29
Feb
If I’d been able to come up with a title that conveys just how much I love The Jezabels it would’ve been here
Nearly half-a-decade after starting this godforsaken blog and testing your patience with a dependably haphazard approach to posting, I finally have a platform to do the one thing I’ve been waiting to do all this time – scream LISTEN TO THIS BAND!
You could be forgiven for thinking this has never been a priority for me given that the subject matters of so many features on The Pop Cop are as far removed from the actual music as possible (Valentine’s Day cards? Cooking recipes?).
The reason I don’t make a habit of gushing about new bands is because I have this romantic belief that true greatness is not something any of us stumble across every day or every week. So if I’m going to recommend a group you might never have heard of before, I don’t want them to be liked by you – I want them to change your life.
Enter The Jezabels. I’ve been listening to the Sydneysiders for about a year now, but seeing them on stage for the first time a few days ago has made me wrestle with my own memories of previous times I was this overwhelmingly excited about a band’s career prospects… the three that immediately spring to mind are Sigur Rós at The Garage in 2000 (supporting/blowing away Godspeed You Black Emperor no less), Franz Ferdinand at the Art School in 2003 and Arcade Fire at the GUU Debating Chamber in 2005. After each of those nights in Glasgow, I remember being left with an inescapable compulsion to rave about them to everyone I thought might care and everyone else who didn’t.
The four parts of The Jezabels make a whole of mythical proportions. Take a drummer (Nik Kaloper) who could give The National’s Bryan Devendorf a run for his money when it comes to impact and ingenuity; take a guitarist (Sam Lockwood) who fashions dreamy pop melodies so button-pushingly stirring you’d think they’d been created in a science lab; take a keyboard player (Heather Shannon) who propels the epic mix to yet loftier heights, contributes delicious vocal harmonies and makes you forget the band don’t use bass; and take an entrancing singer (Hayley Mary) with equal measures of vulnerability and swagger who oozes star quality yet lays bare every lyric with unyielding sincerity.
The Aussie band, who described their appearance at Oran Mor in Glasgow last Sunday as the best gig they’d ever played, even have a few Scottish connections. The father of Hayley is Glaswegian (her real surname is McGlone) and when she was younger, the two of them used to busk, with her dad playing Celtic folk tunes on a harp. You might also recognise their song, A Little Piece, which was used in the second half of Skye stunt cycling legend Danny MacAskill’s video Way Back Home.
The Jezabels’ incredible debut album Prisoner gets an official UK release on March 5, although it has been available to buy on import for several months. The group also have an additional 15 songs to call on from the three EPs in their back catalogue, which features a host of fan favourites such as the phenomenal Hurt Me. And, oh yeah, LISTEN TO THIS BAND!
One Response to “If I’d been able to come up with a title that conveys just how much I love The Jezabels it would’ve been here”
March 11th, 2012 at 16:58
i’m with you on the jezazbels… loved them since those early eps… and getting my first chance to see them in a month or so… but having given the album a fair few listens i don’t like it as much as the eps… i think they’d have been better off putting a couple of ep tracks like ‘hurt me’, ‘disco biscuit love’ and ‘easy to love’ on the album…
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