Demos

Blacklisters - Swords

Owain Paciuszko 26/07/2009

Rating: 4/5

Leeds four-piece Blacklisters debut single Swords is a delightfully rough edged skew-wiff song, flailing from grumpily sneered spoken word akin to Gindrinker - with lyrics as charming as 'There's no I in team, there's a u in cunt.' - then swaggering, drunkenly into shouted, angular post-rock. It's attention grabbing and messy whilst still retaining the sense of pseudo-strucutre, or at least the idea of thought being put into making a shambles, that keeps it totally listenable and extremely enjoyable.

B-side OK47 propels itself off a grinding, grumbling bassline, with vocals hollered angrily against feedback drenched guitar and splashy drums. The vinyl pressing of the single comes with two additional tracks; the first is the epic Minutegun, which crawls in slowly and sinisterly and continues to tread through dark alleys throughout its six minute runtime. Elsewhere Again is a pacy, angsty track with a Jesus Lizard sound.

Blacklisters bridge that gap between being wild and creative and approachable, creating smart, edgy indie-rock. An impressive debut release foreshadowing a full album at the year's end.