Aircooled are a supergroup for those that are in the know! It’s fair to state that they are purveyors of guitar tainted machine rock! Last year the outfit dropped their debut long player ‘St. Leopards’. which is a play on where they are based St Leonard’s-on-Sea. They are set to release the follow up, titled ‘Eat The Gold’ on 16th February which can be purchased HERE. In celebration of this Aircooled will be playing two album launch gigs on Saturday 17th February here in Brighton at The Prince Albert. Support will come from Winter Gardens and The Evening Sons. Tickets for the concert have now sold out, but tickets for the new added 2pm show can be found HERE.
We were fortunate to catch both Aircooled and Winter Gardens live in action last year at the ‘Seaview Festival’ at De La Warr Pavilion, Bexhill-on-Sea. Here’s what we reported:
Aircooled live at ‘Seaview Festival’ at De La Warr Pavilion, Bexhill-on-Sea 8.7.23:
Next up before the break for the DJ set was local favourites Aircooled with their own brand of guitar tainted machine rock. Aircooled consists of Oliver Cherer (of Music’s Not Dead record shop), Justin Welch (The Jesus and Mary Chain, Elastica, Piroshka), Katharine Wallinger (The Wedding Present), keyboardist (artist and former member of Elastica) ‘Mew’ on keyboards plus positive dancing, and finally from Magyigon, Myanmar is Riz Maslen on vocals and keyboards.
Playing their first festival, Oliver announced “This is a hometown show. It had better be good.” Draped in front of the two keyboards were motifs of a roaring leopard from their debut album ‘St. Leopards’. It was these keyboards that were at the heart of Aircooled’s dance sound. As well as Oliver on guitar moving across the stage, one of the synth players was dancing very enthusiastically.
This spread to the audience with a group dancing in front of the stage. There was a friends and family feel to the Aircooled set, with plenty of good-natured banter between core fans at the front of the stage and the band. Most of the tracks in Aircooled’s set were instrumentals, with the first lyrics on the penultimate song ‘Hyperproductiv!’. Aircooled saved an obvious fan’s favourite ‘Supamotodisco’ to close a very lively danceable set.
Winter Gardens – Taking influence from 80’s post-punk, Factory, Postcard, 4AD, Creation era bands, Winter Gardens have developed their own ‘dream punk’ sound, all the ethereal haze of shoegaze and dreampop with the energy of punk. Winter Gardens have managed to secure support slots for Modern English, Say Sue Me, Magic Wands, Charles Howl and opened this year’s Rockaway headlined by Gary Numan and Echo & The Bunnymen.
Winter Gardens live at ‘Seaview Festival’ at De La Warr Pavilion, Bexhill-on-Sea 8.7.23:
Winter Gardens came on stage all dressed in black. The vocal harmonies of Ananda Howard and Jasmine Ardley were a key feature of Winter Gardens performance. Compared to previous times I’ve seen Winter Gardens, the vocals were more shared between the two singers rather than Jasmine as backing vocalist. A positive change. Another noticeable development was a punchier sound, especially from Jamie Windless on guitar and Will Cuchford on bass guitar. Winter Gardens’ shoegaze dreamscape sound, reminiscent of Slowdive, was still there, but delivered with more of an edge. They delivered a varied set incorporating some dreamy sounds, and other numbers with rock or funky guitars (such as on the latest single ‘Moonjockey’). Winter Gardens closed an entertaining performance with ‘Hyacinth’, their smoothest song of the set with the ethereal vocal harmonies of Ananda and Jasmine again taking the spotlight. The expansion in their live sound worked well at the Seaview Festival, setting a good tone for the rest of the day’s music.
The Evening Sons formed on Brighton beach over a mutual appreciation of Big Star and Cheap Trick, and wear their power-pop credentials like a badge of honour; crunchy barre chords, big choruses and multi-layered harmonies hark back to those halcyon days when 3-minute songs ruled the world. Their forthcoming debut album ‘Tracks’ is a paean to endless summers, infatuation, falling in love, friendship, frustration, excitement, fun and the joy of being alive with all of its ultimate possibilities.
www.instagram.com/theeveningsons
Purchase your tickets for the 2pm concert HERE.
