There is no better way of describing this album than the band’s publicity statement:

“Part one in a triptych of compilations covering the first life of Vukovar; this one encompassing all the radio hits of a parallel purgatory. The album also features “Cement & Cerement” the first output by the NeuPopAct (the first one from the new life of the group) and the last song Simon Morris recorded.

“For Simon Morris; His Name Means First And Last.

“All songs performed by Vukovar, with all and eternal gratitude to Phil Reynolds. Further credits may be researched by thyself. Artwork by Oleg Galay and Carl Neomalthusian.

“THIS IS THE END. THIS IS THE START.”

Track listing

Nero’s Felines
The New World Order (Single Edit)
The Blood Garden
The Three Shades
Meet Murder My Angel
This Moment Severed
The Clockwork Dance
The Destroying Place
Little Gods
The Last Goodbye Happens Everyday
Prurient
Voices/Seers/Voices
Cement & Cerement

The album is available in various formats from Bandcamp

Sheffield based Bear Chest, those purveyors of noisy sludgy very loud rock, have dropped a video for an acoustic track ‘No Love’.

The band describe this as ‘our first and only acoustic track’. The track was both recorded and videoed live, and it will be included on their forthcoming album ‘Sleaze’.

The Buzzcocks played their first gig supporting The Sex Pistols in Manchester in 1976; this is a fact that has remained in the band’s bio for many years. Some 40-odd years later Sheffield based Celtic Punks Shanghai Treason played their first gig supporting Buzzcocks at Gorilla in Manchester, a fact that will no doubt remain in Shanghai Treason’s bio for many years too.

Around the same time, Shanghai Treason released their first single ‘Devil’s Basement’. A two-part UK tour followed where the band made their first tentative steps onto the national scene, playing shows in London, Bristol, Birmingham, Edinburgh, Liverpool, York and more. This included the band’s first sizeable local headline show at Corporation in Sheffield; where much to the band’s amusement, gig posters had quite literally been plastered on every lamp-post in the city.

Shanghai Treason’s second single ‘Drowning Heart’ helped to cement a loyal local following who’ve seldom missed a gig since those early shows and now the band are looking to further expand on this with their latest release ‘Can’t Even Hang A Man Right’.

“I wrote the lyrics about Brexit” says singer Sam Christie “I, like many people, was surprised at how easily those in power at the time built a national narrative around what seemed to me to be such a self-destructive idea. Then they made such a hash of it and it dragged on forever. I remember thinking ‘bloody hell… these lot couldn’t even hang a man right’ ”

Guitarist Tom Jackson adds: “This is absolutely one of my favourite Shanghai Treason songs. We’ve been playing this song fairly early on in the set at the shows up to now, and after the 4 count when this kicks in the room explodes and we let people know that we’re here and we mean business.”

We asked our writer Frank to tell us what he thought about the track, here’s what he said:

“‘Can’t Even Hang A Man Right’ is a rip-roaring riot of a song. While the band describe themselves as Celtic Punks, this may be bringing to mind something that sounds like The Pogues, you’d be wrong. This is harder, rockier, punkier. I mean yep, there’s banjo, but there’s hard-rocking riffing guitar in spades. And while you’ll be moshing in seconds, there’s a wonderful slow drop-out section that you can get your breath back in, before it revs to the max, and you’re bouncing round the room again. This is one cool song, it rocks”

So there you have it. A song written about Brexit but released during the coronavirus pandemic; when the country is finally rallying together after a turbulent number of years. The band say, ‘Let’s hope we’ve seen the back of sleight of hand dirty politics from Westminster and the beginning of something else but as the lyrics suggest “You can’t trust the rats by the river.”’

Stream/Download ‘Can’t Even Hang A Man Right’: https://smarturl.it/CantEvenHangAMan

Montreal’s Pottery return today with ‘Hot Like Jungle’, the third single lifted from their much-anticipated debut album Welcome To Bobby’s Motel. It now arrives June 26th via Partisan Records.

Speaking on the song’s inspiration, the band says: “This was written as a love song for Paul’s girlfriend. He had a job working construction one summer and came up with the lyrics almost as a sort of Springsteen parody, they’re very blue-collar. When Austin sings it we always picture him on a mountain shouting off into the distance with a girl out there singing back to him.”

Pottery have previously shared Bobby’s Motel highlights ‘Texas Drums Pt. I & II’ and ‘Take Your Time’, each their own window into the band’s psychedelic dreamworld. The album was produced by Jonathan Schenke (Parquet Courts, Snail Mail) and recorded at Montreal’s Break Glass studio. Although he occupies a central role within the album’s 11 tracks, it should be noted that Bobby is not technically a real person, and Bobby’s Motel is not a real place. Here’s how the band explains it:

Who is “Bobby,” you ask?

Enter Pottery. Enter Paul Jacobs, Jacob Shepansky, Austin Boylan, Tom Gould, and Peter Baylis. Enter the smells, the cigarettes, the noise, their van Mary, their friend Luke, toilet drawings, Northern California, Beatles accents, Taco Bell, the Great Plains, and hot dogs. Enter love and hate, angst and happiness, and everything in between. Beginning as an inside joke between the band members, Bobby and his “motel” have grown into so much more. They’ve become the all-encompassing alt-reality that the band built themselves, for everyone else. So, in essence, Bobby is Pottery and his motel is wherever they are.

But really, Bobby is a pilot, a lumberjack, a stay at home dad, and a disco dancer that never rips his pants. He’s a punching bag filled with comic relief. He laughs in the face of day-to-day ambiguity, as worrying isn’t worth it to Bobby. There’s a piece of him in everyone, there to remind us that things are probably going to work out, maybe. He’s you. He’s him. He’s her. He’s them. Bobby is always there, painted in the corner, urging you to relax and forget about your useless worries. And his motel? Well, the motel is life. It might not be clean, and the curtains might not shut all the way. The air conditioner might be broken, and the floors might be stained. But that’s okay, because you don’t go to Bobby’s Motel for the glamour and a good night’s sleep, the minibar, or the full-service sauna. You go to Bobby’s Motel to feel, to escape, to remember, to distract. You go for the late nights and early mornings, good times and the bad. You might spend your entire life looking for Bobby’s Motel and just when you think you will never find it, you realize you’ve been there all along. It’s filthy and amazing and you dance, and you love it.

Behind their acclaimed debut EP, No. 1, last year, Pottery toured with Parquet Courts, Thee Oh Sees and Fontaines D.C.; played festivals including Green Man, End of the Road, SXSW, The Great Escape and Iceland Airwaves; and earned early praise from The Fader, Stereogum, Rolling Stone, DIY, NME, The Times, The Line of Best Fit, The Sunday Times, Clash, The Metro, So Young and Gorilla vs Bear, who said “Excuse us for getting caught up in the hype, but go see them play and then try to tell us we’re wrong.”

Speaking of which, the band are today pleased to announce a bunch of rescheduled dates for later this year across the UK, Europe and North America. Please see further below for the UK touring itinerary and keep your eyes peeled for more news in the coming weeks.

UK Tour Dates:

08 SEP 2020 / UK / Manchester / Deaf Institute
09 SEP 2020 / UK / Glasgow / Nice N Sleazy
10 SEP 2020 / UK / Birmingham / The Hare and Hound
11 SEP 2020 / UK / Leeds / Brudenell Community Room
13 SEP 2020 / UK / London / The Dome
14 SEP 2020 / UK / Brighton / Chalk