FEBUEDER + MYLAR + TERRA TWIN + LILY LYONS – THE HOPE & RUIN, BRIGHTON 3.5.23
Brighton’s monthly new music night, ‘Hidden Herd Presents’ returned to The Hope & Ruin on Wednesday night. For May this event spotlighting emerging artists and ones-to-watch featured four up-and-coming bands: Febueder, Mylar, Terra Twin and Lily Lyons. For a change May’s artists were all out of town bands, three are London-based and headliners Febueder are from Berkshire.
Lily Lyons
Singer-songwriter Lily Lyons opened May’s ‘Hidden Herd Presents’. Having showcased her music at venues such as Hampton Court Palace, Glastonbury and Ronnie Scott’s Jazz Club, this was her first appearance in Brighton.
Lily took to the stage with just her electric guitar sitting cross-legged on a stool. She started her set with her debut single ‘Slow Motion’. Lily explained the second song ‘Spectre’ was written after reading about love languages and words of affirmation.
Her next song was ‘Don’t’, her second single and also on her EP ‘Like I Used To’ released towards the end of last year. This was followed by a new song ‘Fabric’.
While Lily Lyons was singing those in the audience who had arrived early at The Hope & Ruin were completely quiet. Respectfully listening during the performance with warm applause after the songs. Lily put a lot of feeling into her singing. She varied her vocals by changes in emotion and tone, rather than tempo or volume.
After her fourth song, she asked how much time was left. When the organiser said she had time for one song, there seemed some disappointment in the audience that Lily couldn’t have played more. Lily’s last song of the evening was another unreleased number ‘Spinning Sides’. She explained how she wrote this song about when things were tough and the relief that followed when things improved.
Lily Lyons’s folk style with late night jazz influences, grew on me through her set. Those in the audience showed their appreciation with applause which was louder than the quiet songs they had been listening to. It was an understated, but very good opening set of the evening.
Terra Twin
London-based quartet Terra Twin were next up. Terra Twin started out as the New Zealand-based bedroom project of vocalist and “Lord of The Rings: Rings of Power” star Maxim Baldry. Terra Twin formed as a band at the end of 2021. As well as Maxim on vocals, the band consists of Lewis Spear (guitar), Joel McConkey (bass) and Alex Wadstein (drums).
The volume level increased after Lily Lyon’s set, with Terra Twin’s psych-tinged art-rock. Their first two songs included good guitar riffs and solid drums. Their third song and single ‘Nightshift’ had a quieter start with a dreamy moody guitar sound. This had a nice contrast with angry vocals later in the song.
By contrast their fourth song was more of a rock number, while the next one was introduced as “a little quiet one”. It started with a simple arrangement with lone guitar and tapping on cymbals, before the other band members joined part way into the song. This had a bit of a shoegaze feel, especially the guitars.
The start of Terra Twin’s last song reminded me a little of ‘The Joker’ by Steve Miller Band. Maxim varied his singing style on this track between a spoken word delivery, as if speaking to the audience, and almost shouting as the song got more rock-like. Like many songs in their set, the quality guitar sound from Maxim and Lewis was a key feature of Terra Twin’s sound.
I thought it was a good set from Terra Twin with a good variety in terms of style and tempo. They got a good reaction from the crowd both throughout their set and at its close.
Tera Twin:
Maxim Baldry – vocals and guitar
Lewis Spear – guitar
Joel McConkey – bass
Alex Wadstein – drums
Mylar were the third London based artists to play Brighton for the first time at Wednesday’s “Hidden Herd Presents” event. Art-pop outfit Mylar are Tom Clark (guitar, synth), Rob Janke (drums, backing vocals) Neraj Thangarajah (guitar, keys, vocals) and Tom Short (keys, bass, vocals).
Mylar opened their set with ‘Hobby Horse’ from their latest EP ‘Human Statues’. As a side note, the EP was inspired by an incident after a gig in Portsmouth when someone asked the band “why are you all so tall, are you Dutch?”. On this and the following song ‘Cold’, Mylar varied both the tempo and volume within the songs.
On their third song ‘Dark’, Neraj Thangarajah took over lead vocals from Tom Short. This track could have been a 70’s TV show theme. There was a familiarity within Mylar’s songs as they create a modern sound with recognisable aspects of past musical eras, notably the 1950s to the 1990s.
‘Trailblazer’ was a mellower number, which had shades of The Style Council’s ‘Long Hot Summer’ era tunes about it. Their song ‘50/50’ had a funky drum beat and bassline. Some dancing had started in the crowd at this point of Mylar’s set.
‘Stay Close’ started with a heavy drums intro from Rob Janke, which worked well. During this song singer Tom Short ventured off stage and into the audience at The Hope & Ruin. He returned to the stage for Mylar’s final number, ‘Plastic Champ’.
There was polite applause at the end of Mylar’s set. It appeared to me that the audience’s reaction was mixed, with a few people dancing near the front of the stage, while many were chatting loudly through most of the set. For me there was a bit of a yacht rock feel to Mylar’s sound. While it may not necessarily have been to my taste, I would have liked to have heard more of the band rather than the audience’s chatter.
Mylar:
Tom Short – vocals, bass
Neraj Thangarajah – guitar, keys, vocals
Rob Janke – drums, backing vocals
Tom Clark – guitar, synth
Febueder
Headliners Febueder (pronounced “Fe-byou-der”) are an avant-indie duo from Ascot in Berkshire, comprised of vocalist and multi-instrumentalist Kieran Godfrey and percussionist, multi-instrumentalist and vocalist Samuel Keysell. They were joined on stage at The Hope and Ruin by a bass guitarist. The band’s sound is a unique and eclectic take on indie rock, electronica, jazz and pop.
There was a sense of expectation in the crowd at The Hope & Ruin for Febueder. Unlike many of the upcoming bands on “Hidden Herd Presents” events, Febueder have released two albums ‘Tomalin Has Etched In’ (in 2020) and ‘Follow The Colonnade’ (in 2023) along with several singles. As some of the audience would have been more aware of Febueder, this may explain the anticipation for their set.
Febueder’s set started with a very ethereal sound. Their opening number ‘Pasiphae’ from their recent album ‘Follow The Colonnade’ had a very experimental feel.
On the next song, ‘Belgium Travel’ guitarist Kieran Godfrey played trumpet on the intro. The staccato style of this song was held together well by quality drumming by Samuel Keysell. On the next track, ‘Morning Yawn’, it was Samuel who changed instruments, playing the bass guitar behind his drum kit. On another song Kieran swapped electric guitar for a ukulele. No arguing with the fact that both members of Febueder are multi-instrumentalists. As well as swapping instruments, Samuel and Kieran shared vocals and on some songs swapped lead vocal duties.
In addition to effortlessly switching between instruments, Samuel’s quality on the drums shone throughout the set. Some of the time he played holding one of the drumsticks between his fingers almost like holding a chopstick. The track ‘Celebrating Mask’ started with very impressive heavy almost tribal drumming. When Kieran introduced the last song ‘Alligator’, it was the first time that the band spoke to the crowd.
Febueder’s sound and style may be somewhat unconventional, but they produced an interesting, varied and quality set, which the audience appreciated. It was good to hear something so different. It was a fitting finale to the evening’s entertainment and in keeping with the “Hidden Herd Presents” ethos of providing a diverse line -up of artists.
Febueder:
Kieran Godfrey – vocals, guitar, trumpet and ukulele
Samuel Keysell – drums, bass guitar and vocals
Details of the next two month’s events can be found HERE.
