In a fitting bout of irony, the Trello card for this recent I Don’t Know How But They Found Me release was lost. Nowhere to be found. It was tucked away in the slate of releases for April. No clue why. The dipped mind of caffeine and those little wafer biscuits you can get in Italy are rummaging around in the abandoned barn of a brain which is now scuffing together words to hit the count. Gloomtown Brats, discovered at last and listened in on with great expectation. With janky little slides and funky numbers to it all, the rippling effects of the 1980s spring into action. Four coffees deep and a heavy bass line are all you need to have your heart start clawing out for emergency help.
Give it three minutes though – a stock classic for the pop-oriented sleekness here. Martin Fry wishes. Gloomtown Brats is knocking into anything it can, a drunk at the club whose footwork needs lessons of sophistication. IDKHow brings out a conversational tone which relies more and more on its instrumentals. Neat pops and sharp observations of how surnames and sick riches make all the difference in an arena-like town. Survival of the fittest, or fattest wallet? Ripples of the synth-heavy 1980s float through this one, the broad spectrum of Pet Shop Boys to Duran Duran flogged and brought to the modern listener – with great expectations and a high bar to vault. No trouble for IDKHow.
But it is not just sonic forces which match IDKHow with those shuffled comparisons, much of it comes from the mood and surprise venom found at the core. Gloomtown Brats sources its surprise from turning the tables on the rich and wild who find themselves scattered in the clubs and bars of the country. Turn your attention on their attitude and focus on what makes them fall in line – IDKHow does and the result is an effective, spiralling piece which can hardly hide its rage. Why hide it? Post-punk is not the only genre which needs to pick up arms and hit out at what is wrong with the world. The way it’s managed here is wonderful, striking and a staggered throwback with enough modernity to fix it all together.
Therein lies the faithful problem with Gloomtown Brats. At times it feels like a pop-up book of influences and struggles to find a voice of its own. Even then this is just one of plenty, the synthpop thrills and chills of the work put out so far are well-worked enough to feel, in its own way, timeless. Timelessness is easy to find, it is fashioning the angle and voice which matters most, something the jolly beats and upbeat energy of Gloomtown Brats does not quite connect with. There are two sides to IDKHow working in opposition to one another, and while the result is fascinating, it creates a difficult spot for the artist toiling away, looking down at his influences and up at those in need of a punch.
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