Bubbling away in the cavernous doldrums beneath the Roundhouse where tonight the insufferable Dropkick Murphys bumble along incomprehensibly to fiddles and punk that's about as authentic as most 'Irish pubs' are Peckham's
Beaty Heart, who've voyaged north of the Thames to headline the somewhat insipidly denominated 'Sonic' night of this year's Roundhouse Rising festival. They're preceded however by a quite demented half hour from analogue gear enthusiasts
CLOUT! who sound, for the most part, like Seb Rochford rewiring every psychotic vision within the discography of Devo to hugely dramatic effect. Validating their stated claim under manifesto pretence of setting out 'to challenge the idea of having a particular role in a band', each member may be found thrumming out bass crunch one moment and emitting crackled lines of synth warble the following and, as Joe Lean may well have apathetically garbled were he here, "you can tell they've listened to some cool records."
Attentions and talk then turns – somewhat perplexingly – to school days of yore as the ambience develops the distinctive aroma of schooled assembly, a padlocked trunk of a tuck box hauled onstage as impromptu settle. As such it feels as though Beaty Heart are merely peers, elevated only in altitude and not attitude nor eminence and what's more, as the quartet anxiously grapple with the odd minor-slash-slightly-major technical difficulty, this intimacy or warped sense of camaraderie engenders a quivering state of nervousness within lead vocalist Josh Mitchell.
To run with the alma mater metaphor Mitchell and sampler extraordinaire James Moruzzi, embellished in cardinal beads, look a little as though they've just returned from gap year excursion as the stage is bestrewn with Western African instrumentation either amassed along the way or perhaps acquired across the road at Ray Man Music at some nebulous point in time. Chiselled cheeks and neatly kempt fringes lend them an air of Made In Chelsea outcast skulking in E4 screen corner too although it's perhaps best for all involved not to dwell on said comparison for anything over a fleeting thought.
Then, cometh the (later than scripted) hour and cometh the men, women (and debatably children) of the Roundhouse Choir, a 'vibrant vocal group aged 16-25 led by Osnat Schmool'. Despite the concrete flooring heaving with itchy feet there are conceivably as many performers onstage as there are onlookers off it as Schmool's impeccably inculcated 'Choir proffer a luscious vocal backdrop into which Beaty Heart's dismantled melodies may trustfully fall, these choral washes often trailing in the wake of Mitchell's equally masterful yodel. The thirty-odd voices behind the band subsequently serve as a soft, mattress-like foundation upon which the likes of Happyness, Banana Bread, and other 'psychedelic drum pop' numbers may whimsically bound although they also provide unforeseeably accomplished West African vocal interludes customarily only heard emanating from Wellington Street and, more accurately, from the Lyceum Theatre.
Much has been made by many (
ourselves included) of the sonic similitude between Beaty Heart and Animal Collective, however tonight such a comparison is diffused and diluted in the best way feasible as we begin to associate the two solely in the way in which every 21st century post-punk impersonator has imitated XTC in some way, shape, soundwave, or format. Mitchell's voice merely – and dare I say it naturally – assimilates itself to that of Noah Lennox and that in itself is pure praise in place of panning for it is truly something of a marvel. Never is this more effectively substantiated than on gloopy closer Slush Puppy, a stupefying brain-freeze of a track that brings a strangely transcendental experience to a quite exquisite climax. Emerging from the basement feeling to a certain extent purified, we slip into the gushing stream of shirtless stoics bellowing some hooliganistic chant re: Dropkick Murphys. They may have been cleansed in a quite conflicting manner as every hair drips yet Beaty Heart are now, quite undoubtedly, coursing through the vein of vast ambition that every new band ought to be rabidly attempting to feel out.
