In a few days time, Yorkshire formed but London based post-punk sextet DEADLETTER will begin to ‘Tour The Kingdom’ on an eleven date jaunt around the country beginning in Newcastle and then calling in at Glasgow, Blackpool, Sheffield, Leeds, Manchester, Hull, Birmingham, Brighton, Bristol and London.
The Brighton & Hove News Music Team are no strangers to this exciting outfit, having already witnessed them playing live in Brighton last November at The Folklore Rooms as part of the ‘Mutations Festival’, and then again back in February at The Hope & Ruin as part of the ‘Independent Venues Week’.
DEADLETTER, who dropped their ‘Binge’ single back in August, make a welcome return to Brighton on Monday 26th September and will be headlining at The Hope & Ruin in Queens Road with support from slurry jangle janksters The Famous People who are Bowie Bartlett (vocals), Alfie Beer (guitar), Bertie Beer (drums) and Scott Pearce (bass). We covered their performance at the Green Door Store back in July as part of a one-off covers night experiment, where they were performing seven tunes by The Smiths – Review HERE. This time around, however, they will be performing their own material.
DEADLETTER, which is always stylized as one word and in capitals, dropped their debut single ‘Good Old Days’ back in 2020. They uploaded two singles last year, ‘Fall Of The Big Screen’ in January and the anthemic ‘Fit For Work’ in July, which received both regional BBC and 6Music play from Steve Lamacq and Tom Robinson. The track was also made Huw Stephens’ “Tip of the Week” on BBC Radio 1, and a live session of the track was also played on his Introducing show on Radio 1.
At their previous Brighton concert performance the instrumentation utilised included an unusual vibraslap, which is a percussion instrument consisting of a piece of stiff wire connecting a wooden ball to a hollow box of wood with metal “teeth” inside. This was being used by saxophonist/backing vocalist Poppy Richler, who also had a go on the cowbell and shakers. Behind the Gretsch drumset was Alfie Husband, George Ullyott was in charge of the Fender bass and vocals, whilst Will King, a giant of a man, was on guitar and I think the sixth member was called James and he too was on guitar. Frontman Zac Lawrence was as always on vocals duty as well as tambourine.
During this performance at The Hope & Ruin on 3rd February 2022, we likened their sound at differing times to the Gang Of Four, a danceable UK Decay or Killing Joke, A Certain Ratio’s ‘Shack Up’, and Half Man Half Biscuit meets Mark E Smith (of The Fall). But don’t just take our word for it, go check them out in Brighton on 26th September at The Hope & Ruin – Purchase your tickets HERE.
Check them out on Bandcamp.
