Single released 22/10/2007
"Bet on this Sheffield duo making a big splash with their debut album in 2008. For now you can swoon to the skatetastic video for second single Me And You (out 29 October) and hear b-side Apples And Pairs - a gorgeous strummed waltz that builds to a brassy crescendo Arcade Fire wouldn't sniff at - on their MySpace page." CP BBc Collective
"Slow Club are this year's best kept secret, with Charles playing guitar and Rebecca playing the chair. Yes, the chair. They're on Moshi Moshi and new single "Me and You" is fantastic" [Huw Stephens NME Buzz article]
"Sweet, charming and completely twee, Slow Club are hard to resist. Part folk, part country, part rockabilly 'Me And You' is one of thsoe songs that can't fail to make you smile, be it the big opening joint vocals, the fastly strummed acoustic guitar, handclaps, or the loveable lyrics similar to that of The Research. As the male/female vocals play off each another "we're moving gravel off of someone else's drive, into a wheelbarrow it helps us stay alive". They sing about pounds and euros, marrying into money, love letters, bats hibernating on bathroom walls, illiterate pets all over a simple rollicking guitar and bass drum. With what sounds like a gospel choir in the background makes this a completely loveable hidden gem. Flip it over to the b-side to hear a great use of glass bottles and beautiful lyrics on 'Apples And Pairs'. Their debut album will be released in 2008 and I'm very excited about it." [Artrocker]
Guardian Band Of The Day
"Today, Paul Lester tells us about the musical stylings of Charles and Becky, who are like a northern English take on the White Stripes, only less creepy
Friday October 26, 2007
Guardian Unlimited
Slow Club: how cute can you get?
Hometown: Sheffield.
The lineup: Charles (vocals, guitar) and Becky (vocals, guitar, percussion).
The background: They're not yer typical Sheffield act, that's for sure. They don't do synthpop (Human League), white funk (ABC, Heaven 17) or sampladelic electro (Cabaret Voltaire), and they've got nowt (South Yorkshire for "nothing") in common with Arctic Monkeys or Bromheads Jacket. If anything, these two schoolfriends, a voice-guitar-drums boy-girl duo in love with Leonard Cohen, Rod Stewart and "show-tunes" who formed last July and have gigged relentlessly since, are like a northern English take on the White Stripes or X Factor's Same Difference, only less creepy (don't you find the White Stripes creepy?).
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They operate, or rather gambol and frolic, in that area - field, meadow - between twee C86 anorak janglepop, nu folk and rockabilly (jolkabilly, anyone?). Charles plays his acoustic guitar furiously, even though he's not that angry, and writes stripped-down though occasionally brass-enhanced songs about fruit and miniature houses while riding the exercise bike in his parents' house. And Becky, all golden hair, summer frocks and cute manoeuvres, plays an organ called Miles and finds percussion in found objects - water-filled glass bottles, spoons, the backs of wooden chairs - that she hits with her feet and sometimes her hands, usually while standing up. Their harmonies alternate between cooing and yowling, and they have what you might call chemistry, but there's nothing biological about their relationship, and it sure ain't physical.
Their debut single might have been called Because We Are Dead, but the video shoot was more Alice In Indieland, full of balloons and cakes and synchronised dance routines with a bunch of their pals. They've been described, by important and high-ranking music industry officials (not us), as "Britain's best-kept secret" and alt. radio is all over them like a rash, one requiring cream and everything. They're the Nancy & Lee, if not the Peters & Lee (their eyesight's fine, don't worry), of Freshers Week romance, and if they ever make a musical about undergrads falling in and out of love as they fall in and out of student union discos, this pair will be singing the soundtrack.
The buzz: "In a city jam-packed with derivative Monkey bands, Slow Club stand out... Gut-wrenchingly beautiful."
The truth: They're cute alright, only with a sinister undercurrent of... yet more cute.
Most likely to: Make you go, Aaaah.
Least likely to: Make you go, Aaaargh!!!
File next to: A Hawk And A Hacksaw, Nancy Sinatra & Lee Hazlewood, Sean & Sarah Smith, Sid & Nancy.
What to buy: Me & You 7-inch single is released by Moshi Moshi on Monday. Slow Club will release their debut album in 2008.
Links: MySpace page
Monday's new band: Official Secrets Act.
Paul Lester
- Me And You
- Apples And Pairs