Not hanging about
Well what a surprise, Camden Crawl throws up two bands of particular interest to us at Room Thirteen playing at the same time. Having seen SixNationState several times over the past year or more, and seeing their progress in terms of crowd numbers grow, it was recent band of the week This City that got our attention. It seems Rock Sound have been impressed by them too, since it was their event at the Crawl which This City opened.
Already a live favourite in their native Brighton, the band received wider exposure via the Channel 4 ‘Mobile Act’ show, although they pulled out of the toruing stage due to “artistic reasons”.
Despite being early doors, This City drew a healthy sized and enthusiastic crowd and wasted no time in trying to pummle the audience into the ground with their explosive brand of hard rock you can dance to, think punk meets nu-rave and you’re heading down the right road. From the outset it looks like This City were a good choice to start the night.
Vocalist Chris Purr turns in a passionate and full on performance, along the lines of Rage Against the Machine in terms of sound. He is backed by a band who arrive at the Crawl a well-oiled machine, the work is clearly paying off on the live side of things.
Recent singles ‘We Move’ and ‘Kids With Fireworks’ receive a good reaction, but for all their energy, unity as a band and catchy beat fueled punk rock, after a while This City do start to drift dangerously close to being predictable. What they do is fine, but after about twenty minutes you begin to want a bit more variety.
Undoubtedly one to keep an eye on, but on this showing they could use a bit more variety if they’re to really make it to the big league.