New Video: Succulents - Underdog

 

Whatever genre of music we may gravitate towards in the alternative realm, there's one thing we all share; We're all on the outside looking in at popular culture. Sure we sometimes dip our toes in to see if its less turgid and exasperating as it always has been; occasionally the whole foot stays there for a good 14 minutes without any sign of minor infection. Ultimately however, it all gets a bit much and that comforting feeling of kicking against the pricks re-emerges with only minimal guilt attached. 

You can see it as being the miserable outsider like some sort of Albert Camus novel, but another - perhaps more positive - spin would be to place yourself in the mindset of the plucky underdog. Now I don't know what their thoughts on French existentialist thinkers are, but Succulents from Manchester have just released their debut single conveniently titled 'Underdog', which fits quite nicely with the first 100 odd words of this review. It's almost as if it's by design. 

Formed by Laurie Hulme and Lucy Ridges, the band fittingly describe themselves as a "girl-and-boy-next-door lo-fi indie duo" who came about after Hulme moved out of Manchester to live with his partner's parents during her pregnancy. He found himself obsessively writing songs during this period and they make up the basis of Succulents' catalogue. Best known for his critically acclaimed solo project Songs For Walter, Hulme is also a member of Manchester band Big Other. A photographer by day, Succulents are completed by Lucy Ridges, who adds a fresh energy and enthusiasm to the project and completes the you and me against the world energy that all great duos must have. That and good songs obviously.

'Underdog' is a promising start. With a band like Succulents, there are obvious touchstones that it'd be easy to compare them to; the band themselves citing "the sentimentality" of Belle & Sebastian as well as cult favourites like The Pains of Being Pure at Heart,  Yo La Tengo and The Field Mice as inspiration. There is no doubt these bands have played a part in the thinking of how 'Underdog' is to sound, but two other bands immediately spring to mind here: The lo-fi brilliance of The Delgados pre-Peloton and the excellent, if short-lived cult 90s' Cardiff band Mo-Ho-Bish-O-Pi. 

Hulme says of the single: 

“’Underdog’ centres on a mischievous protagonist deliberately trying to provoke their partner, delighting in pushing buttons and watching the sparks fly. There’s a darkly playful edge to the narrative, not unlike the gleeful antagonism found in 'The Twits', wrapped in warm, fuzzed-out indie-pop textures.
 
"It started life as an acoustic, finger picking song and then I realised it would be better louder. At the time I was also playing in a kraut-punk band called Chew Magna and I was really into Can and kraut-rock middle eights, so there’s an obvious nod to that time in my life too.”

The finished product is far from polished, but what it lacks in finesse, it makes up for in a plethora of charm. The choices in production here seem subtle, but absolutely bang on. The dueling vocals never seeming cloying or overbearing and compliment each other nicely. The guitar has the right increments of lo-fi fuzz, not allowing those effects to overpower and hold the melody hostage. 

The time is now; the underdog is back with a vengeance. 

You can follow and find out more about Succulents from their Bandcamp page above.