Ten years ago I stumbled into London’s grassroots music scene. DIY, if you will. I had already been aware of bits of it for a few years, occasionally seeing bands that could be considered a part of it. Like Male Bonding and Trash Kit supporting Vivian Girls at Trinity Centre Hall, (25th January 2010). Or Fair Ohs and Novella supporting Veronica Falls and Mazes at The Marquis of Lansdowne (28th January 2011). I’m sure there were others that weren’t in late January, but those are two standouts.

But what I had not done yet; was pick up an instrument and take part. By Autumn of 2013 I was in a band myself. We had spent the summer playing a few shows for disreputable promoters, had recorded a demo song, and were now looking to get booked for concerts with some like-minded outfits. “Cool gigs” was how I remember phrasing it.

As of about September that year we had found some groups we liked the sound of and felt some kind of kinship with. We started regularly attending their gigs, and those by others they had played with. This is going to be something like a scene report, a decade after the fact. The kind of bands that were around then - the beginnings of some still with us, and remembering some long since disbanded.

THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 5, 2013
Shopping and Weird Menace

First stop is a night that still runs, but when it was at a venue that’s now gone - Bark at Alley Cat Bar. Alley Cat Bar itself always felt like an odd fit for those in DIY. It was a basement bar on Denmark Street / Tin Pan Alley that seemed to be just one of any number of music bars that were living off past glory (in this case that of the street rather than the venue itself).

We were drawn there to see Shopping, the then quite new band of Ray Aggs of the aforementioned Trash Kit. Earlier that year they had released their first single and then debut album, as far as I can remember this was the first we had gone to see them play.

I have no memory of opener Treasure, which makes me think we probably didn’t watch them, but I do remember Weird Menace. Featuring Emma Wigham on guitar and vocals and Mark Jasper on tabletop noise guitar, both of whom you might know as the core members of Witching Waves, Katy Cottrell (currently in Es) on bass and vocals, and a drummer I can’t find the name of anywhere.

Listening back, their droning guitars lead a sound that moves at a marching pace with overlapping vocals crawling around it. A clear line runs through it to what Witching Waves have been doing since, though less frenetic than a lot of it, with a more brooding energy.

Shopping have always been taut and upbeat. An energetic spark of synchronised sound and movement, all parts of a well-oiled machine. You can lose yourself focusing on just one element for a while before a slow zoom out brings your focus back to the unit as a whole.

THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 12, 2013 -
Dog Legs

A week later we went to The Shacklewell Arms for the first time to see US headliner Shannon and the Clams (for those not in the know, a 50s and 60s influenced garage pop band). This might have been the first Upset The Rhythm promoted show that I ever attended.

On guitar and vocals in Dog Legs was Moema Meade (now releasing experimental gabber as Lady Neptune and the touring bassist for Sacred Paws). Drummer Liam Bradbury always played a children’s drum kit. If I remember correctly my bandmate said an awkward “great set!” to Moe at some point when passing on the way into the loos to a response of “fanks”, and then briefly speaking again at the bar was asked “are you in a band?”

SATURDAY, OCTOBER 19, 2013 -
Good Throb and Left Leg

First visit to Power Lunches for a gig. We had been for a zine reading event in the upstairs bar at some point, but I think my first time at a concert there was this one. Our first “cool gig”. I remember there being a strike affecting the Overground line so it was particularly sparsely attended (not that we were bringing much of an audience either way). Girl Germs were a promoter and DJ duo running fundraiser gigs for feminist causes.

I had already heard Good Throb while browsing online in the aftermath of the release of their second 7” - Culture Vulture. I was particularly enamoured with the title track, and went back to their self-titled EP after, from which Feminazi and Bag are personal highlights. Sardonic and venomous, their songs are built off a tight rhythm section and LOUD buzzsaw guitar. All formed into withering put-downs fired at Capitalism, culture snobs, and punk scene chauvinism.

Left Leg were pitched somewhere between Unwound, or the DC Discord lot, and the less remembered atonal post-punk wing of the C86 comp - like Big Flame or Bogshed. Intellectual lyrics with a left wing bent over eerie melodies punctuated by jolting rhythms. Guitar and vocals handled by Aaron Batley (Actual Crimes, Jane Doe Ensemble) and drums by Vicki Butler (GHUM), both of whom were previously in Sad Shields.

To be continued...?