It’s easy, if you don’t live in London, to be dismissive of the capital’s endless miniature enclaves of snooty, self-satisfied indie hipsters. I certainly am. But sometimes they get it right. Hatcham Social, associates of Tim Burgess (of The Charlatans) and Faris Badwan (of The Horrors) are a case in point. Their third album is a lovely thing, lo-fi but full of restless, melancholic, creative spirit. That whole lost boy English indie thing was dead creative currency long before Barat & Doherty relentlessly finished it off, yet occasional bands still pop up and find new seams to mine within it. This trio are one such.
The imaginatively named Cutting Up The Present Leaks Out The Future, an admirable nod to William Burroughs and Bryon Gysin, boasts many good things. First off, its title and the title of the songs within. Numbers such as “Lion With A Lazer Gun”, “Ketamine Queen” and “To The Moon (Is This The Way Man Will Survive?)” beg to be listened to in a way that, say, “Every Teardrop Is A Waterfall”, “Us Against The World” and “Hurts Like Heaven” do not (cheers, Coldplay). Then there’s the sound, sonically rough as gravel, cheap, so that any listener with a decent stereo will be reaching about for which wire isn’t connected properly, all buzz, hum, and quiet distortion, a sturdy punk attitude.
The mood is gripping throughout, a ramshackle fusing of The Shadows, Palma Violets, Pulp and the Velvet Underground if they were trapped in a dank smoky cellar of rockabilly twang. Best of all, though, it all feels unforced and the songs shine - the drifty “Spirit of 45”, a likeable progeny of the endlessly overrated Smiths; the Pink Floyd-go-Link Wray guitar work on the closing “Don’t Go To Sleep”; the coolly moving, string-tinged “Lion With A Lazer Gun”; the spiky post-punk jangle of “Confessions of An English Opium Eater”, to list but four. The rest also displays equally haunted attitude, sussed songwriting and switchblade smarts.
Overleaf: Listen to "Ketamine Queen"