(Review by Ben ‘Jerry’ Robinson)
DEADLETTER – RESIDENT, BRIGHTON 13.9.24
Tonight’s an exciting one; we have DEADLETTER playing at the mighty Resident Music shop. Not only that, it’s on their album ‘Hysterical Strength’s release day too! I can feel it in my bones that tonight is going to be something very special.
Hailing from Yorkshire originally, but now South London based, DEADLETTER formed in 2020, just days before the pandemic struck. After a plethora of live gigging over the past few years, a single and an EP release, here we are in 2024 with the fruits of their labour culminating in the excellent debut album ‘Hysterical Strength’. The band’s musical style is what I’d describe as post punk, jazz infused, brooding but fun and exciting at the same time.
They are no strangers to Brighton, having played here at the ‘Mutations Festival’ (2021), Green Door Store (2022), The Hope & Ruin (2022), ‘The Great Escape’ Festival (2022 & 2023) and most recently last November at Patterns on their headline tour. I was lucky enough to catch them at the 2023 Great Escape Festival and thoroughly enjoyed their set ,so I have been following them from afar. I am excited to see how they have evolved since then.
Tonight’s show is the start of a run of 7 in-store dates across the UK, ending in London on the 21st September. This evening’s show sold out very fast, something I had anticipated and ended up buying both the LP and CD to secure my entry tickets on Dice.
With doors opening at approximately 6:30pm, we all filtered in, filling every ounce of shop space available. I was lucky that I managed to get a spot right at the front, which is great for viewing the action, but at the same time a bit uncomfortable that I am seemingly less than a metre from vocalist Zac Lawrence, I am hoping I don’t put him off his stride.
At 6:45pm the band come out taking up places, all nicely spaced out, with drummer Alfie Husband and bass player George Ullyott both positioned to our left hand side of the shop counter, guitarists Will King and Sam Jones are both behind the counter with vocalist Zac Lawrence in front of the counter along with their new saxophone player, the bands original saxophone player Poppy Richler left the band in July, but I should point out is on the album.
After some moody intro bass lines, the fast patter of Alfie’s drums kicked in for ‘Credit To Treason’; the first song from the album, a great tune, getting livelier as it progressed, the saxophone ever present along with that heartbeat bass line, Zac pacing back and forth with his tambourine.
Moving straight into ‘More Heat’, you get to hear more of the two guitarists at work, both jerking and extorting crazy cool sounds, it’s not that traditional lead and rhythm you see in so many bands, but something very different, bringing a more alarming noise and urgency to the songs, it all works so well especially blending with the saxophone.
Crouching down on the floor Zac awaited the clicks of Alfie’s drumsticks before leaping up for ‘Mother’; a moody song, but my word a bloody good one, Zac was circling round shaking and belting out the lyrics “Oh mother, just forget it all and dance” before eventually sitting on the counter and staring down at the floor for the close.
The music vibe is an intense one, utterly mesmerising though, Zac and the band are very much warmed up and in the flow as they played ‘Bygones’ a well-paced track, which had me dancing along. That is one thing about these Resident gigs, the urge to dance is there, but not really possible due to lack of space, all I could do was sway and jig about a bit, but by heck I really wanted to let loose during this one and quite frankly had that feeling for the majority of the set.
“Good evening we are DEADLETTER and it is a pleasure to be here, thank you for coming down to celebrate the release of our album with us….. on the same day it came out” Zac said in his dry manner, he continued “that was the first four songs from the album and the following one will be the fifth” As you may have guessed and as we were finding out, tonight’s set was going to be the album in full and in track order. The fifth track was ‘A Haunting’. Zac waved his hands in the air beckoning the crowd to make noise and ramp it up as he took his shirt off.
Before ‘It Flies’ Zac addressed the crowd again whilst pacing back and forth like a caged lion, “Thank you, this is very weird isn’t it, I don’t know where to look, it’s like reading stories to children, it’s about how close everyone is… not reducing anyone here to that, unless you a child of course in which case you need not be offended”. What with me being probably the closest person I wasn’t too sure where to look either. ‘It Flies’ though was an excellent song, I found myself already singing along and I’ve not even heard the album yet. I reckon that’s a good sign of excellent songwriting, if the audience is able to pick up and memorise words so quickly, it can only be a good thing. I know I am going to have that line “the omnipresent flicker of the television set” in my head for days now.
Spotting a dog in the crowd, Zac said “I’ve just noticed there is a dog down there, and I think this is the first dog that has seen DEADLETTER play, it’s a day of firsts, first album, first dog, whatever could come next?”, he continued “Moving on to side B of the album we now have the album’s title song ‘Hysterical Strength’”. This one started with some almost 80s sounding saxophone playing, the drumming is excellent, Alfies style is heavy with the use of the cymbals, especially the continued use of the high hat, which I found created a rather unique style, his timing so darn good, it adds a sense of speed to the songs even though they are not necessarily fast.
‘Relived’ was a bass heavy number, with both George, Alfie and Sam both echoing back lines to Zac, this along with the saxophone reminded me a bit of seeing Personal Trainer who played at Resident in August. I could certainly draw some comparisons, in that all the instruments used bring a cacophony of audio joy to the ears.
Zac split the crowd walking from the centre front of the shop to the back, creating a gap, before crouching on the floor while the band started playing ‘Deux Ex Machina’, he then slowly worked his way forward singing towards the front counter, upon arrival the song exploded with noise from the guitars, sax and fast paced lyrics, the song then had a false end before bursting back in to life, ending with Zac kneeling on the payment counter.
“Let us pray” he declared as the band broke into ‘Practise Whilst You Preach’, slowly Zac rose up until his head was up against the ceiling, at one point he palm hit the ceiling a few times and the smoke alarm detector fell from the ceiling just to the side of me, narrowly missing us at the front. He said afterwards joking “there is a line in that song about a light bulb going a bit weird, so that was divine intervention there if I’ve ever seen it”.
Zac then thanked the crowd, “This brings us to the last two tracks of the album, so thank you very much for coming, it’s been a while coming, but it’s here and we just can’t wait to make another one” prompting a big cheer.
The first of the last two songs was ‘Mere Mortal’, this one has had lots of airplay on BBC 6Music what with it coming out as a single back in April this year, a fine punchy number for sure and one I was familiar with.
For the final song ‘Auntie Christ’, Zac strapped on his acoustic guitar, “I just hope to God I never have to stare at Sabrina Carpenter for 45 mins again” he joked referencing the album sleeve that was displayed to the side of my left arm. He thanked us all again “thank you very much, seriously thank you for coming down, it is a big day for us after all, we wouldn’t have got here without people like you, so thank you. This brings us to the album’s final song, our final song, and if you haven’t listened to it yet, I do apologise that we have just spoiled it all”. This song was far more guitar led, a real atmospheric number, a fine way to close the set and indeed the album.
Zac is an impressive frontman; you can’t help but be transfixed by his movements, punching the air, pacing about. I know he often will have his top off and move out into the crowd at gigs, he and the band have a huge understated confidence about them. I was impressed when I first saw them in 2023, but it has to be said their relentless gigging has made them so so good, I remember back in the day you’d get a short set of 3 to 6 songs at these Resident instores, but to come here and play the full album without missing a beat shows real musical class. They deserve every success that is hopefully coming to them, they more than deserve it, I am a very happy chap that I got to be there on the day the album was released and experience it. Thank you DEADLETTER and thank you Resident for putting it on.
If you want to catch DEADLETTER soon and I do urge you, they are playing at Chalk, Brighton on the 14th November. Now the album is out there I am sure it will sell out, so get in there fast. Tickets are currently available from HERE.
‘Hysterical Strength’ is out now on So Recordings and available at your nearest record store…Resident.
DEADLETTER:
Zac Lawrence – vocals, acoustic guitar
George Ullyott – bass
Alfie Husband – drums
Will King – guitar
Sam Jones – guitar
New member of the band – sax
DEADLETTER setlist: (all from 2024 ‘Hysterical Strength’ album)
‘Credit To Treason’
‘More Heat’
‘Mother’
‘Bygones’
‘A Haunting’
‘It Flies’
‘Hysterical Strength’
‘Relieved’
‘Deus Ex Machina’
‘Practise Whilst You Preach’
‘Mere Mortal’
‘Auntie Christ’
