There Goes the Fear, a UK/US Music Web site | Live UK gigs, news, and events

Video of the Moment #2316: Clean Cut Kid

Why do I think Liverpool’s Clean Cut Kid would be a fun group of folks to hang out with? They put on a great show at SXSW 2016 last year, and their new video for ‘Leaving You Behind’ is hilarious too. It’s a track from their upcoming debut album ‘FELT, which is purported to drop in April, and its accompanying video sees the band perform while a comical series of games between a man and a woman (remarkably dressed like Margot Tenenbaum) ensue. We’ll leave you to watch the video below to see who won. To read more on Clean Cut Kid on TGTF, go here.

Clean Cut Kid / April and May 2017 UK Tour

Liverpool band Clean Cut Kid have just announced a headline tour of the UK for this April and May, starting in Glasgow on the 28th of April, stopping off in London on the 10th of May, and ending with a homecoming show at the Liverpool Academy on the 20th of May. The band have already released a string of hit singles, including ‘Vitamin C’, ‘Runaway’ and ‘Make Believe’, and are currently in the process of recording their debut LP. You can check out their video for ‘We Used to Be in Love’ at the bottom of the page.

Tickets for the following shows will be available starting today, Friday the 3rd of February, at 10 AM. TGTF’s previous coverage of Clean Cut Kid is gathered right back here.

Friday 28th April 2017 – Glasgow King Tut’s
Saturday 6th May 2017 – Birmingham Institute
Monday 8th May 2017 – Bristol Exchange
Tuesday 9th May 2017 – Brighton Patterns
Wednesday 10th May 2017 – London Scala
Friday 12th May 2017 – Manchester Sound Control
Saturday 20th May 2017 – Liverpool Academy

Video of the Moment #2207: Clean Cut Kid

Liverpool group Clean Cut Kid are currently on tour in the UK, playing tonight in Bristol. They’ve got a new promo video to share with us, and it’s for a track that Annie Mac debuted as a Hottest Record in the World earlier this month.

So what did Clean Cut Kid decide to do with a song called ‘Make Believe’? If you’ve ever wondered about of what really goes on under your sheets – get your mind out of the gutter – the North West band show you their hypothesis. Whimisical? Yes. Serious? Not at all. Watch it below. For more on the band on TGTF, including our coverage of them at SXSW 2016 back in March and Live at Leeds in April, go here.

Clean Cut Kid / October 2016 UK Tour

Liverpool alt-pop quartet Clean Cut Kid have announced a run of live dates in the UK for the end of October, following a lengthy list of summer festival appearances including Latitude, Reading and Leeds, and Festival No. 6. As we mentioned in our preview of the event, Clean Cut Kid are also scheduled to appear at LeeFest Presents: The Neverland 2016 at the end of this month.

Clean Cut Kid’s October headline tour will include stops in Glasgow and London as well as a hometown date in Liverpool on the 29th of the month. Tickets for the following shows are available now. TGTF’s previous coverage of Clean Cut Kid is right back this way.

Wednesday 19th October 2016 – Newcastle Cluny 2
Thursday 20th October 2016 – Glasgow Nice ‘n’ Sleazy
Friday 21st October 2016 – Leeds Headrow House
Saturday 22nd October 2016 – Coventry Kasbah
Monday 24th October 2016 – Bristol Louisiana
Tuesday 25th October 2016 – Brighton Prince Albert
Wednesday 26th October 2016 – London Dingwalls
Friday 28th October 2016 – Nottingham Bodega
Saturday 29th October 2016 – Liverpool East Village Theatre
Sunday 30th October 2016 – Oxford Jericho Tavern

Preview: LeeFest Presents: The Neverland 2016

This year’s LeeFest marks the 10th anniversary of the independent arts festival, which started in 2006 in founder Lee Denny’s own back garden. Dubbed LeeFest Presents: The Neverland, the festival’s motto this year is “Never grow old”, and it promises a “stunning musical lineup” along with a host of other wide-ranging entertainment opportunities. The exact location of The Neverland’s new secret venue and campsite near Tunbridge Wells, about an hour southeast of London, will only be revealed to ticket holders near the time of the event, which is scheduled to take place on the 28th-30th of July.

What we already know about LeeFest 2016 is that its strong live music lineup presents an enticing mix of established artists and up-and-coming acts. Headliner Lianne La Havas could possibly fall into either category, after her breakthrough 2012 album ‘Is Your Love Big Enough?” She is currently supporting Coldplay on their ‘A Head Full of Dreams’ world tour and is scheduled to open for fellow soul singer Leon Bridges on his September and October dates in America. La Havas released a new EP ‘Blood Solo’ back in February, providing solo interpretations of tracks from her second full album ‘Blood’, as well as the delicately haunting new track called ‘Fairytale’, which you can hear just below.

In contrast to La Havas’ soulful folk stylings, Liverpool rockers Circa Waves join the LeeFest headline bill in the midst of their own summer festival circuit. They recently appeared at Live at Leeds 2016 and will grace their hometown stage at Sound City 2016 at the end of this month. Circa Waves have been quiet so far in 2016, but their emergence back onto the live scene, including a handful of upcoming headline dates around the UK, might be a hint that something new from the band is forthcoming. In the meantime, you can get in the festival spirit with their video for ’T-Shirt Weather’, which featured on their 2015 debut album ‘Young Chasers’.

The LeeFest 2016 docket features a wide array of other artists previously covered here at TGTF, most notably 2015 Mercury Prize nominee Ghostpoet.  The LeeFest lineup also includes a lengthy list of our SXSW 2016 alums: Manchester art-rockers Everything Everything, dance pop duo Formation, Liverpool’s own Clean Cut Kid, indie pop wunderkind Oscar, Kent ‘dirty-pop’ bangers Get Inuit, Sheffield rock duo Nai Harvest and Tunbridge Wells native Will Joseph Cook.

Newer acts like London all-female quartet The Big Moon and Belfast alt-rock duo exmagician (pictured above) hope to build their reputations on LeeFest’s stages as part of their summer festival tours as well. Given that LeeFest’s past lineups have hosted such heavy hitters as London Grammar, Jack Garratt, Years & Years, and Clean Bandit, it seems like a safe bet that if you’re not already familiar with the names on this year’s list, you will become so in very short order. (On that note, stay tuned to TGTF for our pre-LeeFest interview with exmagician, which will post in the coming days.)

The live music portion of the festival will also include DJ sets from Submotion Orchestra (pictured above), The 2 Bears, Midland and Horse Meat Disco. Aside from the musical festivities, LeeFest also offers a variety of other entertainment categories comprising Comedy, Spoken Word, a generic Performance classification, and the very curiously-titled Sillyness. Divided among three so-called “realms”, The Neverland aims to provide “immersive adventures at every turn”, even including a Family category for arts enthusiasts with young children.

As a preview of the main event, LeeFest: The Neverland is partnering with the Tunbridge Wells Forum for a free festival launch party featuring a surprise headliner starting at 6 PM on the 3rd of June. Keep your eyes on LeeFest’s official Facebook page and Twitter feed, which are being updated with further details as the 2016 festival approaches.

Live at Leeds 2016 Roundup (Part 2)

If you missed the first installment of Rebecca’s roundup of Live at Leeds 2016, you can catch up on it right back here.

Following Mystery Jets at the Academy, I arrived early for Clean Cut Kid’s set at Leeds University Union and caught their soundcheck, which consisted of a stripped back version of ‘Vitamin C’, showcasing Evelyn and Mike Halls’ impeccable vocals. The crowd had already built up before the end of the soundcheck, and I’d bumped into a couple of people on my way in who were looking for the stage and excited to catch the band in action. The set was bookended with the band’s two most popular tracks, opening with ‘Runaway’ and closing with ‘Vitamin C’. From start to finish, it was an indie-pop filled half hour of fun, bright guitar hooks and vibrant vocals, and there was an abundance of dancing, clapping and singing along from the crowd.

I caught Catholic Action at Nation of Shopkeepers, the kooky bunting-trimmed venue in the city’s centre. Catholic Action are one of those bands who sound good on record, and even better live. Their upbeat, pop/indie blend was well suited to Nation of Shopkeepers, which was probably my favourite venue of all that I was able to visit on the day. A friend of mine recently described the band as a “Scottish Weezer”, and after hearing them perform, I can’t say that I disagree. Their set was a standout for me on the day, from the jingling guitars to the clap-inspiring drumbeats and crisp vocals.

Back over at the Brudenell Social Club I arrived partway through Vitamin‘s set. The dreamy indie pop quartet are Leeds locals and were in full-flow by the time I arrived, having drawn in a medium-sized but enthusiastic crowd. Lead singer Jared Laville was decked out in a double denim stonewashed ensemble and was charismatically wooing the crowd. During the final song of the set, the band’s latest single ‘Waterfall’, Laville descended into the crowd, with people reaching out to touch him like he was the messiah of dream pop.

After Vitamin was Anteros on the Games Room stage across the hall at Brudenell. As with The Velveteens earlier in the day, it took a while for the crowd to build and required prompting from lead singer Laura Hayden to bring the crowd forward. Hayden was vibrant and commanded attention, standing before the crowd with just a microphone in her hand, occasionally bashing a drum. The whole band looked like they were having a great time. Stand out tracks were ‘Breakfast’, the band’s latest single, and their previous singles ‘Fade to Grey’ and self-titled ‘Anteros’, which is such an excellent track and sounds even better live, showing off Hayden’s brilliant voice. The band has created an iridescent variety of wistful indie-pop that’s just edgy enough to avoid being too sweet. Their performance was another standout for me, but I can’t help thinking that they might have benefitted from a stage closer to the city centre that would have drawn in a larger crowd.

The first and only other time I’ve seen We Are Scientists live was in 2010 on the NME stage at Leeds Festival, so I was determined to make it back to Leeds University Union to catch them before I had to leave. I made it to the Union in order to get a decent spot on the stairs, which in hindsight wasn’t the best idea as I was constantly bumped into by people trying to make their way up and down the staircase, struggling against the tide of people that had also decided on the same viewing spot as myself. But the struggle was worth it. From the minute Keith Murray and Chris Cain walked on stage they built up a cheeky back and forth between each other and the audience, with Cain immediately going over to the audience at this side of the stage and shaking hands with members of the audience.

We Are Scientists opened with ‘The Scene is Dead’, before following up with other hits such as ‘Nobody Move, Nobody Get Hurt’ and ‘I Don’t Bite’, and ‘Buckle’, the first single from their latest album ‘Helter Seltzer’, released in April. I had to leave shortly after, but I was happy to have experienced the 20 minutes or so in the band’s presence, which was the cherry on top of an already great day.