Friday 31/08/07 Rock The House @ Harewood House, Leeds

There is an ominous bank of cloud covering most of Leeds, the police have closed off the top of Briggate due to an accident and I am stuck in a number 36 bus in the middle of the resulting traffic. A pessimist would say this does not bode well; an optimist, would say things can only get better. So apologies to The Dirty and The Horrors (and my heart goes out to the Horrors fan who got made up only to arrive at the gig just as they finished), but suffice to say a) it wasn’t my fault and b) things got better.

Arriving at the house, we’re ‘greeted’ by the sound of Sons and Daughters murdering Adamski’s ‘Killer.’ It is a long walk to the stage and, by the time we get to see them, they are starting their last song, hastily dedicated to Iggy Pop instead of the usual Johnny Cash. Suck ups. Nevertheless, the two-boy-two-girl group put on a feisty performance, full of impish indie sexiness, further bolstered by the inclusion of the riff from ‘I Wanna Be Your Dog.’ Fun, but too brief a taste to tell.

More definite and definable are The Young Knives, who, like The Sunshine Underground, were rocking up Branham Park only last week. Looking like they’ve come straight from the office and greeting the crowd with “Thanks… this house,” they lay down a jagged guitar and bass sound that is in danger of stopping my heart. Throwing out licks that the Futureheads should have done on their last album and bellowing “what’s the point?” repeatedly through their first song, these guys have an alluring post-punk/mod nihilism that doesn’t lapse into laddishness and a stage presence that is refreshingly anti-celeb and disarmingly self-deprecating. ‘The Decision’ is quality pop, ‘She’s Attracted To’ is ‘Parklife’ gone shocking and ‘Hot Summer’ is a manic harmonic conjuration that actually dispels the clouds, but not the crowds. “This is dedicated to all humans everywhere,” says Henry Dartnell introducing the mammoth snowball of a track, ‘Terra Firma.’ Huge dedication; huge sound; huge new fan.

It’s the second time this Gigwise hack has seen The Sunshine Underground in as many weeks, and I am not relishing it; at Leeds Festival, they sounded like a tedious, poor man’s Killers. But tonight, with the wind tossing the bass-heavy sound around the curiously intimate locale/venue, the edge has been taken off Craig Wellington’s arrogance and, rather than alienating and subjugating, he’s a lot more appealing and entertaining. Daley Smith, the bassist, has also been gagged. Though most songs still sound ‘Planet Earth,’ (apart from the one that sounds like ‘Chegger’s Plays Pop’), a post-punk PiL attitude begins to leak through, and ‘Your Friends’ is positively funky. Though they could do with a bit more Gibson in the mix, this is the best I’ve seen them. Perhaps there’s something in the air here.