Evil Sword in London next Friday!

 

Hello once more!   What a run we've had recently, so many amazing concerts with Jake Xerxes Fussell, Wolf Eyes, Sophia Djebel Rose and Tara Cerlkin Trio - it's been non-stop, but a lot of FUN.   We've got something very special planned for Halloween Friday next week (October 30th). The truly unique, and somewhat macabre, Evil Sword will be boarding Theatreship from their native Philadelphia. Barely controlled chaos-punk, packed with gallows humour and ghoulish overtones await. Plus, arty no-wavers Rainham Sheds and Ebby (featuring members of Lewsberg and Pip Blom), will also be performing. Sounds like an amazing show, right? Will it be spooktacular? You better believe it!   Read on for a full write-up of next Friday, along with listings for our Mississippi Records evening at the Horse Hospital (Nov 3rd), and our birthday bash on December 12th at Chats Palace with Maria Reis, Trash Kit and Dog Chocolate. We've also added a new event next February for one of our favourite groups, Old Saw. Enjoy...           Now with our Upset The Rhythm record label hat on... we have some excellent news to share!   EarthBall’s debut LP ‘It’s Yours’ is now back in print with a new deliriously yellow colour scheme. Updated artwork and transparent sun-yellow vinyl, there’s never been a better time to let the Canadian scorched-improv unit into your solar system.   Available now from all the best shops and our very own Bandcamp hither.         Upset The Rhythm presents… EVIL SWORD RAINHAM SHEDS EBBY Friday 30 October Theatreship, South Quay Plaza, London, E14 9SH 7.30pm | £12 | Tickets: https://link.dice.fm/f5f9fa0cf04d  EVIL SWORD are Kate Ferencz and Ben Furgal from Philadelphia, USA. Their chaotic live shows combine elements of noise, cryptic metal overtones, performance art, and gallows humor and feature macabre props, flashing lights, stage sets and costumes. There are hardly any instruments in this group, but they make such a racket you’d never know it. The bass and the percussion sound like they’re having a great time, telling each other jokes. Then the words come in and it all locks together in these strange, hypnotic rhythms. Recent album ‘Basket Fever’ (Magic Pictures, 2023) features electrocuted bells, backwards parts, rusty horns; I’m pretty sure I even heard a clarinet in there somewhere. But, what’s this new racket? Crashing pots and pans, flashing lights, literal bells and whistles, exploding furniture… this parade of dreams and nightmares could only be Evil Sword’s new split 12” LP with Miss Pussycat - ’The Skit Split’. These unhinged songs conjure up a world of fairy tale magic and monstrosities in equal measure. Evil Sword formed on a Halloween, and now they return to London to work through their demons. https://evilsword.bandcamp.com/album/the-skit-split  RAINHAM SHEDS present all-female maximum art-core no-wave on a primitive tip. Both incomparable and conceptual, the five Shedwomen divest themselves of all cultivated musical norms and graces to most efficiently deliver crude skronk with cloven hooves. Brainchild and performance artist Kate Mahony ruminates on subjects including French philosophy, sex with furniture in damp flats and the nuclear threat. Featuring members of bands including Shake Chain, Flat Soufflé, The Chop and Sassyhiya among others, you are never far from a Shed and upon watching, we are reminded that we are all a little part Shed. https://permanentslump.bandcamp.com/album/rainham-sheds EBBY are a minimalist indie-rock band from Rotterdam, Netherlands, centered around songwriter and former Rats on Rafts member Doortje Hiddema. Originally a solo project, the group expanded into a trio featuring guitarist Michiel Klein (Lewsberg) and bassist/rhythm-box player Casper van der Lans (Pip Blom). https://ebbyband.bandcamp.com/album/abcde         Mississippi Records presents….  A PEOPLE'S HISTORY OF MUSIC  Tuesday 3 November Horse Hospital, Colonnade, London, WC1N 1JD  7.30pm | £12 | Tickets: https://link.dice.fm/Ya21ea072733 A PEOPLE'S HISTORY OF MUSIC is a slideshow / lecture / film presentation which draws from archival film, sound clips and images to tell a history of global music scenes that struggled and endeavoured during periods of authoritarianism. The project, developed by Eric Isaacson, is a timely and compelling story of how powerful interests try to control music and how people fight back, nimbly evading systemic repressions by puritans, corporations and tech lords alike. Making wide, bold swings, the show covers music from Ethiopia, Germany, North Korea, Cambodia, Brazil, Kenya, the USA and beyond, while drawing on Eric’s colourfully described, personal experiences of the fascist creep. Eric Isaacson is the founder of Mississippi Records and many other small esoteric record labels such as Cairo, Pyramid and Velvet Ramp. Over the past twenty- three years he's released over 390 records and 165 mixtapes of DIY music from around the world. Eric is known for his humbly comical, singular style and for his ability to revitalize audiences through digging up buried treasures from the global music underground. https://www.mississippirecords.net/         Upset The Rhythm presents… MARIA REIS TRASH KIT DOG CHOCOLATE Saturday 12 December Chats Palace, 42-44 Brooksby's Walk, London, E9 6DF 7.30pm | £10 | Tickets: https://link.dice.fm/A967cfb2af7a MARIA REIS has been steadily creating a legacy that will undoubtedly endure in the portuguese songwriting canon for years to come. Co-founder of the Lisbon based Cafetra label-collective, Reis spent her teenage years honing her craft, particularly with her co-leading role on Pega Monstro with her sister Júlia Reis, with albums like 'Alfarroba' and 'Casa de Cima' on Upset The Rhythm and whose indefinite hiatus since 2018 opened the gateway for a prolific solo venture. 2019 saw the release of the celebrated 'Chove na Sala, Água nos Olhos', a definitive statement of Reis' almost casual gift of painting vivid and impressionistic portraits of everyday life, conveying all the anger, resignation and melancholic joy of moving on. Two years later, following a string of widely praised live appearances, Reis records the 'Flor da Urtiga' EP with assistance from Noah Lennox aka Panda Bear (Maria plays in Panda’s live band), a sweeter affair, shot through with witty irony, through layered acoustic guitars, lightweight percussion and joyful harmonies. Maria Reis returned recently with a newfound maturity on 'Suspiro’. An attentive and sensitive observer of both intimate and surrounding spaces, Maria Reis continues to explore wordplay in her very personal manner, a poetic act as brutally honest as filled with imagery allusions, enchanting the mundane with lyricism. Touched by a resigned and dreamy melancholy, ‘Suspiro’ settles, for the most part, on electric and acoustic guitar lines, simple but expressive rhythms, floating vocal harmonies and a voice almost tangible in the way it conveys memorable hooks without fear of appearing both fragile and tenacious. https://mariareis.bandcamp.com/album/suspiro TRASH KIT are Ray Aggs (guitar, vocals), Rachel Horwood (drums, vocals) and Clémentine March (bass). Three deeply creative individuals united by a shared musicality that surges through their bodies, hearts and heads. Their songs, once succinct, patchwork post-punk numbers of an honest diary-like nature now tussle more with long-form songwriting, expeditious polyphony and cascades of sung-spoke vocals. Songs on their last album Horizon (Upset The Rhythm, 2019) have had their very fabric stretched into smart new shapes, allowing the band to run away with refrains and unlock the dancefloor. Although Trash Kit have their forebears in bands like Sleater Kinney, The Ex and The Raincoats, their sound is still very much their own take on facing forwards and relies as much on the naturalism of an internalised folk music as on their sincerity of vision. 2026 marks a new reinvigorated era for the band as they are joined by bassist Clémentine March. Breathing fresh life into their back catalogue on stage and jumping head first into sharing new material live, her spirited and responsive playing is once again steering the trio into new, expansive territory. They can’t wait to get back on the road to light up DIY venues across the the UK with what promises to be an energetic and joyous experience for the band and the audience alike. https://upsettherhythm.bandcamp.com/album/horizon DOG CHOCOLATE are a post-pop-"pencil case" punk band, much indebted to lasting friendship. 15 years into their journey as a band, and somehow continuing after the upheaval and weirdness since the virus, they’ll probably still exist in some form when we’ve all been replaced by cyborgs. Their most recent album “So Inspired, So Done In” is Dog Chocolate’s most cohesive yet. Tying together everything that came before, with repeated themes of work, city life, escapism into nature and the creative process, often looking at minutiae to express big ideas. Musically they’re a loud, multicoloured scribble of noise, often eschewing choruses to find the next melodic nugget that connects the puzzle pieces. The live experience is part cathartic explosion, part group therapy, using sincerity and buffoonery in equal measures to try and get a rise or make a connection. https://upsettherhythm.bandcamp.com/album/so-inspired-so-done-in  Have a fabulous weekend, thanks for spending this time with us! Upset The Rhythm                             UPSET THE RHYTHM UPCOMING SHOWS

EVIL SWORD RAINHAM SHEDS EBBY Friday 30 October Theatreship, South Quay Plaza, London, E14 9SH 7.30pm | £12 | Tickets: https://link.dice.fm/f5f9fa0cf04d   Mississippi Records & UTR presents….  A PEOPLE'S HISTORY OF MUSIC  Tuesday 3 November Horse Hospital, Colonnade, London, WC1N 1JD  7.30pm | £12 | Tickets: https://link.dice.fm/Ya21ea072733   WENDY EISENBERG - Two Day residency Sunday 8 November &... Monday 9 November Cafe OTO, 18-22 Ashwin St, London, E8 3DL 7.30pm | SOLD OUT   GROUPER Wednesday 18 November Thursday 19 November Cafe OTO, 18-22 Ashwin St, London, E8 3DL 7.30pm | SOLD OUT   Upset The Rhythm's 23rd birthday party!!! MARIA REIS TRASH KIT DOG CHOCOLATE Saturday 12 December Chats Palace, 42-44 Brooksby's Walk, London, E9 6DF 7.30pm | £10 | Tickets: https://link.dice.fm/A967cfb2af7a   OLD SAW Monday 15 February Cafe OTO, 18-22 Ashwin St, London, E8 3DL 7.30pm | £14 | Tickets: https://link.dice.fm/cbad45586bd3 PROTOMARTYR Tuesday 16 February  Electric Brixton, Town Hall Parade, Brixton Hill, London, SW2 1RJ 7pm | £22.50 | Tickets: https://link.dice.fm/S8d7eed78742   TARA CLERKIN TRIO Wednesday 7 April Scala, 275 Pentonville Road, Kings Cross, London, N1 9NL 7.30pm | £21 | Tickets: https://dice.fm/event/6a99774bfbcf590001f607a9

EarthBall - 'It's Yours' LP repress

 

Best news! (so many of you have been enquiring about this, thank you mightily for your patience) … EarthBall’s debut LP ‘It’s Yours’ is now back in print with a new deliriously yellow colour scheme. Updated artwork and transparent sun-yellow vinyl, there’s never been a better time to let the Canadian scorched improv unit into your solar system. Available now from all the best shops and our Bandcamp hither.

 

 
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Sophia Djebel Rose and Wolf Eyes this week in London!!

 

Hello everyone!   Thank you all immensely for attending our recent shows for The Yummy Fur, R.M.F.C. and Carla dal Forno. What a whirlwind it's been! This week we're keeping our foot on the 'entertainment accelerator' with four more London events.   Tomorrow's Jake Xerxes Fussell concert at Union Chapel is sold out, but we still have a handful (and by that we mean around 20 tickets) for our pair of Wolf Eyes shows at Cafe OTO this coming Thursday and Friday.   Then on Saturday night we're delighted to invite Sophia Djebel Rose to play at the Horse Hospital. The Franco-Moroccan artist blends folk, noise, experimental song and poetry into a new language of their own. We're lucky to have Manchester’s She The Throne performing too, much finesse is whipped up in the maelstrom. It'll be an excellently immersive evening.    Continue reading for all your need to know this week, along with a full listing for our (almost) Halloween show at Theatreship on October 30th with Evil Sword, Rainham Sheds and Ebby!                 Upset The Rhythm presents… WOLF EYES C*NTROACHES Thursday 15 October &… Friday 16 October Cafe OTO, 18-22 Ashwin St, London, E8 3DL 7.30pm | £18 | Tickets: https://link.dice.fm/U3eff5fa1c73 / https://link.dice.fm/m671ef64f8f8 WOLF EYES are an experimental music group from Michigan, originally formed in 1998. Renowned for their distinctive and uncompromising sound, the band fuses elements of noise, industrial, and avant-garde music to create compositions that are both unsettling and hypnotic. Over the years, Wolf Eyes has released an extensive catalog of albums and EPs through numerous independent labels. Known for their intense and unpredictable live performances, Wolf Eyes have earned international acclaim as one of the most innovative and challenging acts in the experimental electronic music scene. Currently comprised of John Olson and Nate Young, the duo has collaborated for over two decades, continually pushing the boundaries of sonic exploration. Wolf Eyes’ new album ‘Self Embalmed’, is due out this autumn as a picture disc LP. https://wolf-eyes.bandcamp.com/ C*NTROACHES are a Berlin-based noise-punk trio known for their chaotic, cacophonous, and visceral sound. Their eponymous self-titled LP, released by SKiN GRAFT Records in 2024, delivers a challenging, mind-grinding auditory experience that appeals heavily to fans of extreme music. https://cuntroaches.bandcamp.com/         Upset The Rhythm presents… SOPHIA DJEBEL ROSE SHE THE THRONE Saturday 17 October The Horse Hospital, Colonnade, London, WC1N 1JD  7.30pm | £11 | Tickets: https://link.dice.fm/hf9055210b2d SOPHIA DJEBEL ROSE is a Franco-Moroccan artist who distills a singular music. Blending folk, noise, experimental song, and avant-garde poetry, she invents a new language of her own. Born into the perpetual exile of a childhood divided between two countries, Sophia has turned wandering into her greatest strength. As a modern poetess, she now takes the stage alone, armed with an electric guitar, to sing of the beauty of the lands she has ceaselessly left behind. Her live performances intertwine Mediterranean music with ecological and feminist themes, all of it carried by a syncretic approach that merges into a mysticism meant as an invitation to break the course of things and to reclaim one’s strength. Her latest album, Sécheresse, released in february 2025 unveils nine mesmerizing & genre-defying tracks imbued with magnetic allure. Austere yet baroque, dark yet luminous, raw yet refined, this work escapes all categorization: it is an act of faith. To class among the unclassifiable, Sophia Djebel Rose lays the foundations for an oeuvre that follows in the lineage of avant-garde women who never ceased to challenge and expand the limits of style.  https://sophiadjebelrose.bandcamp.com/ SHE THE THRONE are a ritual noise duo from Manchester UK. They aim to bring forth an ancient latent rhythmic union merging themselves, the space they play with the audience who listens, urging them to remember. Musically incorporating elements of industrial music and harsh noise with the darker melody of bands like Portishead, fused to the backbone of experimental hip hop. Since the release of their 2023 album, “NUNTIS” on Trepanation Recordings, they have shared line ups with a diverse range of artists such as: The Body & Dis Fig, Wolf Eyes, METH, AYA, Dälek, Greet, SATORI, Collosloth and more. https://shethethrone.bandcamp.com/         Upset The Rhythm presents… EVIL SWORD RAINHAM SHEDS EBBY Friday 30 October Theatreship, South Quay Plaza, London, E14 9SH 7.30pm | £12 | Tickets: https://link.dice.fm/f5f9fa0cf04d  EVIL SWORD are Kate Ferencz and Ben Furgal from Philadelphia, USA. Their chaotic live shows combine elements of noise, cryptic metal overtones, performance art, and gallows humor and feature macabre props, flashing lights, stage sets and costumes. There are hardly any instruments in this group, but they make such a racket you’d never know it. The bass and the percussion sound like they’re having a great time, telling each other jokes. Then the words come in and it all locks together in these strange, hypnotic rhythms. Recent album ‘Basket Fever’ (Magic Pictures, 2023) features electrocuted bells, backwards parts, rusty horns; I’m pretty sure I even heard a clarinet in there somewhere. But, what’s this new racket? Crashing pots and pans, flashing lights, literal bells and whistles, exploding furniture… this parade of dreams and nightmares could only be Evil Sword’s new split 12” LP with Miss Pussycat - ’The Skit Split’. These unhinged songs conjure up a world of fairy tale magic and monstrosities in equal measure. Evil Sword formed on a Halloween, and now they return to London to work through their demons. https://evilsword.bandcamp.com/album/the-skit-split  RAINHAM SHEDS present all-female maximum art-core no-wave on a primitive tip. Both incomparable and conceptual, the five Shedwomen divest themselves of all cultivated musical norms and graces to most efficiently deliver crude skronk with cloven hooves. Brainchild and performance artist Kate Mahony ruminates on subjects including French philosophy, sex with furniture in damp flats and the nuclear threat. Featuring members of bands including Shake Chain, Flat Soufflé, The Chop and Sassyhiya among others, you are never far from a Shed and upon watching, we are reminded that we are all a little part Shed. https://permanentslump.bandcamp.com/album/rainham-sheds EBBY are a minimalist indie-rock band from Rotterdam, Netherlands, centered around songwriter and former Rats on Rafts member Doortje Hiddema. Originally a solo project, the group expanded into a trio featuring guitarist Michiel Klein (Lewsberg) and bassist/rhythm-box player Casper van der Lans (Pip Blom). https://ebbyband.bandcamp.com/album/abcde Considerable thanks for reading, see you frequently this week! Upset The Rhythm                             UPSET THE RHYTHM UPCOMING SHOWS

JAKE XERXES FUSSELL NAIMA BOCK Wednesday 14 October Union Chapel, Compton Terrace, Islington, London, N1 2UN 6.30pm | SOLD OUT   WOLF EYES C*NTROACHES Thursday 15 October &… Friday 16 October Cafe OTO, 18-22 Ashwin St, London, E8 3DL 7.30pm | £18 | Tickets: https://link.dice.fm/U3eff5fa1c73 / https://link.dice.fm/m671ef64f8f8   SOPHIA DJEBEL ROSE SHE THE THRONE Saturday 17 October The Horse Hospital, Colonnade, London, WC1N 1JD  7.30pm | £11 | Tickets: https://link.dice.fm/hf9055210b2d   TARA CLERKIN TRIO - Two Day residency THE SLEEVES (Oct 20) ANA PALINDROME (Oct 21) Tuesday 20 October &... Wednesday 21 October ICA, The Mall, London, SW1Y 5AH 7.30pm | SOLD OUT   EVIL SWORD RAINHAM SHEDS EBBY Friday 30 October Theatreship, South Quay Plaza, London, E14 9SH 7.30pm | £12 | Tickets: https://link.dice.fm/f5f9fa0cf04d   Mississippi Records & UTR presents….  A PEOPLE'S HISTORY OF MUSIC  Tuesday 3 November Horse Hospital, Colonnade, London, WC1N 1JD  7.30pm | £12 | Tickets: https://link.dice.fm/Ya21ea072733   WENDY EISENBERG - Two Day residency Sunday 8 November &... Monday 9 November Cafe OTO, 18-22 Ashwin St, London, E8 3DL 7.30pm | SOLD OUT   GROUPER Wednesday 18 November Thursday 19 November Cafe OTO, 18-22 Ashwin St, London, E8 3DL 7.30pm | SOLD OUT   Upset The Rhythm's 23rd birthday party!!! MARIA REIS TRASH KIT DOG CHOCOLATE Saturday 12 December Chats Palace, 42-44 Brooksby's Walk, London, E9 6DF 7.30pm | £10 | Tickets: https://link.dice.fm/A967cfb2af7a   PROTOMARTYR Tuesday 16 February  Electric Brixton, Town Hall Parade, Brixton Hill, London, SW2 1RJ 7pm | £22.50 | Tickets: https://link.dice.fm/S8d7eed78742   TARA CLERKIN TRIO Wednesday 7 April Scala, 275 Pentonville Road, Kings Cross, London, N1 9NL 7.30pm | £21 | Tickets: https://dice.fm/event/6a99774bfbcf590001f607a9

Philip Frobos - Waxwing / Kawasaki single!

 

Surprise!

Philip Frobos returns today with his first new solo music in five (count them) years. Having kept busy with his group Omni - recently celebrating the 10th anniversary of their debut album - Frobos now eases back into solo mode with a digital single featuring two thrilling covers: ‘Waxwing’ by Sorry and ‘Kawasaki’ by Jane Birkin. Consider your appetite whetted: there’s much more music waiting just over the horizon!

Philip adds:

“‘Waxwing’ and ‘Kawasaki’ were two covers that had been on my docket for some time. ‘Waxwing,’ originally by the elegant and occasionally grotesque band Sorry, features dual drumming from Rodrigo Avendaño (Soccer Mommy) and Jonah Swilley (Revival Season, Mattiel). It was recorded by Avendaño at his studio in Atlanta, GA, and mastered by Andy Clarke. I immediately fell in love with the Sorry track. I found it captivating in its dark humour, contemporary dystopian outlook and sense of disengagement. ‘Kawasaki,’ also recorded by Avendaño, shares similar themes, albeit coming from a different place and time: societal rejection, apathy and nihilism. Jane Birkin, Serge Gainsbourg and Jean-Claude Vannier are household staples for me; Sunday mornings with coffee and eggs.”

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The Yummy Fur - out today! Plus upcoming London shows for Carla dal Forno, R.M.F.C. and The Cleaners From Venus

 

Good morning all!   Let there be… The Yummy Fur.   Today we’re over the moon to release Everybody Talks About The Weather, the brand-new album from uproarious Glasgow legends The Yummy Fur - their first collection of new material in over 27 years! Enticing, ambiguous and exhilarating, Everybody Talks About The Weather is a rapid dash through scenes from art, myth, life and fantasy; a witty whole assembled from glittering scraps. Meaning is never flattened; curious twists are embraced. Their wiry songs have grown into underground pop anthems, boasting sing-song melody and palpable menace in equal measure.   Everybody Talks About The Weather is out now on limited ‘blue sunshine’ vinyl, black vinyl, CD and digitally!           The Yummy Fur are about to tour the UK too: 25/09 - Glasgow - Poetry Club 05/10 - Oxford - Little Bully 06/10 - Exeter -The Cavern 07/10 - Brighton - The Prince Albert 08/10 - Norwich - The Holloway 09/10 - London - The Lexington  10/10 - Bristol - Cafe Kino 11/10 - Manchester - Kamera 16/10 - Glasgow - Hug & Pint    “In Xanadu did Kubla Khan grab the mic and jam with the band”?  The Yummy Fur passed him the tambourine!   Alright, on to London shows now! Firstly, thank you all kindly for coming to see Hana Stretton and Marisa Anderson recently.    Next Thursday we're very lucky to have Carla dal Forno playing for us at the ICA. Joined by The Guests - its going to be fantastic. Well worth snapping up a ticket sooner rather than later, as tickets are dwindling.   Then on Saturday 3rd October we're upping sticks to The Lexington for a lively evening in the company of R.M.F.C. and The Hobknobs, this one is also close to selling out FYI. Not one to miss!   You can read more about both of these events below, along with our listing for October 5th's concert for The Cleaners From Venus at Islington Assembly Hall. This is the follow-up show to Sep 30th's sold out date.   New UTR events announced for Tara Clerkin Trio, Trash Kit and Maria Reis to be found detailed below. Enjoy!             Upset The Rhythm presents… CARLA DAL FORNO GUESTS Thursday 1 October ICA, The Mall, London, SW1Y 5AH 7.30pm | £16.50 | Tickets CARLA DAL FORNO is an Australian composer, songwriter and producer based in Castlemaine, Victoria. Working between post-punk minimalism, experimental pop and atmospheric electronics, she has built a dedicated international following through a series of acclaimed releases and extensive touring across Europe and North America.Her albums have been praised by outlets including Pitchfork, The Quietus and Resident Advisor, alongside airplay on BBC Radio 6 Music. Beyond her recorded work, dal Forno hosts a monthly radio program on NTS Radio, where she curates eclectic selections spanning experimental electronics, dub, post-punk and leftfield pop - offering insight into the wide-ranging influences that inform her own practice. She has performed headline shows and festival appearances throughout the UK, Europe and the United States, including dates in London, Berlin, Paris and New York City, as well as appearances at Unsound Festival and Le Guess Who? Her fourth studio album, Confession, expands her signature sound while maintaining the minimal, immersive qualities that have defined her work to date. On stage, dal Forno delivers a focused and atmospheric set that moves between brooding electronics and melodic immediacy - a performance that is both restrained and quietly powerful. https://carladalforno.bandcamp.com/  GUESTS is the home recording project of Jessica Higgins and Matthew Walkerdine. Vaguely named as such to avoid any problems with the poster if they pull out of a gig (which has only happened once) but also to capture a sense of reverse hospitality, like what happens when private worlds meet each other, making or having been made a space for. Their debut record, “I wish I was special” (World of Echo, 2024) was variously described as “a collage of concrète experiments and outerzone pop gestures, music that sounds as if it’s been written from the depths of a dream”; “music for people who love music but also hate it too”. Their recently released second LP Common Domestic Bird continues in this vein, layering synthesiser, keyboards and samples over rudimentary drum rhythms and field recordings, which are in turn sung or spoken with to create nine new songs.  https://by-guests.bandcamp.com/         Upset The Rhythm presents… R.M.F.C. THE HOBKNOBS Saturday 3 October The Lexington, 96-98 Pentonville Rd, Angel, London, N1 9JB 7.30pm | £15 | Tickets R.M.F.C. is the recording project of New South Wales’ Buz Clatworthy. Buz Clatworthy seemingly writes songs with natural born ease, both unfussy and hyper catchy. Since 2018 R.M.F.C. have released a slew on 7”s on Anti Fade, Total Punk and Goodbye Boozy and 2023’s debut full-length ‘Club Hits’. This album gained energy and charm from both punchy songs and subtly, with each song moving R.M.F.C. forward, whilst holding something memorable. Since then Clatworthy has continued to push himself creatively through singles, which feels like the smart play. He is allowed the freedom to experiment and express without really having to harken back to any trace of his beginnings of automaton-inflected, fast-paced wormy punk from his youth. Most recent 7” ‘Ecstatic Strife’ dips its mug into the punch bowl of what’s best about New Zealand’s ’80s jangle pop scene, with Clatworthy’s assured drumming keeping it on edge. B-side ‘Golden Trick’ is a magical stunner that delves into something more meditative. It’s meditative and lush and hopefully a promise of more to come. https://rockmusicfanclub.bandcamp.com/ THE HOBKNOBS debut album ‘Helmets Off’ is released this June, by themselves and 12XU. Every word and every strum sounds like it’s placed in exactly the right moment. Perhaps it is this bareness of the songs, that makes it feel as if The Hobknobs are speaking to the listener directly. It is clear that they don’t want anything to cloud this human interaction. Yaël Dekker, whom you may also know as the singer of The Klittens, and Arie van Vliet, who used to spread his word through the band Lewsberg, were once described as loving misanthropes. Listening to ‘Helmets Off’, this description seems rather accurate. Dekker and Van Vliet’s voices seem to know each other well, in a way that magnifies the songs beyond their deceptive simplicity. https://thehobknobs.net/         Upset The Rhythm presents… THE CLEANERS FROM VENUS THE GARDENERS Monday 5 October  Islington Assembly Hall, Upper St, London, N1 2UD 7pm | £18 | Tickets  THE CLEANERS FROM VENUS will be performing this Autumn in London. Martin Newell will be on guitar and piano, joined by Nelson Surfquake Nice -  an original member of Cleaners back in the 80s, and half of The Brotherhood of Lizards alongside Martin. The group will be performing some classic Cleaners songs, with a Brotherhood of Lizards cameo-set thrown in! Martin Newell is a purveyor of ingenious pop music. His music is refracted from late 60s rock only shot through with invention from the rough-and-ready explosion of DIY tape releases in 80s Britain. As a songwriter, he’s right up there with Syd Barrett and Ray Davies, capturing a peculiar Englishness that’s very much his own.  Martin started his career in music aged 19 when he joined an Essex glam-rock band called The Mighty Plod as a singer and gigged in rough clubs, pubs and colleges for the next two years. In his early twenties he joined a hard rock/prog band from Ipswich called Gypp and gigged in the UK as well as touring northern Germany several times. In 1979, he won his first record contract and shortly afterwards his first single ‘Young Jobless / Sylvie In Toytown’ was released, first on an indie label and then with Liberty Records. In the 1980s he formed the anarchic and wonderfully offbeat Cleaners From Venus, who after much defiance of music biz convention, signed to a London record company and began making proper records which were well reviewed and well-received. He began co-writing songs with Captain Sensible in 1986, a relationship which endures to some extent to this day. In 1989 he and his friend Nelson, now of New Model Army formed The Brotherhood of Lizards, were signed to make an album and proceeded to promote it, touring the record by bicycle. This led to many TV appearances and some notoriety and amusement in the media. In 1993, with XTC's Andy Partridge in the producer's chair Martin made what was to become his most successful album ‘The Greatest Living Englishman’, hailed by Rolling Stone magazine as a rock classic. Over the last ten years Martin has continued to release exhilarating albums under his own name and as Cleaners from Venus, most recently a winsome new Cleaners album called ‘K7’ was released on CD and cassette. A highly-entertaining live act, Martin Newell performs infrequently, refusing nowadays to tour at all.  He has been the subject of  a highly-praised documentary film Upstairs Planet (2019) which enjoyed premieres both in London and in New York. A second documentary The Jangling Man, the director James Sharp’s intimate portrait of  Newell’s life and work,  premiered in London and Los Angeles in October 2022. https://www.cleanersfromvenus.com/ THE GARDENERS are a jangle-pop inspired indie rock band hailing from London and Southend On Sea. They have recently backed up Martin Newell as part of a live version of Cleaners From Venus. Check out their sublime new single ‘Round the West’ / ‘Falling from You’.  https://linktr.ee/thegardenersband Have the best weekend, thank you for reading! Upset The Rhythm                             UPSET THE RHYTHM UPCOMING SHOWS  THE CLEANERS FROM VENUS THE GARDENERS Wednesday 30 September &… Monday 5 October  Islington Assembly Hall, Upper St, London, N1 2UD 7pm | £18 | Tickets: Sep 30 (SOLD OUT) / Oct 5: https://link.dice.fm/eb85ea9a3f61   CARLA DAL FORNO GUESTS Thursday 1 October ICA, The Mall, London, SW1Y 5AH 7.30pm | £16.50 | Tickets: https://dice.fm/event/69f1eedac3bbec0001965111   R.M.F.C. THE HOBKNOBS Saturday 3 October The Lexington, 96-98 Pentonville Rd, Angel, London, N1 9JB 7.30pm | £15 | Tickets: https://link.dice.fm/ta72c863481e   THE YUMMY FUR - album launch! BRUNO BOF Friday 9 October The Lexington, 96-98 Pentonville Rd, Angel, London, N1 9JB 7.30pm | £12 | Tickets: https://link.dice.fm/Eb344d50313e   JAKE XERXES FUSSELL NAIMA BOCK Wednesday 14 October Union Chapel, Compton Terrace, Islington, London, N1 2UN 6.30pm | SOLD OUT   WOLF EYES CUNTROACHES Thursday 15 October &… Friday 16 October Cafe OTO, 18-22 Ashwin St, London, E8 3DL 7.30pm | £18 | Tickets: https://link.dice.fm/U3eff5fa1c73 / https://link.dice.fm/m671ef64f8f8   SOPHIA DJEBEL ROSE SHE THE THRONE Saturday 17 October The Horse Hospital, Colonnade, London, WC1N 1JD  7.30pm | £11 | Tickets: https://link.dice.fm/hf9055210b2d   TARA CLERKIN TRIO - Two Day residency THE SLEEVES (Oct 20) ANA PALINDROME (Oct 21) Tuesday 20 October &... Wednesday 21 October ICA, The Mall, London, SW1Y 5AH 7.30pm | SOLD OUT   EVIL SWORD RAINHAM SHEDS EBBY Friday 30 October Theatreship, South Quay Plaza, London, E14 9SH 7.30pm | £12 | Tickets: https://link.dice.fm/f5f9fa0cf04d   Mississippi Records & UTR presents….  A PEOPLE'S HISTORY OF MUSIC  Tuesday 3 November Horse Hospital, Colonnade, London, WC1N 1JD  7.30pm | £12 | Tickets: https://link.dice.fm/Ya21ea072733   WENDY EISENBERG - Two Day residency Sunday 8 November &... Monday 9 November Cafe OTO, 18-22 Ashwin St, London, E8 3DL 7.30pm | SOLD OUT   GROUPER Wednesday 18 November Thursday 19 November Cafe OTO, 18-22 Ashwin St, London, E8 3DL 7.30pm | SOLD OUT   Upset The Rhythm's 23rd birthday party!!! MARIA REIS TRASH KIT DOG CHOCOLATE Saturday 12 December Chats Palace, 42-44 Brooksby's Walk, London, E9 6DF 7.30pm | £10 | Tickets: https://link.dice.fm/A967cfb2af7a   PROTOMARTYR Tuesday 16 February  Electric Brixton, Town Hall Parade, Brixton Hill, London, SW2 1RJ 7pm | £22.50 | Tickets: https://link.dice.fm/S8d7eed78742   TARA CLERKIN TRIO Wednesday 7 April Scala, 275 Pentonville Road, Kings Cross, London, N1 9NL 7.30pm | £21 | Tickets: https://dice.fm/event/6a99774bfbcf590001f607a9

The Yummy Fur - BBC 6 Music session!

 

Listen to The Yummy Fur blaze through a live session for Riley & Coe last night! Top performances of ‘Cogs’, ‘My Lasagne’, ‘Wanda’ and ‘Unity Over Europe’, all tracks from the new album out… tomorrow! 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m0031hvz 

UTR - 23rd birthday bash! with Maria Reis & Trash Kit

 

 

Oh Wow! Upset The Rhythm turns 23 years old on December 12th, so… we’re throwing this party to celebrate! See you on the dancefloor x
UTR


Upset The Rhythm presents…

MARIA REIS
TRASH KIT
Saturday 12 December
Chats Palace, 42-44 Brooksby's Walk, London, E9 6DF
7.30pm | £10 | Tickets: https://link.dice.fm/A967cfb2af7a

MARIA REIS has been steadily creating a legacy that will undoubtedly endure in the portuguese songwriting canon for years to come. Co-founder of the Lisbon based Cafetra label-collective, Reis spent her teenage years honing her craft, particularly with her co-leading role on Pega Monstro with her sister Júlia Reis, with albums like 'Alfarroba' and 'Casa de Cima' on Upset The Rhythm and whose indefinite hiatus since 2018 opened the gateway for a prolific solo venture. 2019 saw the release of the celebrated 'Chove na Sala, Água nos Olhos', a definitive statement of Reis' almost casual gift of painting vivid and impressionistic portraits of everyday life, conveying all the anger, resignation and melancholic joy of moving on. Two years later, following a string of widely praised live appearances, Reis records the 'Flor da Urtiga' EP with assistance from Noah Lennox aka Panda Bear (Maria plays in Panda’s live band), a sweeter affair, shot through with witty irony, through layered acoustic guitars, lightweight percussion and joyful harmonies.

Maria Reis returned recently with a newfound maturity on 'Suspiro’. An attentive and sensitive observer of both intimate and surrounding spaces, Maria Reis continues to explore wordplay in her very personal manner, a poetic act as brutally honest as filled with imagery allusions, enchanting the mundane with lyricism. Touched by a resigned and dreamy melancholy, ‘Suspiro’ settles, for the most part, on electric and acoustic guitar lines, simple but expressive rhythms, floating vocal harmonies and a voice almost tangible in the way it conveys memorable hooks without fear of appearing both fragile and tenacious.

https://mariareis.bandcamp.com/album/suspiro


TRASH KIT are Ray Aggs (guitar, vocals), Rachel Horwood (drums, vocals) and Clémentine March (bass). Three deeply creative individuals united by a shared musicality that surges through their bodies, hearts and heads. Their songs, once succinct, patchwork post-punk numbers of an honest diary-like nature now tussle more with long-form songwriting, expeditious polyphony and cascades of sung-spoke vocals. Songs on their last album Horizon (Upset The Rhythm, 2019) have had their very fabric stretched into smart new shapes, allowing the band to run away with refrains and unlock the dancefloor. Although Trash Kit have their forebears in bands like Sleater Kinney, The Ex and The Raincoats, their sound is still very much their own take on facing forwards and relies as much on the naturalism of an internalised folk music as on their sincerity of vision.

2026 marks a new reinvigorated era for the band as they are joined by bassist Clémentine March. Breathing fresh life into their back catalogue on stage and jumping head first into sharing new material live, her spirited and responsive playing is once again steering the trio into new, expansive territory. They can’t wait to get back on the road to light up DIY venues across the the UK with what promises to be an energetic and joyous experience for the band and the audience alike.

https://upsettherhythm.bandcamp.com/album/horizon

The Yummy Fur - 'Wanda'

The Yummy Fur's brand new single 'Wanda' is out today!

 A miniature portrait study, the song folds together the life of filmmaker Barbara Loden with the protagonist of her singular 1970 feature ‘Wanda’ - a meditation on identity, dislocation and escape. The accompanying film, shot in part on Super 8 by Roberta Cumbianchera, stars fellow Argentinian actress Daniela Aita. Drifting between Hollywood Boulevard and the faded fairgrounds of Raymond Chandler's Santa Monica, its luminous imagery mirrors the song's spectral pull.
 

'Wanda' is the latest glimpse of Everybody Talks About the Weather, The Yummy Fur's forthcoming album, released via Upset The Rhythm on 25 September.