Live Review: The 1975 & Pale Waves
Dirty Hit signees The 1975 and Pale Waves bring their beautifully unique take on pop to Arena Birmingham, Nina Avitabile reviews
Written by Nina Avitabile on 18th February 2019Despite a promising lead single, the rest of the new EP by Public Service Broadcasting, White Star Liner, just missed the boat (don’t worry, this won’t be a review entirely filled by bad boat and/or Iceberg puns...in fact, I promise this will be the last one).
“
For those unfamiliar with Public Service Broadcasting, the London based band use samples from old information broadcasts, news reels and public service announcements, and layer them over punchy instrumental compositions. Although sampling is a common practice in the industry, the band can only be described as experimental, with virtually all of their songs containing no actual lyrics, and using instruments ranging from the ultra-classics (guitar, piano, drums), through to the use of a flugelhorn (if you, like most people, are wondering just what exactly a flugelhorn is, you should be getting the picture of just how experimental this group can be).
“
Then comes the track entitled ‘C-Q-D’, named after the distress signal sent out by the captain of the Titanic once they knew they were sinking. Just where you think things might get interesting (the point at which most people’s interest peaks in a three-and-a-quarter-hour-long Leonardo Di Caprio Movie), the song suddenly falls flat. Although the drums in ‘C-Q-D’ match the Morse code for this distress signal, which, whilst undeniably some small stroke of genius, is not quite enough to compensate for the overall lack of punch packed by the track.
“
The band have, undoubtedly, managed to discuss many aspects of the sinking of the ship for just 13 minutes of EP. They have, undoubtedly, made a good lead single (it just so happens they have produced this single before, just with a different title and subject matter). They have even, undoubtedly, managed to stay sensitive to what is still remembered as one of the great tragedies of modern times. However, I would still suggest that you could listen to any random four tracks previously released by the band and still have a better experience than listening to White Star Liner from beginning to end (which is saying something, because much of the band’s power does come from overall impressions of concept albums). Although, it really should be stressed that this is undoubtedly due to the quality of music previously released by the band, not necessarily a total lack thereof in this EP.
'White Star Liner' is available now via Test Car Recordings. Tickets to see Public Service Broadcasting perform live are available here.
Before commenting, read the Redbrick community guidelines.
See the posts to the right for other recent articles from this section.
Dirty Hit signees The 1975 and Pale Waves bring their beautifully unique take on pop to Arena Birmingham, Nina Avitabile reviews
Written by Nina Avitabile on 18th February 2019Music Editor Letty Gardner looks forward to Portobello's first headline show at The Sunflower Lounge
Written by Letty Gardner on 17th February 2019With the release of 'Strange Creatures' imminent, Drenge bring their thrillingly dark live show to Birmingham in April
Written by Laura Mosley on 13th February 2019