The debut album from Birmingham duo BIG SPECIAL is ferociously ambitious, to the point that their identity is about as fixed as the British weather. This all starts to make sense when vocalist Joe Hicklin waxes lyrical about his influences, which stretch from Jimi Hendrix to bluesman Robert Johnson to country maverick William Elliott Whitmore – not to mention the novels of Jack Kerouac and Charles Bukowski – but bringing them all together coherently is a trick he and Callum Moloney are still in the process of mastering. Not least because somewhere in there they’ve stuck a stick of dynamite up a synthesiser and given Moloney free rein to work through some stuff on the drums.
‘Black Country Gothic’ is a colossal album opener by anyone’s standards, with the duo hurling everything at the wall where it all sticks in perfect symmetry – for a duo fronted by a poet, kicking off with a full minute of pounding drums and thunderous bass is a brilliant way to build tension and momentum. The vocals lurch wildly from a throaty Mark E Smith to a Sam Fender-esque British Springsteen, an abrupt switch up which with a less powerful backing might sound confusing but in context is exhilarating.
Contrast that with the squelchy keyboard-preset groove of lyrical highlight ‘Butcher’s Bin’, where the duo sound like a less obnoxious Sleaford Mods… until they don’t in a crooning middle section. Now glance, if you will, at the gruff 21st century blues on ‘This Here Ain’t Water’, where a chorus dredged up from the delta butts up against Mike Skinner vocals over a prowling synth bassline and eerie feedback. Then cast your eye over the euphoric ‘Trees’, with its chorus that could be a forgotten Killers B-side if they’d grown up by the Bullring not the Bellagio Fountains; look left at the wide-eyed New Order tribute of closer ‘DiG!’, and dead ahead to get both barrels of ‘Desperate Breakfast’’s snarling post punk.
The crucial thing about Postindustrial Hometown Blues is that at no point is it bad, it’s just a bit disorientated. Not so Hicklin’s lyrics, which are almost entirely excellent and rightly foregrounded more than once. In places this is done through sheer brute force, but is carried out most effectively on the drumless ‘For The Birds’, which quietly reflects that “we were supposed to be young, half cut and completely severed”. Ultimately the duo do a lot of things well, on paper and on record, but seem to have spliced a side project or two into the heart of their headline act.
Words - Joe Ponting
BIG SPECIAL official
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| Photo: Isaac Watson |
Tour dates;
07 May – District, Liverpool, UK
08 May – The Key Club, Leeds, UK
09 May – XOYO, Birmingham, UK
10 May – King Tuts, Glasgow, UK
12 May – Strange Brew, Bristol, UK
16 May – Jazz Café, London, UK
17 May – Horatio’s, Brighton, UK (The Great Escape 2024)
18 May – Deaf Institute, Manchester, UK
20 May – Kasbah Club, Limerick, Ireland
21 May – Workman’s Cellar, Dublin, Ireland
22 May – Ulster Sports Bar, Belfast, Norther Ireland
24 May - Netherlands, Den Haag, Zwarte Ruiter (Sniester Festival)
26 May – Bearded Theory Festival, Derbyshire, UK
27 May – Paradiso Upstairs, Amsterdam, Netherlands
28 May – Effenaar, Eindhoven, Netherlands
30 May – Block Party Festival, Paris, France
31 May – Vestrock, Hulst, Netherlands
01 Jun - Dauwpop Festival, Hellendoorn, Netherlands
26 Jul – Low Festival, Benidorm, Spain
28 Jul – Latitude Festival, Suffolk, UK
23 Aug – Reading Festival, Reading, UK
Tickets on sale now here.