sensible non-EU health regulations.
Back to Brexitland next with Manchester’s FALSE ADVERTISING and their infectious indie-pop noise and their guitarist’s nice shiny pink frock, and then the returning CLT DRP who have, in a mere two years, grown from angry young upstarts into angry slightly older established upstarts, and more than deserve their place near the top of the bill. Top spot goes this time to metal-core heavyweights EMPLOYED TO SERVE, who are, being honest, not entirely to my taste. Still, as I may have said before, Stewart doesn’t book bands to please only me and they go down well with an enthusiastic crowd. I get the impression that a number of punters have shown up specifically for EtS, which is fine. The availability of day tickets probably encourages that sort of thing.
While we’re on the subject of punters, it seems to me that the StrangeForms audience has a higher than standard ratio of women13 than most gigs I’ve been to. As with the previously mentioned diversity of the performers, this is a good thing and should be encouraged.
Last lap, now. SLOW LORIS are silly. Silly, but very entertaining. Instrumental rock – their Bandcamp page suggests ‘experimental’ and ‘jazz’, but I’m not so sure – with songs about haircuts and spooky houses. ALLORA are NOT silly, but are very, very good. They are last minute replacements for EXIT CHILD, who pulled out for reasons unknown. Four ladies, they play dark alt-pop with gorgeous vocal harmonies, and sound a bit like Fleetwood Mac would do if they came from Leeds and wore Doc Marten boots. I buy their E.P.
Sadly, the warm glow left by Allora is swiftly blown away by JAGUAR THRONE, a new band who, I think, might feature somebody from BOSSK, and who are, in my opinion, one of the worst bands ever to play StrangeForms. They play macho, lumpen metalcore and have no redeeming qualities whatsoever. To be sure, they are competent and confident, but they leave me stone cold. Maybe it’s just me, though. Thank your personal favourite lord, then, for the returning IRK, a supremely bonkers noise-rock trio who, if their decoy setlist is to be believed, play a set of songs ALL called ‘Going Away To College By Blink 182’14.
Prog/psychedelic/alt-rockers DYSTOPIAN FUTURE MOVIES up next, who are going along fine until Caroline’s guitar dies mid-song. It takes them ages to fix the problem, and they lose one song from their set and all of their momentum. They push on, though, and by their final song, ‘A Decent Class of Girl’, they are magnificent.
MEMORY OF ELEPHANTS haven’t been StrangeFormers since 2017, but they’re still the same turbo-math nut-jobs they were seven years ago. Joyful and triumphant.
After Fall of Messiah’s broken neck, STRAIGHT GIRL15’s broken toe might seem, well, a bit trivial, but I’m willing to believe that it hurts a lot more. It doesn’t, however, stop them from slapping us around the ears with their pounding electro/dance/punk anti-sexual-violence, anti-discrimination diatribes, delivered with a big grin. Or maybe a grimace of pain. Or both.
Only two to go, now, one familiar and one new. The old hands are GALLOPS, disco-math at its finest, back for their third appearance, and they’re grand. Finally, closing the show, are first-timers DELTA SLEEP, who are, it seems, quite popular. I’m not entirely convinced by their emo-ish proggy math, but maybe it’s because it’s the end of a busy weekend and I’m knackered. They do, however, have nice big glowing balls.
STRANGEFORMS 2025
So, what do we have to look forward to this April? Well, I think it’s safe to say that there will be some math-rock and/or some post-rock and/or some noisy stuff and/or some arty stuff. The 2025 line-up is almost complete (at time of writing) and there are some tasty treats to be had. Clearly, the biggest draw is going to be the Sunday night headliner – none other than math/post legends AND SO I WATCH YOU FROM AFAR. They’ve gone through a lot of changes since I saw them playing in a tiny club in Edinburgh, supporting MAYBESHEWILL, both in sound and personnel, but they’re pretty much guaranteed to tear the place apart. What they’ll be playing is anybody’s guess, for they have plenty of material to draw upon. Personally, I’d like to see them re-visit some of the older, more overtly post-rock stuff, as unlikely as that may be. Saturday night bill-toppers are the cinematic, enigmatic, but always mesmerising, duo NORDIC GIANTS. No doubt there will be visual treats to go with the tunes. There may also be a trumpet.
Ireland will be well represented, with the return of math loonies BICURIOUS, and Dublin’s very own post-rock maestros OVERHEAD, THE ALBATROSS, about whom I am unreasonably excited. Riffs and heft will be provided by the returning HIDDEN MOTHERS and, as far as I can recall, the first DOOM band to play the fest, Glasgow’s CWFEN. I’d like to see Cwfen’s Siobhan joining a-tota-so on vocals, for they’re back too. Further crunch MAY come from Brighton’s EVERY HELL, who are described as ‘rock’, and about whom I know bugger all.
There are a few more bands who I don’t know at all, which is always exciting. There’s BUREAU DE CHANGE (Noise from Bath16), OMOIA (alt-rock), SOCKS AND BALLERINAS (math-rock), PATIENCE (alt-rock), WHAT? NAH! (math/jazz) and CIVIL SERVICE (post-rock). I genuinely look forward to finding out what they do and, maybe, discovering a new favourite band. As is my habit in these things, I will NOT look them up on Bandcamp, or whatever, to test them out, and will wait and see.
There are a couple of returnees, BIG LAD and WOT GORILLA?, who haven’t been seen since the Great Missed Episode in 2018. And lastly, there is VLMV, who will very probably be the breathing space in the midst of the hurly-burly of the day.
At time of writing, the very latest festival post says, at the end, ‘& more TBA!’, but there can’t be that much to add, as we already have seventeen names and traditionally there have only been nine bands a day at StrangeForms. Who the last band might be remains to be seen, but I’m putting my money on WET LEG17.
STOP PRESS: Ooooh! It’s SVALBARD again, increasing the metal quotient of the fest significantly. Hefty!
Well, there it is. I said at the beginning that I was going to take a close-ish look at the first StrangeForms, and then just wing it from there, and that’s what I’ve done – although I think maybe it got a bit out of control. If my tiresome rambling and frivolous footnoting hasn’t put you right off, I think you should seriously consider spending a relatively small number of your Earth Pounds on a ticket, or tickets, for StrangeForms 2025. (If only so you can hunt me down and shoot me.) How else are you going to be able to say “I was there when …. played StrangeForms 25, and NOW look at them, headlining Glasto like the big corporate sell-outs that they are!”?
StrangeForms 2025 is on Saturday 26 and Sunday 27 April, and all the info you’ll need can be found right here
TL;DR? StrangeForms has been, is, and will be grand. Buy a ticket. Go!
POSTSCTRIPT: So, just thinking out loud, what of the future? After ten amazing years of StrangeForms, should it continue on as before? Which would be fine. Or should it evolve? Into something bigger, perhaps? A second stage, maybe, which the Brudenell would surely be able to provide. Or formally adopt the Royal Park Cellars as a second venue? I’m not sure.
CON: A second stage would mean a degree of running back and forth, trying to see everything and miss nothing. Hard work.
PRO: A second stage would mean more bands, more genres, more choice. All good things.
CON: Clashes. Always a hazard at festivals, which the current format avoids.
I don’t know. I like the cosy friendliness of the set-up as it is now, Anyway, it’s not up to me. I don’t have a say. Whatever happens in the future, I will be there for as long as my aging carcass endures, or at least as long as my wife lets me. She has been remarkably tolerant. So far.
FOOTNOTES:
- A very good thing when walking back down after a long day, I can tell you.
- Just checked, and apparently BOTH rooms have a 400 capacity. Learn something new every day.
- This memoir is NOT sponsored by Abu Bakr Supermarket, I just really like their samosas.
- Ha! See what I did there?
- Although, obviously, he should.
- I hate that word. Why did I just write that?
- A broad statement that MAY come back to bite me later.
- Somebody DID tell me who ‘G’ was, but I’ve forgotten. Somebody off the telly, I think.
- No deliberation at all. There is a clear winner.
- Ha! See what I did there, part 2.
- Yes, I have been there.
- Not actually a giant cephalopod. That would be weird.
- And, we should say, non-binary/non-gender specific people.
- None of them are called ‘Going Away To College By Blink 182’
- ‘Not straight, not a girl’, in their own words.
- In my experience, that means bubbly farting sounds.
- Actually, I’d really like to see Wet Leg.
APPENDIX: Click HERE for a listing of all the StrangeForms bands from 2014–24
