The Recommender

As some of you may already know, a couple of The Recommender’s writers are involved in promoting new music, having gained worked at two of Brighton’s best-known clubs, Audio and more recently Digital. These clubs vary in size, so at Audio, which is still proudly the home of the regular Recommender showcases you are likely to see fresher talent trying to fill it’s main room. At Digital, which has been one of the UK’s best clubs for many years, there’s a step up in the size of bands, in order to pack the larger main room.

Being involved at both venues we are sometimes able to see first hand the rapid rise of a new band as they appear at Audio one month, only to return to Brighton a matter of weeks later to fill the larger Digital. It’s usually following a charting hit, some Radio One coverage, a handful of NME articles and a bit of major blog hype – you know the typical swingometer factors.

Why are we telling you this? Well, we suggest that Polarsets, a trio from the North East, are showing the kind of key signals that tell us we will be seeing their Audio-Digital transition happen pretty quickly. The reason to back up this prediction is that they bring to the table all the right ingredients to lure that swingometer.

They make the kind of joyous, cowbell indie pop that’s not been this complete since The Sunshine Underground or even the Klaxons, although this is less experimental than the latter and more pop than the former, making them so perfectly radio friendly Zane Lowe may as well sign them himself.

Add in parts of Two Door Cinema Club and their knack for a singalong chorus, before finally injecting a drop of Fenech Soler, with all their brightly-lit power and you will have the teen market going crazy. They’ve played support shows for the likes of Ellie Goulding, the aforementioned Fenech Soler, Egyptian Hip Hop and Everything Everything, so you see what we mean when we suggest they’re on the right path.

Their latest single, ‘Morning‘, follows the synths throughout which play a set of bouncing trance chords, as guitars bubble around and upbeat woodblocks twinkle over it’s pounding drum.

‘Just Don’t Open Your Eyes Yet‘ bangs and crashes with energy and holds a wonderful chorus that’s guaranteed to get the crowd frothing at the mouth, but it’s another track, ‘Bonfires‘, that shows us they have more tricks up their sleeves. On it they’re found following that same consistent path, with more dance themes over some beautiful pop, but this time it begins with a more mature and sparse soundscape, allowing Rob Howe’s vocals to shine as they hit such heights they turn to ice. The song climaxes wonderfully in a powerful, electronic storm.

However, the best and most obvious hit single of the lot has to be their first release, ‘Leave Argentina‘. It’s got more cowbell than Gene Frenkle could handle and the synths are turned up to eleven, in a balearic burst that Faithless would be proud of. Add in a shout-it-out chorus and you get the big tune that all the fans will be waiting for during the show and the payoff won’t disappoint with this born set-closer. We wonder how soon we can witness that very moment at Digital. (MB)

POLARSETS – LEAVE ARGENTINA

POLARSETS – MORNING

POLARSETS – LEAVE ARGENTINA (THOMAS SAGSTAD & MIKE HAWKINS REMIX)