Tonight’s Dublin-based band may not have been situated within a meat locker or fallout shelter, but rather enshrouded in the depths of Camden - specifically a sold-out show at its Electric Ballroom. After a few years away from the live scene and their 2016 debut LP, Holding Hands With Jamie, the industrial-flavoured post-punk band returned with an abrasive, imagistic, and soul-crushing set - proving a cut away from many of their Dublin contemporaries. So what’s going on with Dublin’s burgeoning post-punk scene of late? Between this and the eclectic list of influences inspiring Girl Band’s sound, I went on an excavation trip.
Yet it was the ‘smoke and mirrors’ approach to the start of Girl Band’s set which initiated a somewhat lulled introduction. Amongst ‘Pears for Lunch’ and ‘Lawman’, these tracks intensified mere bouts of pressure with little release or real evolution into something grander - combining this with the slower tempo of these particular tracks and the results weren’t all too compelling. Nonetheless, the headache-strewn crunchings from the various distortions and feedbacks supplied on stage deemed just the beginning of these tropes in what was set to be an experimentally-bound night of noise-rock.
Fortunately enough, the trajectory of Girl Band’s set picked up with a smattering of enticing interludes and higher-octane tracks such as ‘Salmon of Knowledge’ and ‘Prefab Castle’. Yet the truly indelible track of the night came from their unorthodox cover of producer Blawan’s ‘Why They Hide Their Bodies Under My Garage?’ - formerly an IDM track of 7 years ago, now repackaged as a brazen, lo-fi punk track reminiscent of such legendary Krautrock predecessors as Can. With the latter half of this cover bursting into a euphoric cacophony of head-twitching distortions, as well as frontman Dara Kiely’s screamings, Girl Band eventually marked their emphatic return into the circle of Camden’s live scene midway through their set.
Capitalising on this euphoric moment, Kiely’s brethren concluded this evening with two of their strongest tracks amongst their recent repertoire, ‘Going Norway’ and ‘Paul’. With the latter undeniably taking inspiration from industrial-punk acts such as Neu!, the electronic scrapings and scratchings of the former initially drilled away at each of our senses down to a mere nub. Girl Band’s neurotic passion for these industrial-coated noise-rock tropes, somewhat similar to Aphex Twin’s earlier discography, offered one last pressuring crucible for this evening with ‘Paul’, which invariably reconstructed our minds before sending us back into the world’s quietened abyss.
Aptly veering away from their contemporaries of Fontaines D.C, The Murder Capital, and Burnt Out, Girl Band undeniably offered a more boundary-pushing, experimental edge in tonight’s burgeoning post-punk set. Bludgeoning the audience with their monolithic rupturings of distortions incrementally screwing into our minds, this act only offered a couple of pure-relief moments within this set. Yet for their cherished lo-fi sound, a much grander and fuller repertoire encased in more elaborated hooks proved much-needed in this showcasing of modern punk. For now, I’m glad to have made it out alive from this concealed corner of Camden and told the tale of one of Dublin’s most neurotic bands to date.
7/10
Girl Band's latest LP, The Talkies, is out now and can be found here.
All photos are courtesy of Anna Louise Yorke, whose work can be found here.
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