At Manchester Academy 2 on Friday night, there’s a continental ambience surrounding opening act PVA despite the trio coming from London. Combining intense synth beds and fluid, multi-layered percussion recalls English electronic acts of the 90s including The Chemical Brothers and The Prodigy, but there’s an icy cool to lead vocalist Ella Harris which balances out this intensity. The final track of their short set demonstrates a more varied post-punk approach, adding fuzzy guitar power chords to the mix, again recalling iconic 90s bands such as Sensor.
Upon hearing Dry Cleaning’s magnificent ‘Scratchcard Lanyard’, a friend made the observation that they couldn’t imagine their next single sounding any different. Clearly making reference to Fiona Shaw’s idiosyncratic spoken delivery, it’s a fair point until you listen to the post-punk milieu that surrounds the clipped, economical vocals. This is a band that you are more likely to appreciate lyrically in the confines of a bedroom or pair of headphones. Musically though, the band ignite on the stage. The demure ‘Leafy’ starts off the evening in relatively introverted fashion but ‘Unsmart Lady’ ratchets up the tone and Tom Dowse’s skittish guitar mixes power chords with volatile feedback to create an almost nightmarish quality to proceedings.
As if to prove that there is distinctive technique behind Shaw’s vocals, her voice breaks during the opening of ‘Strong Feelings’ and just for a moment the terse mask slips and she laughs at the fuck-up. After a few beats she’s back. “Speaking your lyrics is acting, more than singing is” Shaw has said in the past. “Everyone knows what it sounds like in a person’s voice when they are irritated, or when they are in love. The voice changes, and it doesn’t whack you in the face – it can be quite subtle and creep up on you more.” Bearing this in mind, Shaw’s disposition during ‘Her Hippo’ is tangible.
So far then, debut album New Long Leg has been the focus but there are highlights from the band’s 2019 EPs including ‘Viking Hair’ and the more raucous ‘Magic of Meghan’. On record Lewis Maynard’s basslines aren’t a focal point but this evening the metronomic drive of his contribution is hypnotic, binding the whole package together even when Dowse’s guitar threatens to break out of any rigid structure. The cool, laid-back vibe of ‘More Big Birds’ demonstrates the musicality of Shaw’s vocals but there’s a nightmarish disconnection to ‘Traditional Fish’ ensuring the tone of the evening is constantly shifting.
Of course, it is ‘Scratchcard Lanyard’ which appears to tie all these different approaches into one coherent crowd-pleaser and there is an energetic bounce to proceedings as Dowse’s trenchant guitar lines are perfectly complimented by Maynard’s uptempo bass; Shaw adds the abstract visuals and it all coalesces in to something marvellously compelling.
Iain Fox
