British Birds: Sucking Funny – EP Review

British Birds: Sucking Funny

(Self-release)

CD | DL

Out now

Rising wonky garage-psych band British Birds release a wonderful EP that proves exactly why they are on the up and ones to watch.

There’s something brewing through the garage ether, a desire to press a kind of reset and take us back to the time when our TDK mixtapes would meet pencil to try and iron out the kinks and twists, the end result usually one of warped weirdness across our favourite songs that month. ‘Cassette-ified’ so it seems to have been labelled, or at least that’s what Black Market Karma told us on their latest album. And Chorley’s British Birds are the latest to take that sound and turn it into wonky garage-psych on their latest EP, Sucking Funny.

Following on from their debut album, In Search Of Mr Rykyn, released earlier this year, the band continue to prick the senses of a late summer afternoon as the sun splits through a haze. On hearing it, it’s no wonder they are starting to get picked up by the likes of 6Music.

The new EP opens up with the immediately captivating Dull Boy, a song that follows a winding thread through bands like Super Furry Animals back to the Small Faces, with tales of everyday life loping by. Led by frontman Bobby Mambo, his guitar cranking out the blasts that are kept in line by the great rhythm section of Ellie Winstanley on bass and Lew O’Neill on drums, his delivery and verve come out in spades. With Ellie and percussionist Emma Townson on backing vocals, the song comes together to perfectly capture their more garage sound.

They follow it up with My Bar, a song that could no doubt have come straight from the mind of Gruff Rhys, before That Monster comes in to take the best of both worlds. Sugar-spun melodies drift over the verses thanks to Townson stepping forward on vocal duties, the song flitting across crashing and swirling breaks.

Scowl is brings a pure playfulness to the music and vocals, a real infectious groove that doesn’t let up, but it’s on Indigo where they really nail that wonky sound, the cassette-ified guitar and ambling vocals hypnotically tripping over each other. Winding it up with the storming Open It Close it, on this new EP, British Birds prove that they are flying and are definitely ones to catch wherever you can.

British Birds Live Dates
19 Oct – The Welly, Hull*
20 Oct – The Crescent, York*
23 Oct – The Bullington, Oxford*
24 Oct – The Papillon, Southampton*
25 Oct – The Garage, London*
26 Oct – Traders Taphouse, Chorley
(*supporting The Lovely Eggs)

British Birds are on Bandcamp, Facebook, and Instagram.

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Words by Nathan Whittle. Find his Louder Than War archive here.

Nathan also presents From The Garage on Louder Than War Radio every Tuesday at 8pm. Tune in for an hour of fuzz-crunching garage rock ‘n’ roll and catch up on all shows on the From The Garage Mixcloud playlist.