HOW LONG YOU BEEN DRIVING + WIMP + FRANCIS PIG + RAGDOLL + THAT BAND CALLED SUSAN – THE HOPE & RUIN, BRIGHTON 15.2.25
Brighton’s beloved live music venue The Hope & Ruin, located on Queens Road, had their 10th birthday over the weekend and they celebrated this remarkable milestone by putting on two free entry celebration concerts featuring a host of mainly local bands. On Valentine’s Day they had live sets from the mysteriously billed headliners under the guise of ‘The Four Horseman’. This turned out to be none other than rising stars Lime Garden and supporting them were Ladylike and Harper. Then on Saturday the headliners were originally going to be stupendous Dublin electropunks YARD who were my personal favourite act at last year’s ‘Great Escape’ festival, but sadly their plans were scuppered, but fear not YARD fans as they will now be playing live in Brighton as support to the epic Belfast trio Chalk who will be heading at the Concorde 2 on Saturday 8th March as part of their ‘Conditions’ tour – Further details HERE. So the final billing for The Hope & Ruin’s Saturday birthday bash featured no less than 5 bands! These being, new headliners How Long You Been Driving, as well as Wimp, Francis Pig, Ragdoll and That Band Called Susan.
Over the past decade, The Hope & Ruin has become a cornerstone of the local music scene, hosting unforgettable gigs, emerging talent, and cherished community moments. Known for its eclectic vibes, craft beers, and a steadfast commitment to independent music, the venue has been a sanctuary for music lovers and creatives alike. They are arguably at the epicentre of Brighton’s music culture and its undeniable all-inclusive spirit. So it would be remiss of us not to attend at least one of the two free entry birthday bashes. We were already covering rising stars Fat Dog at the Chalk venue in Pool Valley for Valentine’s Day (Review HERE), and others in the team were happily watching The Seagulls thrash Chelsea three-nil, and so our Saturday night was planned…The Hope & Ruin it is then in order to give our support the cherished venue, even though not all of the bands are to our liking!
Although the two concerts were free entry affairs, clearly demand was going to be huge, so the venue set the option of purchasing guaranteed entry tickets costing a mere £5 per night with all proceeds going to The Clare Project and Gig Buddies Sussex.
It’s Saturday night and we arrive in time and purchase our chosen liquid refreshment and grab our positions at the front of the first floor music room and await the arrival of Hertfordshire based noise punk duo That Band Called Susan, who we originally caught two months ago in the same venue. For the record, there are just two of them (as we are regularly reminded during their 30 minute set from 7:48pm to 8:18pm) and neither of the lads are actually called Susan!
Last year the guys dropped two singles ‘Why Don’t You Love Me?’ and ‘Never Learnt To Swim’ and according to their Bandcamp page they “combine aggressive, insulting bass with borderline abusive drums to create their boundary pushing sound with blistering raw energy”. On our debut encounter, we were certainly thrown several curveball’s due to the unnerving antics of the band’s left-handed bassist, who offered us controlled false cheesy smiles and the like throughout that set. As it’s our second time, we knew what to expect, unlike a majority in the room this evening. Whereas we stood there with smiles across our faces, initially many punters were clearing wondering WTF is going on here! That Band Called Susan were leaving their imprint on punters’ brains, especially with the “than-kew” uttered after most of the tunes.
That Band Called Susan mean business right from the very start as the drummer discards his top even before a single note has been played. Their songs often flit between different beats and this keeps us on our toes as to what might be coming next. Talking of which, the bass guitar pedal when used, opened up a whole new avenue of sound. They ended on ‘The Attic’ with the unnerving repeated line “all of my real friends end up dead in the attic”. Let’s face it, it would be a boring world without the likes of these lads and so let’s put it out there that they are the demented brothers of Snayx and Skinny Milk. By the end of their set, they had brought the crowd around to their way of thinking….a good start to the night!
It was the turn of another duo to grace The Hope & Ruin stage next, this time around it’s Ragdoll who are a noisy outfit featuring Tamblyn Sturgess on vocals and Fender guitar with Freddie Haggar on drums. They entertained us for 29 minutes from 8:40pm to 9:09pm. Our team had encountered Ragdoll here at The Hope & Ruin last April when they were supporting Cowboyy (Review HERE).
Last year they dropped a couple of tunes on Spotify, these being ‘Track One’ and ‘Castle Street’. The duo take to the stage and the very first thing I notice is that Tamblyn’s guitar strings are so long and standing high above the instrument that an eye could be poked, but thankfully specs are being worn! Well worn most of the time, when they aren’t sent flying off onto the ground whilst rockin’ on out! It’s a reasonably mellow start, which lures us into a false sense of security, before hitting us with a barrage of screeches! It’s distortion overload here! I’m not sure the sound quality tonight is as good as usual, but with Ragdoll, it really doesn’t matter!
Tamblyn’s vocals are delivered with true conviction although all of the words are inaudible and occasionally she prefers to stand away from the microphone and bellow out the lyrics au naturel. There seems to be an air of freeform about the performance, where possibly not all of the material is structured, or maybe they are just going off-piste at times. We are informed that they will be releasing a new single on 7th March, which will then be followed by an album on 4th April, although neither of these are named. But we do learn that tonight’s closing track, ‘Black Mirror’ will be the final track on the long-player. Ragdoll sounds such a sweet name and conjures up memories of ‘Teletubbies’, ‘Tots TV’, ‘Brum’, and ‘Rosie & Jim’, but in all honesty they are more ‘Pob’s Programme’ and gobbing at your telly! Let’s just say that Ragdoll are an acquired taste and leave it at that.
The third act of the night were in all honesty the band that we were most looking forward to seeing live in action again, this being Alana Doyle (vocals, drum machine, tambourine), Henry Wickett Padgham (guitar, vocals), Jacob Newman (guitar) and Jade Taaffe (bass, backing vocals), who collectively are Francis Pig, who we have been fortunate to have previously encountered on a few occasions, the last of which being here at The Hope & Ruin last month as part of Love Thy Neighbour’s annual ‘Triptych’ three day event.
Thus far the band have to date released just the one single, this being ‘Obscene Dream’, which came out last December. Its “Dirty little secret” chorus is easily identifiable as are its wonderful bass and guitar riffs. The quartet are certainly pushing the boundaries of conventional synth/punk/rock music, forging a path that is uniquely their own. With a sound that is both driving and minimalistic, they deliver a visceral punch with a blend of heavy baselines, distorted guitars and commanding vocals. Their songs are a potent blend of raw power and poetic depth, exploring themes of eroticism and existentialism with a fearless intensity.
The quartet take to the stage and clearly all eyes are drawn to Alana with her jaunty in-yer-face movements whilst bellowing out her lyrics when she’s not setting up the Roland TR-08 Rhythm Composer in between tracks. Mid-set the theatrics were heightened as Alana briefly joined the crowd and knelt on the floor. At times she also made good use of the floor speaker which butts up to the stage, by writhing around on it. Yes folks, Francis Pig material is rather erotic, an example of this being ‘Sex Talk’ which features a repeated “Let’s talk about sex baby” chorus. Henry does actually get a go on lead vocals for one of the tunes during their 33 minute performance, which ran from 9:31pm to to 10:04pm, and the vibe switches to sounding more akin to The Jesus & Mary Chain meets Velvet Underground meets The Stooges. Tonight the quartet were really at it, and as the punter standing next to me observed “They were on fire tonight!”, I wholeheartedly agreed! You can next catch Francis Pig in action at the Hidden Herd All-Dayer event at the Green Door Store on 1st March – Tickets HERE.
The penultimate selection of the evening were Wimp, but before they could start Sally Ann Oakenfold from The Hope & Ruin came on stage with a special 10th birthday cake complete with ten candles, and all dutifully sang ‘Happy Birthday’ and then the candles were extinguished. I noted on leaving the venue, that all of the cake had actually been eaten…well it wasn’t me!
And so on to Wimp who were in action for 28 minutes from 10:21pm to 10:49pm. Not surprisingly there are at least three acts out there called ‘Wimp’, but this lot are the local outfit that dropped their 5-tune ‘Where The Flower Bloom’ EP in 2023, followed by the 4-track ‘Split’ EP last year. If you’ve heard Wimp then you will know that their sound is the polar opposite of being wimpy! Operating under the usual guitar and vox, drums, bass and vox, and guitar format, the guys exploded into a loud, meaty head bobbing grungey punk sound and was mosh central, with the banner been thrown out there by the vocalist who from the outset informed us that the stage diving record was broken at their last gig! The number was eighteen! This was like waving a red flag to a bull, the younger punters got some serious action going down and at one point several folk joined the band on stage to help with the tune! It was thrilling to watch, but we had to have our wits about us, so that we didn’t get a trailing boot in the head!
Wimp are fast, heavy and clearly have a loyal local following, several of whom are in other similar bands on the scene. They would be ideal for the annual Rebellion festival that happens in Blackpool each year and should keep the 100mph punk versions of Green Day and Limp Bizkit happy! For a wild experience where the music and fans make you feel truly alive, then you might want to head along to the next Wimp concert. In fact they are one of the bands who are playing the forthcoming ‘Homegrown Festival’ which is taking place on Saturday 12th April at no less than 8 grassroots music venues right across Brighton. Two of the proposed three waves of acts have already been announced, and further information can be located HERE. You can also check out our reviews of the inaugural ‘Homegrown Festival’ from 2024 HERE.
www.instagram.com/simp_for_wimp
Rounding off the 10th birthday bash are Brighton based hardcore quartet How Long You Been Driving who commenced their set at 11:19pm. They too, like Wimp, performed at last year’s ‘Homegrown Festival’ where they kept punters at The Hope & Ruin on their toes that night. Tonight it’s very much the same! The band first released their ‘Consumption’ tune in the summer 2023, and this was followed by ‘Party Song’ a few months afterwards. Last summer, their correctly titled 6-track ‘Terrible Noise’ EP came out, which included the 2 previous tunes as well as four newbies. The half dozen songs on the EP come in at sub 13 minutes, so everything is fast, hard and loud with these guys. Arguably its Extreme Noise Terror with added Death Metal nods all the way! The vocals are inaudible and are often “whoahhhh” with the heavy beats. If you have a headache or of a nervous disposition, then it’s probably best to avoid How Long You Been Driving!
Tonight, the fans have really gone into overdrive and safety for the token oldie in the venue (that’ll be me then!) and his chum with expensive camera equipment is fast becoming a worry. We love it at the very front, but on extreme occasions, (probably just once a year) we know when to make a swift retreat, and so we slide out of the music room and continue listening to the tunes on the other side of the door, whilst sharing enjoyable music banter with Sam from Shady Baby.
And that was it, the 10th birthday bash draws to a close. Well done to all involved….“Time for bed said Dougal”.
linktr.ee/howlongyoubeendriving
Forthcoming concerts at The Hope & Ruin can be found HERE.
