With Just A Hint Of Mayhem

Music reviews, gig reviews, fun trivia and extra added random stuff!

‘Ballads For This Age’ EP – HerOrangeCoat December 1, 2024

Filed under: Review — justwilliam1959 @ 10:50 pm
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After teasing us with some sublime tracks over the last few months HerOrangeCoat has now released those songs along with a couple of new ones to form her 5-track EP ‘Ballads For This Age’. It kicks off with “Ballad 1 (Sorry)” a toweringly, transcendent and heavenly song. The emotion in her voice and the sparseness of the instruments made the hairs on the back of my neck stand up, not in fear, but in awe of such a gorgeous piece of music. Apparently, the song is not a cry for help, but rather a resolute, resigned defeat. It speaks to the vast mental health emergency, whilst detailing HerOrangeCoat’s own personal journey with anxiety. Next comes “Ballad 2 (Skin Off My Back)”. It is a divinely dark slice of modern folk which feels like a deeply personal song and Georgia delivers it with controlled emotion and finesse. This is a majestic and heavenly tune.

“Ballad 3 (Jamaica ’59)”, is my current favourite. It flows like a river enriched with Joni Mitchell’s essence. The music is understated, but excellent, and Georgia’s voice is spectacular and perfect. It has folk, jazz, and soft rock entwined throughout. Incidentally “Ballad 1 (Sorry)” and “Ballad 2 (Skin Off My Back)” made it into the Mayhem song chart hitting number 2 and number 1 respectively. HerOrangeCoat once again proves that she is not afraid to use the gaps between notes in the dark, mysterious “Ballad 4 (Second Nature)”. The simplicity draws you deep inside the song and then unveils its mesmerising complexity. The EP ends with a song that doesn’t have the Ballad prefix. It is, appropriately, entitled “Postscript” and the simple and beautiful harp sound carries you into an ethereal Valhalla of music. Georgia’s voice and backing vocal is emotional, soulful and glorious. This is a stunning EP and one which I will be playing often. You need this music in your life.

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Echobelly – The Crescent, York – Monday 25th November 2024

Filed under: Review — justwilliam1959 @ 2:14 pm
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#It is hard for me to believe that Echobelly formed 32 years ago, how can that be? How are the 90s more than 30 years ago? Anyway enough ramblings from this old bloke, earlier this week I had the privilege of witnessing Echobelly playing live for the first time since I saw them at the Old Trout in Windsor back in April 1994. That doesn’t account for a number of times I saw them at festivals though. Are they still good? You will have to read on to find out, first I need to give you the low down on the rather excellent support band Blue Violet.

Blue Violet – Photo taken by me using my very cheap android phone

Blue Violet released their debut album ‘Late Night Calls’ in 2022 and their sophomore release, ‘Faux Animaux’ is scheduled for early in 2025. They have been championed by some influential radio stations including BBC 6 Music whose Steve Lamacq described them as “a cocktail of Iain Banks and Jane Austen”. I can see where Steve was coming from having witnessed Blue Violet for the first time. If I was remaining on a literary comparison theme I might add Douglas Coupland. Their music has a dark and mysterious pop rock style and is loaded with great hooks. Vocally Sarah McGrigor and Sam Gotley where on top form in York. The material from the first album has a slightly electro feel, but they add a rockier element to it on stage. There were, I think, three songs from their debut album in the set; “Undercover”, Hard Rain” and “Asylum”. The stand out of those older songs was “Hard Rain” for me. one of their 2024 singles, “Imagine Me” seems like a stalking song and has some synth riffs that evoke the Sisters Of Mercy in a pop goth style or even Kylie applying loads of Kohl eye makeup and going full on Goth-Kylie. The highlight of a set full of peaks was probably current single “Fire”. Although I loved “Human After All” so much I bought the t-shirt! The band were incredibly tight and Sarah is a great performer who seems to love engaging with the crowd, she does that like she was born to it. I think the new album could be a classy collection of songs and having seen Blue Violet live and frankly, on fire, I am looking forward to new music from them.

Photo by Eddie P – The man who puts the Eddie into Vinyl Eddie!

Finally it was time for Echobelly, let me say up front that Sonya Madan has aged far better than I have, does she have a Dorian Gray style picture in her attic? Whether she has or not the music is the main point here and what a point it was. You could sense it was going to be a great night as soon as the opening bars for “I Can’t Imagine the World Without Me” from 1994’s debut album ‘Everyone’s Got One’. The crowd were excited for every song but the buzz went up a gear when the band hit us with “Car Fiction” four songs in. This is one of my favourite Echobelly songs and comes from their 1995 album ‘On’. The whole audience was bouncing for that and the next couple of songs. Mid set Sonya announced that the band would be taking it down a little, to be fair I needed a rest at that point. We were treated to gorgeous and perfect acoustic takes on “Insomniac” from 1994 and “Worms And Angels” from 1995. There was a huge singalong element to the set which might have peaked with the magnificent “Great Things”, what a great song that is!

Another Photo by Eddie P – The man who puts the Eddie into Vinyl Eddie!

The three song encore was immense and probably loosened the rafters on the Crescent’s roof. “King Of The Kerb” just smashed it with everyone in the band firing on all cylinders and turning everything up to 11. A little more introspection was on offer with “Giving It All” (originally a part of Glenn and Sonya’s side project Calm Of Zero) and finally we were hypnotised into total submission with “Dark Therapy”. Echobelly have been around a while and they will be around for a hell of a lot longer too. A great show!

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Live At Leeds In The City – Saturday 16th November 2024 November 25, 2024

Filed under: Review — justwilliam1959 @ 11:08 pm
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Just over a week ago I had the opportunity to cover Live At Leeds In The City 2024 for those cool, weird and wonderful folks at Soundsphere and The Modern Record click on each to read the review which was written by me with some rather excellent additional pieces from Rock Photographer Extraordinaire, John Hayhurst. Simon Pattinson, working with York Mix, joined us for the ride, and what a ride it was this year! We witnessed close to twenty bands between us. My personal favourites were Neckbreakers and Avalanche Party. Were you there? Who were your favourite acts of the day? There are some ace photographs in both of the above links all by John Hayhurst apart from an Avalanche Party pic by Lucy Joy Pembroke. (All her four fabulous Avalanche Party pics are in the collection below!)

Avalanche Party by Lucy Joy Pembroke
Avalanche Party by Lucy Joy Pembroke
Joe and Glen of Avalanche Party by Lucy Joy Pemberton
Tom from the Blinders guest with Avalanche Party by Lucy Joy Pemberton
Hungry by John Hayhurst
Gravy by John Hayhurst
Casisdead by John Hayhurst
Marika Hackman by John Hayhurst
Ruby Duff by John Hayhurst
English Teacher by John Hayhurst

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‘Go HARD or Go HOME’ – Not Now Norman November 23, 2024

Filed under: Review — justwilliam1959 @ 3:47 pm
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It is a while since the mighty Not Now Norman have featured on these pages, but with a new album hitting the streets very soon it is that time! The album is out on 29th November and is called ‘Go HARD or Go HOME’. It kicks off with the rather strange and at times scary (well you try listening to it through your headphones in the dark) “Norminius Sanctus”. It has a dark, monastic feel that would be perfect to soundtrack the opening credits of a Hammer Horror film. The title track starts a full on metal assault with epic scale AC/ DC style riffs that support Taylor-Grace’s pitch perfect rock vocal. At times she sounds like Joan Jett on steroids with some Ozzy Osbourne vocal chords spliced into her own voice box. The current single “Feral” is next and it has a great 80s rock hair metal feel to it with some hooks that Madonna in her prime would have been incredibly envious of. “WHO I AM” is another single and it has riffs forged in rock heaven and drumming that could smash mountains and vocally this is one of my favourite tracks on the album. If you love prog style power ballads you are going to find yourself in a relationship with “Family Photo”. This will be the next single released on the same day as the album. Taylor-Grace says this about it “This track is one of the toughest I’ve written. When I was born, a relative disowned me for being a girl. I’ve heard people praise this person highly to me, saying ‘they’re still your relative’ when they’ve never deserved it. I didn’t realise how it affected me until I started writing it. It’s for all those people who have been disowned for reasons they can’t control.” I have been on this planet a long while and it baffles the hell out of me that people with these kind of opinions actually exist.

The emotion in “Mama” is palpable and Taylor produces perhaps her finest vocal performance to date. It is huge in sound and cinematic in ambition. The band prove their funky skills on “Midnight Sun” the guitar work and drumming makes you want to move. It also has an early 70s rock vibe, like Medicine Head on speed. The rock just don’t stop on this brilliant set of songs as “Mister Know It All” takes things up another gear with a stellar, rip-roaring riff rampage. Everyone knows a Mister Know It All, right? I certainly do. There is a great blues mood on “King Of A Wasted Land” which has an occasional but wonderfully haunting vocal double track from Taylor-Grace. The guitar solo toward the end of the track is one of the best on the album. I am not totally certain who this is directed at, but my take is King Charles III, or any one of the recent UK Prime Ministers. It doesn’t matter to me I despise all of them. Just when you thought an album could get no heavier this one hits you with the titanic tower of metal that is “Bad Liar”. I was transported back to early Suzi Quatro with “Why Don’t You Like Me?”, particularly the chorus refrain which I doubt I could shake from my brain even if I wanted to. The punkiest sound on the album is probably “Green Light” which evokes Motorhead playing with Girlschool, a roaring tiger of a song. I have heard many great and interesting covers before, and Not Now Norman’s take on Britney’s “Toxic” is phenomenal. It retains the pop tropes of the original but give it a hugely harder rock edge.

This sophomore album from Not Now Norman hits all the spots perfectly and scratches music itches that you never knew you had. Am I disappointed with anything about this release? Yes, that it is about to be released just when I thought I had completed my top 20 albums of the year list! Now I need to go away and have a rethink, yes this album is THAT good!

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“Haunted” – amilost November 19, 2024

Filed under: Review — justwilliam1959 @ 9:43 pm
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Back in September we reviewed amilost’s single “Tiny War” and now the talented Norwegian/ Scottish duo have a fabulous new single, “Haunted”, which hit the streets a few weeks ago. It has a wonderful pop mentality in its ethereal wide synth based cinematic sweep. The vocals soar an the chorus stays with you for ages, dare I say that it haunts you? amilost had this to say about the track “Haunted is about that person you can’t quite shake out of your head. It’s about feeling like you had control over the situation, but realising you were in-deeper than you thought and that in fact – the other person has a hold on you instead.” This is an act that I am confident will feature again on these pages, I love them.

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Delilah Bon – The Key Club, Leeds – Friday 15th November 2024 November 17, 2024

Filed under: Review — justwilliam1959 @ 10:40 pm
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The last time I saw Delilah Bon live was just over two years ago, also at the Key Club in Leeds. In the time since that gig she has achieved so much. Supported Scene Queen and Shaka Ponk, appeared on prime time French TV, played Download, Reading and Leeds Festivals, released her second album (that ought to be in many of the best albums of 2024 lists), collaborated with ALT BLK ERA and so many other things. Delilah Bon really does grow in stature and confidence with everything she does. This show in Leeds was very near the end of a sold out European and UK tour which began in September. Was this gig good? Regular readers will already know the answer to that question. But before I tell you let me talk about the magnificent support act tiLLie.

She is an American artist with a similar presence and attitude to Delilah. tiLLie has made a few appearances in the pages of Mayhem, including reaching number one in the Mayhem Chart a year ago. She describes her music as Nightmare Pop and that is hard to disagree with. Radio 1’s Jack Saunders called tiLLie “a maverick artist born from the gates of Hell.” Having heard her and now experienced her live, Jack is clearly spot on! Tonight we were all taken on a wacky, weird, wonderfully wondrous walk through the tiLLieverse and it felt good. She kicked off with an attack on myopic, incel keyboard warriors with “mOmS bAsEmeNt”. Has there ever been a song like “jeLLiefish aPocaLypsE”? I don’t think so and that is why it stands above so many other tracks from her peers. We were also treated to a few more tracks from the ‘tiLLieverse’ EP. But my highlight of the set was “bLeSs uR hEaRt” which blends anger, sarcasm and a powerful take down of the MAGA Christian fundamentalists. You need some tiLLie in your life. She has some great merch too, click here to buy some 🙂

So what was Delilah Bon like? Absolutely on fire is how she was, this was a stunning tour de force of a gig. It is clear that Delilah cares hugely about her followers, fans and every marginalised and abused person in the world. She is a phenomenal champion for the LGBTQ+ community as well. She is in simple terms a wonderful human being. The show started off in a high gear and kept adding more. Early on we got a classic performance of “Grown Ass Men” and “Chiquitita”, the latter dedicated to all the older women. There was a song added to the set that I don’t think has been performed on this tour so far, a towering take on “Homework”. If the audience thought Delilah was playing in top gear, they were blown away for the last part of the set. Brat Punk Riot Grrl rage was in full flow on stage and in the crowd. We were treated to “War On Women”, “Epstein”, “I Wish A Bitch Would” and “Dead Men Don’t Rape”. The latter had everyone in the room screaming the chorus, including this old white bloke. That song has a power that not many songs can handle. “Dead men Don’t Rape” might be a perfect end to a Delilah Bon set, but Delilah knows best, so after that “Evil Hate Filled Female” and “Maverick” truly brought the house down. This wasn’t just a gig, this wasn’t just a show, this was a statement of intent from one of the most talented and passionate artists on the planet right now. Planet Bon Bon is where it’s at, fire your rocket boosters and get here! Delilah Bon has lit a fuse of hope for the lost, forgotten, abused among us, she holds a torch for the disadvantaged and all of those that are simply different. It is up to us to help keep all those flames burning higher, fiercer and stronger.

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“Pretty Gay!” – BAYBE November 14, 2024

Filed under: Review — justwilliam1959 @ 8:22 pm
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Baybe is a new artist to me and a true artist as she plays every instrument on her songs. She is involved in the production of her music and live shows. She also works on all her design and branding. She is based in Nashville, Tennessee, and has been playing in a range of genres and bands over the years. Apparently she started her musical journey as a voice-over artist for children’s dolls. Now that is delightfully weird, right? Her new single “Pretty Gay!” has a feel of Billie Eilish and tiLLie about it, but it is totally BAYBE, It is a dark song about relationships and the track haunts you for long after you listen to it. I love it, do you?

.If you have enjoyed this article, feel free to follow the blog, or follow us on; Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Threads, Bluesky, Linkedin, and EMail. Are you interested in writing and reviewing for With Just A Hint Of Mayhem? If so then please get in touch.

 

“My Drummer’s Girlfriend” (Featuring Wheatus) – ALT BLK ERA November 13, 2024

Filed under: Review — justwilliam1959 @ 11:04 pm
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In June, we reviewed the excellent single, “My Drummer’s Girlfriend” by the obscenely talented ALT BLK ERA. Just when you thought things could not get better for ALT BLK ERA, well at least until the release of their debut album in January, they work with none other than Wheatus on a new take of “My Drummer’s Girlfriend”. It loses none of the original excitement but it gains a slacker punk feel thanks to the delightful Wheatus gang! Check out all versions in the Spotify link below!

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“Where The Wind Blows” – Drop It First November 12, 2024

Filed under: Review — justwilliam1959 @ 7:22 pm
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Drop It First is a mega-talented melodic punk band from Quebec City, Canada. The band is made up of members of Our Darkest Days and Go Great Guns. They have just launched their first single “Where The Wind Blows” in advance of their debut album ‘Fundamentals’ which is scheduled to hit the streets on 17th January. The song is overflowing with hardcore emotion and describes dealing with grief and loss. It is anthemic and stares sorrow straight in the eyes and says I can live through you and reach the other side of the dark chasm of loss. The harmonies are huge and even the riffs ooze emotion. An obvious comparison might be Rise Against, but I hear a little Head Automatica here too. If the rest of the album is this good it could become a classic! the video is wonderfully dark and apocalyptic and I love it! The video is dedicated to two of the band members’ mothers who passed away in 2024, this makes it clear where the depth of this loss comes from. My own mother is still alive, but I will never forget losing my father back in 2001.

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“Rabbit Hole” – Forgotten Dream November 11, 2024

Filed under: Review — justwilliam1959 @ 9:49 pm
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According to their Spotify profile, Forgotten Dream is an alternative rock band from a future past. That sounds like some kind of rock star version of the X-Men, right? Another story, although obviously this might be some kind of secret identity thing, says that the band is from Cremona in Italy. Wow, I really went down a rabbit hole there, didn’t I? Speaking of rabbit holes, Forgotten Dream has a new single out, and it is called “Rabbit Hole”. It is heavy punk with a heavy seasoning of grunge and megatons of energy. Maryanne Muse’s voice is haunting, vibrant, and perfect for the psychedelic trip the song and the video take you on. What is a rabbit hole? Maybe a complexly bizarre or difficult state or situation conceived as a hole into which one falls or descends. I believe that Lewis Carroll first used the rabbit hole phrase in his 1865 tale ‘Alice In Wonderland’, “I almost wish I hadn’t gone down that rabbit-hole—and yet—and yet—it’s rather curious, you know, this sort of life!” As far as this track from Forgotten Dream goes I have completely gone down this band’s rabbit hole and it is a magnificent, magical, monumental, mouthwatering, musical world down here! watch the video, listen to the song, and come and join me.

.If you have enjoyed this article, feel free to follow the blog, or follow us on; Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Threads, Bluesky, Linkedin, and EMail. Are you interested in writing and reviewing for With Just A Hint Of Mayhem? If so then please get in touch.