This image: Beth Orton
Jordan Worland, from local music website Slate the Disco, selects his must-see gigs in Cambridge during September
September sees Cambridge’s live music scene awaken from its summer lull.
Having risen through the ranks of the UK indie world, championed by pop stars and indie icons, and collaborated with Suede legend Bernard Butler on her stunning 2013 self-titled album, Natalie McCool returned this year with her sophomore album. The singer-songwriter’s brilliant debut was built on a foundation of deliciously dark, gloomy indie pop, but The Great Unknown is an awakening – emerging from the shadows and rising victoriously with a number of prickly pop tunes. Natalie McCool brings her breed of slick alternative pop to The Portland Arms on the 26th.
Sticking at The Portland, on the 29th you can catch veteran bluegrass ensemble The Coal Porters or Cambridge pop punk outfit Standing Like Statues on the 23rd.
The Travis Waltons return to The Corner House on the 10th. Formerly Cambridge based – but now in Bristol – The Travis Waltons are a powerful two-piece playing indie rock in the vein of Tellison or The Get Up Kids. Support on the night comes from Cambridge newcomers Superstars of Track and Field; expect 90s slacker indie rock influenced by Buffalo Tom and Sugar.
Our pick of the ‘lesser-known’ acts playing the Corner House this month goes to the indie rock stylings of Tribute; catch them on the 3rd.
There’s a pair of excellent shows down Norfolk Street at the Blue Moon this month. First up, on the 17th, are Crumbling Ghost – purveyors of doom-infused psychedelic rock who use folk standards for their inspiration and incorporate the rhythms and cadences of traditional music in their sound.
This is followed by the excellent bill of The New Tusk, Pet Grief and Grieving on the 23rd. Brighton’s The New Tusk produce short attention span punk which is a refreshing post hardcore-ish mixture of punk rock, lo-fi, and emo. Pet Grief bring a scrappier, slob rock sound to the party. Expect loud, then quiet, and then usually loud again from this London outfit.
This image: Silver Apples
It’s also a busy month at the Cambridge Junction, with Silver Apples on the 5th catching our eye in particular. Decades after their brief yet influential career first ground to a sudden and mysterious halt, Silver Apples remain one of pop music’s true enigmas: a surreal, almost unprecedented duo, their music explored interstellar drones and hums, pulsing rhythms and electronically-generated melodies years before similar ideas were adopted in the work of acolytes ranging from Suicide to Spacemen 3.
O’Hooley & Tidow are an English folk music duo (left) from Yorkshire comprised of singer-songwriter Heidi Tidow and her wife, singer-songwriter and pianist Belinda O’Hooley (formerly a member of Rachel Unthank and the Winterset).
Together, they are regarded as one of British folk’s mightiest combinations and their highly anticipated new album Shadows was released last month. Catch them performing tracks from it on the 6th.
Beth Orton and her intoxicating voice will also be stopping by in town, hot on the heels of the release of her latest record, Kidsticks. On it, she’s heading back to her experimental, electronic roots – see her in action on 25 September.
The Cambridge Junction also plays host to two of this year’s most hyped acts: Blossoms (26th) and Rat Boy (27th) were both featured in the BBC Sound of… poll for 2016 back in January, and they’ve both been tipped by many outlets.
This image: Blossoms
