poppedmusic

Wild Front

Liverpool Arts Club, 4th October 2018

Words: Daniel Burton

With a steady stream of music being released over the past 3 years, including their debut single ‘Roco’ in 2016 and their latest single ‘Make You Feel’, Wild Front have kicked off their career in a great way. Having previously supported the likes of Judas and Fickle Friends on tour, playing a vast variety of festivals over the past few years and appearing at this year’s Reading & Leeds Festival on the Festival Republic, they are clearly headed in the right direction. With the night being highly anticipated already, the late addition of two excellent support acts only added to the expectation of what was to come from the night.

Opening the night was the Manchester outfit DeNova. Whilst any other band would have been demoralised and put off by the rather disappointing crowd size, they used it as fuel to their fire to bring an electric performance to The Arts Club Loft.

Playing their new single, ‘You Are Not Alone’, they got the crowd fired up with nodding heads and smiles in place across the room which definitely gave DeNova the seal of approval. This has surely got to be the song that can rocket them into the limelight of the indie rock scene and into everyone’s ears. In between a set filled with red-hot moment, they managed to break it down getting the crowd fully involved whipping out the tambourine and some unexpected dance moves on the stage.

Finishing off the set, they played an unreleased track, ‘You’, which was very upbeat with catchy lyrics and melody leaving the audience with a very positive last memory of their set.

If you had never heard Life At The Arcade (aka LATA), and came to see them, I can assure you that you would never leave disappointed. They are your typical hard-working local Scouse band with catchy hooks and well-thought-out relatable lyrics that connect with the audience immediately.

Having seen them only the week before supporting Red Rum Club at the O2 Academy, it was interesting to see how they would play at the smaller Arts Club venue and to a substantially smaller crowd. Although it may be a given that some bands may put the same effort into all gigs, and don’t get me wrong I know they put their all into last weeks gig, for this night, they seemed to dig even deeper and try even harder to pull around a crowd that were maybe less aware of LATA before now. They certainly achieved this and it was evident by the end of the set as everyone had nudged ever closer to the stage and were fully behind the band.

Having seen them twice now, it was interesting to hear the small things second time round that I didn’t originally. Having hidden features like this is a very hard skill to achieve and to pull it off shows real class.

I think at this point I must give a shout out to the drunk middle-aged mum having the time of her life dancing around to every tune as if it was the last time she could have a good boogie. There were a few head bangers in there too which got a little chuckle from everyone in the room.

Playing their latest single, ‘Little Lies’, they gave a really upbeat yet heart felt performance. This release shows the maturity they have developed and demonstrates that sometimes going back and trusting your basics, you can come up with a tune that should be on everyone’s playlists right now.

I was very intrigued as to the what the atmosphere would be for the night, as from their studio releases, I wasn’t sure whether it would be a chilled laidback vibe or whether the crowd would be up for a good time and pack to the front of the stage.

Having followed Wild Front on social media for some time, I have been getting some really positive vibes from them and after Life At The Arcade came off stage, I was getting rather impatient and couldn’t wait for them to grace the stage and they certainly didn’t disappoint when they eventually did. Kicking off the night with the title track from their debut EP, ‘Physics’, they brought shoulder swaying bass lines and delivered an upbeat and groovy vibe to the night.

The range of influences the band share shines through across their entire repertoire of music. Whilst most songs contain a mix of indie, rock & pop, they are all underpinned by a jazz undertone which enables the south coast 4-piece to give you the full Wild Front experience and guide you through a wide spectrum of feelings throughout the night. This shows the great versatility they have in the sounds they create over this to make every song have its own individual style. This shone through when they played their 2018 single, ‘Simmer Down’. This brings out a more down and dirty sound with a grittier yet remarkably strong feel-good aura that made me forget all my problems and feel like I could conquer the world, even if it was only for 3 minutes.

Reigning the rock side back in a bit, they also played a few tunes with soothing slow melodies in ‘Rico’ and ‘Southside’, which make you succumb to their heavy indie sound running through and force you to just sit back and relax for a little while and take in the world. With songs like ‘Dive’, that have a simple bass line alongside a vintage synth sound, they start with a 90s disco theme at the start and progress to a more current indie hit style, and it only compounds the ability they have to change up their musical form at will.

After the night had drawn to a close, it was only then that I comprehended that fact that this was the first time I’ve seen a band use a violin bow on a guitar, as well as singing into the guitar pickups for an intro to a song. Both of these unique methods of creating sound only added to the overall good feeling of the night, and help provide exactly what most people needed towards the end of a hard week.