The Uncomfortables ‘Levi’s Genes’

Firstly, apologies to The Uncomfortables, there’s a bit of getting stuff off our chest before we get to how much like them, but it was their email that set us off. Hang in there, we will get to them, honest.

As we’ve said before, and more than once, it’s harder to be in band today that at anytime since rock and roll was invented, whenever that was. In the musical olden days, bands just did what bands are supposed to do. They wrote songs, recorded them, took drugs, played shows and chucked TVs out of hotel windows. Other people did the rest, because, well, they were good at doing the rest.

Musicians are good at making music, see. Not saying it’s wrong that today bands are expected to do all the stuff other people are better at, but it is slightly odd. And the internet on its own doesn’t help making the DIY thing any easier. Take the default music site of choice, MySpace. All it does is homogenise bands by serving up samey pages that strip away the single most important quality musicians have – identity. Personally, we love sifting MySpace, but it’s little wonder most bands sink in the goo.

Other sites have come and gone when it comes to trying to bust the MS stranglehold, but we think The Uncomfortables, and a growing band of, erm, bands, are on to something by using our new favourite site bandcamp.com. The thinking is very smart – it’s a breeze to use, crisp, clean pages, lots of ways to share, and the behind-the-scenes stats should prove very useful as should users choosing how much they want to pay for tracks. It’s very, very, smart. And best of all it’s simple.

Of course, it’s just another tool and bands need to learn how to use them much more effectively, but having something as good as bandcamp in your toolbox, it’s a start, right?

Right, feel better for that. The Uncomfortables then. Hailing somehow from Preston and Leeds, there’s more than a dash of early Pulp about this lot. There’s a real Jarvis twang about frontman Matt Gallagher and they wear the same tongue in cheek sense of fun on their sleeves – if you’ll excuse the mixed metaphor there. We can’t help hearing a little bit of The Coral in there and, as should be compulsory for a band with a bit of Leeds in them, you can hear the ghost of the almighty Cud.

What makes them stand out though is they are clearly proper musicians, who can play proper and everything. And as my old pal James T points out, you really could do with a lawnmower if you’re going to cut the grass. And if you are brilliant live and getting shows beyond the safety of your hometown mates, that’s when using online tools such as bandcamp really comes into their own.

But don’t get us started, you’ve just read what happens when someone gets us started. And if you have read this whole piece, thanks. It’s nice to know we’ve held your attention.

More hear…
- Did we mention bandcamp.com? You can find The Uncomfortables page here. Especially clap your ears round the fantastically titled ‘Portrait Of A Band In Decline’ EP.
- … but they still have a MS you’ll be pleased to hear.

My latest fortuitous stumble is Noah Lennox. Appreciate that for all the cool people I’ve utterly, utterly missed the boat on Panda Bear. It’s a boat that’s come and gone more than a few times, and I’ve missed it every time.

Still, better late than never. I’m going to be rummaging further, but this jaw-dropper should keep me going for a while. Sounds like Brian Wilson on acid, someone said… erm, wasn’t Brian Wilson was on acid? It’s more like listening to the Walker Brothers late at night on a medium wave.

The six-minute edit we’ve got here doesn’t do it justice, you do need the full 13-minute version… it would have killed my bandwidth, but there’s a nice link below in the More Hear bit.

Oh, and there’s a great review and interview with Noah on paperthinwalls.com, give that a go, it’ll save me some time. It’s a nice site, we liked it a lot and got a bit sidetracked and spent too much time there when we really should have been writing stuff for here. Still.

Anyway, pin your ears back and enjoy.

More hear…
- You can buy the full, gob-smacking, 13-minute version here. And you really should, believe us.
- You can visit his rather sparse myspace here

Editor of NME when it proudly proclaimed the arrival of Coldplay, The Strokes, White Stripes and Andrew WK from its front pages. “Three out of four ain’t bad,” he reasons. He is ever so sorry about The Strokes. He really is.

Ben wrote for Smash Hits, Select and Melody Maker before the NME thing and these days you’ll find him being a director at the fantastic War Child charity. In among all that somewhere he also helped invent the men’s weekly magazine market with Zoo… which he is sorry about too.

Former Melody Maker reviews editor, blah, blah, and ex-features editor at NME.COM, blah, blah, has written for Rolling Stone, MixMag, Muzik, Zoo, and a ton of magazines and websites no one remembers anymore, etc. And so on. And so forth.

He set up and ran warchildmusic.com, breaking an entirely fictitious record for the fastest-selling download album of all-time with ‘Help: A Day In The Life’. It was fast though.

These days he lives in a house, a little terraced house in the country and as well as running some other websites, occasionally works as an editor. Still likes music.

My New Favourite Band then. We have the credentials for this malarky you know. A raft of experience on the UK music press, you know, quaint titles printed on that funny stuff called paper? No? Never mind, it’s not that important.

So anyway, in the old days the music arrived in the post, the phone rang endlessly inviting you to this show or that. It was a bun fight, but it was easy.

In those days you had record labels who signed bands. These days who needs it? It’s never been easier for musicians to get their stuff out there, it’s never been harder to get noticed.

These days, we buy our music, we listen online and we pay for our live shows. Does it make things sound better? That’s what we’re wondering too.

We like the idea of just writing about music. We like the idea of listening to an old track and posting because, heck, it sounded good, we like the idea of posting a tune because there’s a good story attached. Yup, we like the idea of all that and we really like the idea of showing you some new music too.

Please support the people featured on this site by buying their songs, going to their shows and generally telling anyone who’ll listen how amazing they are. The music you hear, erm, here is for promotional purposes only. If you are a copywriter holder and would like us to remove your fine work our little music-loving site, please contact us at info(at)mynewfavouriteband(dot)com

Thank you.