Gulliver’s on Oldham Street in the Northern Quarter is certainly one of the more unassuming venues in this musically rich area of Manchester. Neither the ornate red tinges of Night and Day Café nor the grunginess of The Peer Hat, Gulliver’s from the outside is a simple Irish pub, yet it boasts an intimate performance space that hosted an evening with Leeds-based four-piece Bathing Suits.
Bathing Suits create a noisy brand of fierce electroclash that is proving to be one of the more exciting fixtures of the underground scene at this moment. Pounding electronica is punctuated by fierce guitar stabs and augmented bass tones.
Latest single ‘I Can Be A Freak’ combines a deeply danceable four-to-the-floor rhythm with deranged, poppy vocals (think Madonna on methadone), creating a slightly unnerving but nonetheless enjoyable experience. Bathing Suits’ music is noisy and perplexing, with the songs’ tight programmed drums giving the rest of the band free will to create strange and spiky textures. The use of the guitar in these tracks feels strangely deconstructed, with each player almost assaulting their instrument in a way.
Besides the music, Bathing Suits are a uniquely exciting performance piece. Through the closing performance of ‘Lousy Havocs’ (one of only three currently released songs), the lead singer writhes and contorts onstage against the backdrop of the crashing and screeching guitars and bass. Confrontation rose to a new level at one point during their performance with the lead singer sprinting full pelt through the crowd, ruffling some feathers along the way. As audience members sprawled into a table of empty pint glasses, the antics of Alan Vega of New York synth punk provocateurs Suicide came to mind, whose violent confrontations of the crowd added to their allure and notoriety.
This is very much inherent to Bathing Suits — a performance of confrontation and provocation. These moments of intensity are matched by the intensity of the rest of the band, who are all engrossed in their fearless noise-making, with the guitarist mockingly windmilling his guitar à la Pete Townsend and contributing to this anarchic deconstruction of guitar music.
A few words of course to the support. Magnum Opus ii produce a strain of exciting and noisy guitar music with layers of noise cut through by a strong melodic edge. Keep a special eye out for the no-wave-esque sax recalling the more melodic side of James Chance and the Contortions, which proved to be a highlight of their set. They were followed by Normal Village, a mathsy noise outfit coupling the wailing eccentricities of black midi with the driving, relentless energy of Bad Brains. A tad derivative, yes, but accomplished in many respects.
As Bathing Suits exit the stage one by one, their guitars leant up against the amplifiers create an almost excruciating level of feedback, a true testament to the resounding impact of their performance. The effects of Bathing Suits were felt for a few days afterwards, through ears ringing a continuous E note as a reminder of the all-out offensive Bathing Suits launch in both performance and music.
Whilst their recorded output thus far proves to be a solid document of their sound, Bathing Suits must be seen to be believed to truly experience their brand of electronic noise. See them now where they deserve to be seen in a tiny venue, where the full effect of their performance can be felt in its rawest form.
