I was first introduced to A Sudden Burst of Colour on a night out with a friend who told me of a young instrumental band from Motherwell, some 15 miles south east of Glasgow, who were "making waves" on the local music scene. So when I found out that they were playing at King Tuts I went along to see what I thought for myself.
By the time I entered the recently renovated King Tuts Wah Wah Hut on St Vincent St, on the fringes of Glasgow's central business district, I had listened to a couple of the band's videos on YouTube and was keen to hear more. The most evident reference to their style and sound would be another local band Mogwai, and one of the obvious similarities between the two bands is the lack of lyrics. Stuart Braithwaite, one of Mogwai's singer / guitarists once said "I think most people are not used to having no lyrics to focus on. Lyrics are a real comfort to some people. I guess they like to sing along and when they can't do that with us they can get a bit upset." This doesn't seemed to have stood in the way of Mogwai on their way to success and I see no reason for it to do so for the young lads in A Sudden Burst of Colour. It certainly didn't seem to 'upset' anyone on the night!
On our way up to the venue I was taken with the names recently added to the stairs, acting both as a roll call of superb bands and a reminder of what a great wee place King Tuts is. There have certainly been many wonderful nights in this small but vibrant little venue.
On the night I would guess that there were some 50-70 people gathered in front of the small stage with many more milling about in the adjacent bar area or just popping in to catch a glimpse of whoever was playing. The band came on stage at about 20:15 and their set consisted of only 4 songs, however, with each one lasting around 5 or 6 minutes we got to hear them for the next half hour or so.
The lads lined up on stage with Liam Shaw on drums at the back and centre, Callum Brand on lead guitar to our left, Calum Farquharson on bass in the middle and Luke Duncan on rhythm guitar on the right.All of the band were born in 1993 except 'the old' boy Luke who is a year older at 21 and the band have been together since March 2012!
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A Sudden Burst of Colour |
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Callum Brand |
The band's opener was Afterglow which started with a low thrum of guitar and some simple bass lines and then the drums came crashing in to pound out a metronomic beat over which Callum Brand laid some fine high end guitar notes. It had the audience nodding their heads and tapping their feet from the outset and as the song progressed there was some fine interplay between the drums / bass and the two guitars culminating in a thrash of staccato sounds which then eased off and the drum and lead guitar took over to provide a quiet section before the whole delicious cacophony came back together to bring the song to a thumping close.
I was very impressed with the drumming which, probably due to the lack of the traditional verse / chorus / verse lyric structure, was given space in the songs to act as an equal rather than the more usual 'time keeper'. Liam played some great stuff and the use of his symbols added significantly to the over all sound. |
Calum Farquharson |
Another song, Riptide again had Liam's drumming as an integral part, especially at the start when he thrashed out some solid, sonorous beats. Calum Farquharson played fittingly fine rock steady bass & along with Liam the two of them provided a concrete platform to the song. Calum reminded me of the late, great Ian Kevin Curtis and I half expected him to grab the mike and start singing!
Some of the musical references I detected, apart from the generic East African style guitar i.e. single notes picked from the higher register of the fretboard (a sound favoured by the likes of Vampire Weekend), were Hank Marvin, John Martyn, the American collective Friends of Dean Martinez and a smoother version of Wooden Shjips. As the quotes from the band's web site (www.asuddenburstofcolour.com) make clear their musical style is ethereal, imaginative, pleasingly melodic and they create evocative soundscapes to boot! As Cast the Net Promotions say of their music on the web site”Think somewhere in the massive void between Massive Attack and The Deftones” and you have them to a T! I was to learn later that the band's musical preferences include Deftones, Incubus and the multi-instrumentalist DJ Matt Preston aka Phaeleh from Bristol.
The lads then finished off their potent, professional and studied performance with the track Zen (which is right up there with Friends of Dean Martinez's opener Landfill off their Lost Horizon album) and showcases the band in a more subdued, subtle and mellow vein. Throughout the song Luke's rhythm guitar 'harmonised' fluently with Callum 'Brandy' Brand's lead and there is some wonderful picked guitar work by Callum two thirds of the way in as the track starts to build in intensity (again fine work from drummer Liam) before fading out on a few solo guitar notes. Sublime!
The band were to release their independently produced début 3 track EP ‘Reborn’ in April 2013 and it is available in both physical and digital formats, which can be found on the Music / Merchandise pages of their web site. The EP was officially released at a sold out show in Glasgow on April, 5th 2013 and the band are currently working on their second EP which will be completely self produced, engineered, mixed & released in due course.
So to recap, if you like mood music which paints wonderfully imaginative images with fine and delicate brush strokes and evokes wide open soundscapes. Or indeed, you like the pumped up quasi thrash metal guitar sound, then this bunch of talented young lads cover the spectrum. Oh, and you can use your own imagination to add 'pictures' to the tunes, you really don't always need lyrics to guide you there!
Set List:
Afterglow (on EP)
Riptide (new)
Riptide (new)
Let go or be dragged (new)
Zen (on EP)
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