Cabaret has, in recent times, become a bit of a dirty word. Blame Dita Von Teese; suddenly a performance tradition that has been around since the early 18th Century is now accessible to all who can afford entry-level Anne Summers’ nipple tassles. It is, then, quite refreshing to see a band embrace the macabre, eery side of this hallowed art form. The Sly-Tones, dressed in Shoreditch smoking apparel and sporting facepaint that’s half Norweigan black metal, half Insane Clown Posse jugallo, are not afraid to wear their influences proudly on their cuffs, and this, their first major E.P, is promising in both it’s execution and its confidence.
Lead singer Ashley Edwards is best described as Tom Wait’s with less of a nicotine dependency, a growl that would sound awful normally but coupled with the atmospheric, carnival of horrors accompaniment channels all of the madness and horror of cabaret and acts such as Screamin’ Jay Hawkins and Lord Sutch. This potent delivery is most superbly showcased on final track ‘Shake The Cage’, where the whole tone becomes far more sinister, channeling that most important of musical influences, mental illness. The angular, erratic guitars crash beautifully into honky-tonk piano, washing the listener in a sea of crushed velvet, sharp leather and opium smoke.
What’s perhaps most astounding with this band is that, unlike much music, they are not following a current or vastly popular trend in modern music; the only two bands I can think of who are in anyway similar are the Dresden Dolls and Darling’s Cabinet Of Sundry Horrors, neither of whom have gained that significant an audience in Europe. Songs such as ‘Run Rabbit Run’ and ‘Silver Harpoons’ show that the Sly-Tones are as much substance as they are style, and now that the Horrors have departed to fulfill longstanding shoegaze fantasies, the Sly-Tones might well be the next band to bring the spectacle and the macabre into the modern musical climate.
8/10
No comments:
Post a Comment