Local favourites // Novella

A Google of 'Novella' may confuse the lazy among you into thinking that London's Novella is also in fact Finland's Novella, or perhaps Christian rock band from the early 90s. They're not.

This Novella has been knocking around London support slots for a while, but their recent superb trio of Sonic Youth / Teenage Fanclub influenced tracks is the best the band has produced yet, each descending into grinding jams swamped in fuzzy feedback with dreamily laissez faire vocals.

Alongside Warm Brains, Not Cool, Male Bonding, Gross Magic, Yuck, Colours, Weird Dreams, Sauna Youth among others, London isn't exactly wanting for lo-fi talent, however the tracks below suggest Novella is more than able of joining the party. Catch them at 1234 in a few weeks.

The Things You Do by Novella.
Oh Brian by Novella.
Beach Fatigue by Novella.

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Sauna Youth // Tense Men

We haven't done a local favourites feature in a while, so now you get two for the price of one. Or two for the price of none, really.

Trading in 3 chord riffs and cat calls, Sauna Youth is a balls out blast that resurrects the late 70s without seeming formulaic or copyist. Sharing a Faux Discx 7" with Ale Mania and various London stages with Abe Vigoda, Fair Ohs and Trogons of late, the soon to be released Backgrounds marks a distinctive step forward. The band have been about for a while now, but hopefully this release will drive them on to even better things.





To segue impecibly, Tense Men is a project formed of Sauna Youth frontman Rich and Cold Pumas' Ollie. Their sound is claustrophobic post punk built around looping, agitating guitars, chanted lyrics and incessant cymbal-led drumming. It's definitely tense, I'm pretty sure they're men and the tracks below, particularly A Gruesome Discovery, suggest this side project has legs.

TENSE MEN by TENSE MEN

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