NoNewWaveNoFun

   📷 Jenn Cliff-Wilcox It's been a long time coming but on Friday 6th May, one of the finest bands and scurges of the establishment to come out of Liverpool in recent years, The Shipbuilders  finally released debut album Spring Tide . The album is the culmination of a journey that   the band have been on for five years. A melting pot of urgent Spaghetti Western soundtracks, jazz-inflected odes to drinking absinthe, disco-tinged surf freakouts and much more, The Shipbuilders ’ world is one that implores to be explored.  The ten tracks recorded with Danny Whitewood ( BC Camplight , Ladytron ) are the product of the inner workings of the mind of Matty Loughlin-Day , a Clinical Psychologist by day, backed by  Danny Lee (guitar), Jack McAllister (bass) and Graeme Sullivan (drums), ‘Spring Tide’ is released via Mai 68 Records and sits snugly in any record collection that also has Sea Power , The Coral and The Pogues in it. We talked to the band to get an insight into the album tr

  Having recently toured the U.S with NNWNF favourites Parquet Courts, Retrofuturist motorik pop icons Automatic  have returned with a new album ready to go. Excess is released on June 24th on Stones Throw Records and t he trio of Izzy Glaudini (synth/vocals) , Lola Dompé  (drums/vocals) and Halle Saxon   (bass), gave an indication of the sound of their new record with lead single ' New Beginning'. Never one to be fashionably late to the party, Ryan Doyle Elward took a listen and dissected the details.    Automatic's 2019 release Signal  was from start to finish fantastic. A combintaion of Gary Numan with Tubeway Army ( Are 'Friends' Electric?) plus Warpaint (eponymous) as an Isaac Asimov Sci-fi film score. But the band's recent single ' New Beginning' seems to view any futuristic, vision as impossible unless humanity's current trajectory is checked. Between the machine shrieks and the soft, crooning vocals, there's a kind of dialogue occurring.

  There's an old, dismissive and slightly arrogant saying about those in the teaching profession: Those who can, do..those who can't, teach.  If you try hard enough, you can almost hear Alan Partridge saying it in an ill-conceived attempt to present The East Anglia Teaching Awards. It's often wheeled out by those wishing to look down their noses at someone who has just as much - perhaps even more - influence on the lives of their children than they do.  In a slightly different context, the work of the music journalist is often seen as the work of someone who couldn't do music very well. I'm an example - albeit a small one - as I was in a couple of bands that did naff all and now I write about better bands for scant reward; makes you wonder why really...Anyway, there is a point to this introduction other than perpetuating my own existential angst. Honest.  There are music journalists who can co-exist in their own musical world without the nature of their musi

  CHIHUAHUA are a band that are beginning to turn into a fascinating propostion. Based in Manchester, they're an uncompromising and exhilarating experience; often polorising audiences with the extremity of their sound. I met up with the band prior to their gig at Alexanders in Chester and we talked about their debut E.P, their fierce live reputation, a shift in sound and..why the Devil drives a Fiat 500. The nucleas of CHIHUAHUA - Singer/Guitarist  Rhys Evans, Guitarist Tom Shivers  and Drummer Shaun Davies - formed as Punk trio Inhalers  during their first year at University. ".. Then Bono's son stole the name and we had to change it!" quipped Shaun. Frustrated with the limitations of Punk and looking to experiment with a fuller, more experimental sound, the band added Multi-instrumentalist Rufus Murphy on Bass and decided to change their name.  It was 2021 before CHIHUAHUA were fully born and the fruits of their labour began to be realised. This time last year, the

  South London's Pushpin  have a been a band that have been bubbling under the surface nicely for the last year or so. Comprising of Adam on Synths, Arthur on Vocals/Guitar, Ed on Vocals/Bass and Laurence on Vocals/Drums, the band have produced a collection of consistenly inventive synth-led Alternative Pop that makes you thirsty for more.  Forming just before the first Lockdown in 2020, the band took their time and experimented to come up with their uniquely clever sound. Here at NNWNF HQ, we first came across the band when their debut single ' Folds' landed in our inbox in 2021; we've been fans ever since - see our review at the link below.                             Pushin - Folds review Pushpin have released new E.P Picnic  this week and we got in touch with the band to get more about the origins of the songs, track-by-track. They also told us where the name of the E.P came from : The E.P is called 'Picnic' because it's really like a picnic - it's

It may be patently obvious, but we're big fans of Chester's very own indie-pop trio Peaness  here at NNWNF HQ - even if two of them don't live in C-town anymore, we're still claiming them as our own! So, it's patently wonderful then that the band's debut album is finally on the horizon. Some might say, it's totally snick! I wouldn't though, because that would smack too much of trying to look too cool - which in itself, is probably trying to look too cool - the Coolness Paradox as it's definitely not known. Anyway, the band's long-awaited debut album World Full of Worry finally arrives on 6th May via their own label Totally Snick Records. It's an album full of charm, wit and more feel good hooks than you could possibly attempt to count. Basically, it's a seratonin-inducing joy of a record, that should see Peaness getting much more attention than they already do.   The hilarious new video for the band's forthcomi

Formed in Liverpool in 2012, indie rock trio  Good Grief consist of guitarist/vocalist Will Fitzpatrick, bassist/vocalist Paul Abbott and drummer Matiss Dale. After releasing a handful of singles and touring both the UK and the US, the band took a hiatus in 2015 to concentrate on other areas of life. Unlike Fugazi, t he hiatus was not indefinite though, and the band reformed in 2018 with unfinished business on their minds.  Support slots were the initial impetus to carry on, playing with bands they love like Superchunk and Wussy reactivated the band's mojo.  New album Shake Your Faith came about after the band fully reformed and was due to be released in 2020 as the Pandemic hit - that old familiar tale. The good folks at Everything Sucks took up the option and now the album is finally seeing the light of day. Ryan Doyle Elward delved deep to see if it was worth the wait.                                📷: Andy Von Pip First track ‘Metal Phase’ from Good Grief’s Shake Your Faith

This week was the second anniversary of the first UK Covid 19 Lockdown. Back then, there was no sign of a vaccine and it seemed like a dystopian nightmare directed by M Night Shyamalan. Now of course, we're all vaccined to our eyeballs and everything is back to how it was before all this unpleasant nonsense began, isn't it? You'd think so. Monday 14th March was much like any other Monday, except that was the day I tested positive. I'd been to take the dog for a nice long walk that afternoon and was strangely tired when I got back; putting it down to age, I had a nap and thought nothing of it. Later that night I got so cold and shakey I needed to check. Then....BING, straight up on the lateral flow test.  Now many of you would have had Covid in some form by now, perhaps even more than once. Many of you would have had next to no symptoms and been deeply frustrated by the inconvenience - I wasn't quite so fortunate. I'm not going to pretend I was on death's doo

   Chester two-piece  Sustinere  have today released their third E.P Volume Three; a raucous six track collection with a huge cluster of riffs and massive ear-shattering drums. The band consist of Rob Jones (Guitar/Vocals) and Michael Pearce (Drums/Vocals) who've been making music together since they met at University. Taking influence from bands like Royal Blood, We Are Scientists and Manchester Orchestra, Sustinere have gained continued momentum based on the reputation of their fierce live performances. In a first for NNWNF, we talked to  Rob before their EP launch show at Telford's Warehouse  and got him to give us a track-by-track guide to Volume Three -  the lyrical themes, the influences on the riffs and creating a real swashbuckler! 1) Intro    For our third E.P, we wanted to have an introductory track to kick things off. It came from an idea I'd played around with on my IPad from as far back as 2016 I believe, but it never became a full song, so we mashed that with

 It's been an productive few weeks for the Brighton-based art rock group  Youth Sector. In February, the band - with an exemplary approach to face and head hair - released it's new E.P Adult Contemporary , which was preceeded with several excellent single releases .  The final track to be shared from the E.P,  'Always Always Always'  deals with the topic of the excessive aspiration of rampant consumerism, with the band's obvious wit and charm at full throttle. . Guitarist and lead vocalist Nick Tompkins shared further thoughts: The song is about greed and blind ambition. Trying to understand wh some people are driven by the pursuit of acquiring more of whatever it is they have at whatever cost. Much of Adult Contemporary takes aim at many of the buzz topics of the modern era, but with an eccentricity that other bands can't provide. Lead single ' Self Exile' scrutinised those that go on the offensive when proved to be wrong, with a recognition of gaslight

  When Edwin Starr  was passionately decrying the mascinations of armed conflict in his 60s' call-and-response classic ' War', it seemed the whole world was answering back: Warrrrr...huh....good God Y'alll - What is it good for? ABSOLUTELY NUTHHHINN! Of course in those days, the war was in Vietnam, The Cold War in full flow, with the Americans and the Russians engaged in an ominous game of one-upmanship that seemed like it could cause World War III at any given time. Later, the collapse of the Soviet Union led to a break up of the state, with countries claiming independence from the Motherland and seemingly creating a new era for Eastern Europe.   A lot of time has passed since then and old resentments have re-surfaced, culminating in Russia invading Ukraine with seemingly no legitimate reason for doing so. Led by Vladimir Putin and his aggressively pro-violence rheotoric, the Russians have brought dangerous times back to Europe. The people of Ukraine have been innocent