Like bolts of electricity from the fingertips of The (evil) Emperor we are busy typing up every discovery we locate. You see, the love of music coarses through us. We can’t help it. That’s why we blog. Part of this process of immersion is gifted to us via lots of live music. We like nothing more than to venture out to a good lineup to watch a new band hand out some fresh cuts. In the coming weeks we have plenty of shows lined up on the Recommender’s calendar, like stocking up on fuel for the winter, but none are more enticing than the one we’ve scheduled for November 5th.
We have some roots in the city of Oxford and plenty of blog inches have been zapped onto The Recommender’s pages regarding that city’s Blessing Force music and art collective. It’s members include people from the more established bands, Foals and Stornoway, but through it we’ve also seen the emergence of Chad Valley, Pet Moon, Jonquil, Fixers and Trophy Wife, among others. The latter are now actually releasing their music on the newly-formed but naturally evolved Blessing Force record label. To celebrate their next EP, Bruxism, the Blessing Force team are throwing another showcase, with Trophy Wife headlining. In support are today’s recommendation, Wild Swim, and it’s fair to say that they’re perfectly set to run the next lap of the collective’s reputation. This gig is about as exciting as it gets.
This Oxford-based five-piece may have been known to some of you as Picturehouse; a previous incarnation that saw them release the Bright Eyes EP a few years ago. As enjoyable as that was, the new changes see them return with their tails up and the production on a new level. The alternative indie pop remains, but the roots that were fixed in the rapid drum taps and dancing frets of Foals, among some psychedellic tweaks, have blossomed into something far more rounded. Where they experimented into corners before, they now seem free to wonder newly discovered open spaces. It’s no dramatic revolution – it’s mainly just a name change after all – but it certainly feels like an evolution.
Being linked with the Blessing Force circle will help, as will the added factor of having the management team from fellow Oxford band, Stornoway, on board too, but like all the recent bands from this city of dreaming spires, their music has a creative, alternative foundation to it. There’s a couple of EPs floating around under the new moniker, called A Glimpse Into The Night and Broken Flowers. On these, you can hear such tracks as, The Fallout, which is particularly excellent, starting with one solitary layer but winding up to a complicated orchestra of interwoven elements by it’s end. Inbetween you get one slow, long build up to a mechanical chorus that is pumping by the time it hits full speed. Another Night also enters the room like a shadow, slowly cranking up. After a couple of minutes, just as you think it’s about to run out of energy, it switches up a gear into a smooth throb, before Richard Sansom’s remarkable vocals go for the full-on Wu Lyf seminar. It’s another example of mature, patient songwriting that is clearly their trademark these days.
Good gigs, just like the one we anticipate that’s coming up at the former Photographer’s Workshop in Oxford, will hopefully help give momentum to their ascent. This unique building was once a hub of Oxford’s artistic underbelly, with everyone from Magnum photographers, to the likes of Jonny Greenwood, all utilising it’s black and white darkrooms (remember them!), exhibitions and studio space. We once worked there as our first ever Saturday job, aged 14 or 15 years old! It used to loudly pump out the best music of it’s day, using speakers spread throughout it’s large spaces, but it’s sadly been redundant since it closed around a decade ago. We will be heading back there for the first time in many years with the former owner of The Workshop, so it will be interesting to see it re-born in this way. Ollie from My Bands Better Than Your Band says he’s also joining us, so the entire night should see a collection of people from the industry underground – which, incidentally, is exactly what Blessing Force always intended. (MB)
WILD SWIM – ANOTHER NIGHT
WILD SWIM – THE FALLOUT
