Brighton Bands - Our Top Picks!
Straight from our 10 of the Best! Spotify playlist.
Welcome!
'10 of the Best' is a little feature we run every month, where we select 10 of our favourite tracks for you wonderful lot to have a little listen to each and every month.
This might be on a theme, a location, a festival or even just 10 songs which you’d never put together but we can’t get enough of that month (think Dua Lipa’s One Kiss getting unceremoniously slammed into Bill Withers Lovely Day’, they shouldn’t go together but my god we will try…).
This month we’ve put together some tracks from our favourite bands from Brighton. Bands we’ve been listening to since we launched our first sustainable styles back in 2016.
The theme of Brighton bands came to us as between Christmas and New Year we heard the news that local band Abattoir Blues have sadly called it a day. They've been one of the best live bands we’ve seen in and around Brighton over the last couple of years.
But it got us thinking that we should put together a little low-down on the bands that have made Brighton a blast for us!
So, here we go...
Cheers,
Rich, co-founder of Goose Studios
1. Abattoir Blues
It seems only fitting to start with these guys. We’ve seen them a few times in and around Brighton and every single time they have absolutely destroyed it with a live performance that is as visceral as it comes. Lead singer Harry Waugh just has a presence about him on stage that you can’t help but feed in to him and the music.
In short, you were always going home sweaty and with a smile on your face and that is what a gig should always be about.
Sense, the last song on this month’s playlist shows a real raw tenderness to the band is a fitting end to this month’s playlist. Going to miss catching these guys around Brighton!
2. The Magic Gang
We can’t really say much about The Magic Gang that hasn’t already been said by pretty much damn near everyone in the music biz. They look ace. They play ace music. They guys are ace.
Going to a gig of theirs makes you feel carefree and young no matter what your age!
After releasing their third EP on the Felix White from The Maccabees newest imprint Yala Records, The Magic Gang have gone from strength to strength with their debut album charting comfortably inside the Top 20 in the UK.
We’ve gone to the very beginning here with their 2015 version of Alright, which still sounds as great now as it did then, nearly 4 years ago. I am sure they will be traversing Europe this summer, so get down to ya local venue or hop on a plane (if that still is a thing after Brexit…) and catch them asap.
3. Sulky Boy
Dan Taylor’s Sulky Boy is on something of a hiatus nowadays but his 2017 track Drunk Dial from the EP Sulky Boys Play Love Songs is so, so damn good. Similar to The Magic Gang, Sulky Boy takes us right back to the music we used to listen to when we were 17/18 years old (which if you know me, is like a small life time ago…).
The winner for us is the chorus. It’s absolute belter, one of those songs you sing out loud whilst cooking ya beans on toast, but to reduce it so is an injustice as Taylor’s lyrics make us nostalgic for those all too elusive ‘good times’ we bang on about.
Or maybe that’s just us thinking about all those drunk calls we wish the other person had just ignored…
4. Our Girl
We saw Our Girl headlining The Haunt in Brighton when they toured on the release of their debut album 'Stranger Today' a couple of months ago. Released on Cannibal Hymns (who have their own mad good stable of bands), Our Girl are littering lists of bands to watch in 2019.
All over BBC 6music, Soph Nathan’s voice weaves through layers of reverb whilst the drums hold everything together. Like The Magic Gang they will be all over the place this summer, so keep your eyes peeled and try to catch them before you have to be 28 rows back with a £7 lager in your hand wishing you saw them about 8 months earlier somewhere more intimate.
5. Breathe Panel
Straight from Our Girl (see above), guitarist Josh Tyler swaps bands, drops the bass and picks up the guitar for Breathe Panel. We won’t lie, we’ve been shit and slack to the whole Breathe Panel thing and only caught them for the first time in November (opening for Our Girl incidentally) and then we realised we’ve made a massive cock up.
Their self-titled debut album came out in the summer of 2018 and it’s a genuine little piece of summer magic, like one of those all too raw albums which become synonymous with a season, it just feels like summer. The bass drives, the guitar melodies are infectious and damn they know how to mic up a drum kit.
This is one band you’ll be listening to in July, beer in hand and the sun on your face. Oh and the album artwork is something we want framed and put on our ‘office’ wall.
5. Underwater Boys
One place to start with Underwater Boys - Bye & Bye. Simply, one of our favourite tracks of last year and ended up as our office ‘most listened’ individual track from Spotify last year.
We listened to it first in May and caught them at The Western venue for Alternative Escape festival back in May and yeah, these guys are just a super humble and genuine bunch who if the ‘gram is to be believed, were in the studio a couple of months back. Fingers crossed as we’ve got the January blues and want some Underwater Boys love to make us feel better.
Peace out gang and happy listening x
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