shame were tourists in their own adolescence – and nothing was quite like the postcard. The freefall of their early twenties, in all its delight and disaster, was tangled up in being hailed one of post-punk’s greatest hopes. In 2018, they took their incendiary debut album Songs of Praise for a cross-continental joyride for almost 350 relentless nights.
They tried to bite off more than they could chew, just to prove their teeth were sharp enough – but eventually, you’ve got to learn to spit it out. Then came the hangover: shame’s front man, Charlie Steen, suffered a series of panic attacks which led to the tour’s cancellation. For the first time, since being plucked from the stage of The Windmill and catapulted into notoriety, shame were confronted with who they’d become on the other side of it. This era, of being forced to endure reality and the terror that comes with your own company, would form shame’s second album, 2021’s Drunk Tank Pink, the band’s reinvention.
If Songs of Praise was fueled by pint-sloshing teenage vitriol, then Drunk Tank Pink delved into a different kind of intensity. Wading into uncharted musical waters, emboldened by their wit and earned cynicism, they created something with the abandon of a band who had nothing to lose. Having forced their way through their second album’s identity crisis, they arrive, finally, at a place of hard-won maturity. Enter: Food for Worms, which Steen declares to be “the Lamborghini of shame records.”
Formed in London in 2015, the band Bo Gritz quickly established themselves as one of themost exciting and dynamic live experiences in the capital, supporting the likes of BlackMidi, H09909, Bo Ningen, John, and playing their own sell-out headline shows. Whilst honing their sound in the live arena, the band recorded and released two EPs(2016’s Everyday Ennui & 2018’s TAPE EP) as well as two singles (You Just Cover &Reality Repeated, both unleashed in 2017). Both of these EPs were a consciousattempt to document the raw, elemental performance that is seeing the band live,whereas the singles showcased more studio friendly recording techniques.
After taking a break during the COVID-19 Pandemic, Bo Gritz returned in 2023 withtheir debut album ‘Chroma’ (Glasshouse Records), accompanied by a whole new liveshow. Recorded at Hermitage Works Studios with engineer Nathan Ridley (Phobophobes,Blue Bendy, Big Joanie) and the band’s own converted basement studio, ‘Chroma’introduced electronica to the band’s sound and is a frenzied half hour of pulsatingindustrial rock, fitting alongside the likes of contemporaries Scaler and Gilla Band. Thetrio are now taking this new music on the road.
Check out these two bands on our Rock-Punk playlist of the concerts to come:
