Happy Birthday – Hoxton Bar & Kitchen, London 04/11/10

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Click on any image to enlarge | All photographs by Anika Mottershaw

The revelation that Hoxton Bar & Kitchen has air-con was perhaps the biggest cause for celebration tonight, but Happy Birthday certainly deserved a few cheers of their own. The Sub Pop signings could have done with a bit more tightness at times, but their ramshackle, chaotic energy and exuberant songs more than made up for the occasional sloppy moment (and let’s face it- those never did Pavement any harm). Their best known track ‘Subliminal Message,’ channelling the same synthy 80’s vein as M83 albeit with a poppier, Cyndi Lauper-ish bent isn’t that representative of their sound. Indeed, on the whole, their energetic, guitar-centric power pop recalls the likes of Fang Island – which of course is no bad thing at all. It’s far from epoch-defining stuff, but for melodic, hook-laden indie pop delivered with humour and verve one could do a hell of a lot worse.

Tonight’s support came courtesy of Spectrals, whose name makes them sound like a B-list Motown signing, but whose oeuvre is more along the lines of a stoned Camera Obscura. Their woozy, reverb-drenched surf-pop proved divisive amongst my associates – some declaring them one of the most promising new bands in Britain; others decrying them as charmless slumber-merchants. This reviewer fell between the two camps; their songs strike a soothingly pleasant note and they certainly capture the zeitgeist, but their lack of variety coupled with lead singer Louis Jones’ unfortunate hissy fit didn’t exactly endear.