Lo-fi, kooky and slightly macabre
The Woe Betides is the London based three piece made up of the fantastically named Grundy le Zimbra, Simon Mastrantone and Colonel Sexlife and signed up with the House of Strange. Knowing this information it gives this album "Never Sleep" a lot to live up to.
Can the perceived kookiness of the band translate into their music?
Three words, Yes. It. Can.
This album is lo-fi, it's synth, it's electronica, it's guitar pop, it's an eclectic mix that all ties together to be presented to us as a cohesive, creative and exciting release.
From the opening three tracks alone you get a multitude of styles offered. 'Bone on Bone' is a macabre, camp and dramatic offering with the creepy, stalkeresque lyrics "she hates me, but she can't escape me" giving rise to a feeling of a scary Halloween movie. But it's then followed with 'The Ape, The Owl and the Satellite', a song which in its title alone feels like a children's poem something reinforced in the nursery rhyme feel to the chorus.
Throughout the ten tracks there are some beautiful harmonies and the instrumentalisation is of great quality. The varied beats and riffs gives each track individuality whilst simultaneously keeping a unified feel to each other.
There is an overarching sense of melancholy and the battling of personal demons in the lyrics but it never gets too heavy. 'One of Your Pills' is pretty dark but it never drags you down to it's depths of seeming despair and it's quickly followed up by 'This Head, This Heart'. With this track the tempo goes back up, and we are treated to some classy Beach Boys/early Beatles style harmonising. But, like with the rest of the songs, it is kept resolutely lo-fi and sparse.
The closing tracks like 'What Can't be Taken Back' and 'NatWest Tower' wouldn't sound out of place if played alongside Kings of Leon or Biffy Clyro and 'Little Beliefs' is gloriously grungy with some fantastic guitar riffs and hooks that create strangely creepy effect, my personal favourite track.
"Never Sleep" is an album that doesn't crowd you. The Woe Betides shows us what they can do by spreading out their influences and multitude of styles over the 10 tracks. The strangeness and macabre feel to the album as a whole doesn't feel forced. To quote a famous television programme "It's creepy and it's kooky, mysterious and spooky" and is an album of true creativeness made by truly creative and off-kilter personalities.