Music > Live Reviews

Bodega + Dry Cleaning

Norwich Arts Centre

27/03/19

The night is opened by London four-piece, Dry Cleaning. Their set is characterised by reverb-soaked guitars and sometimes charmingly, sometimes irritatingly, dry spoken word lyrics. Their vocalist remains dead pan throughout, delivering stream of consciousness-style observations, commenting on everything from the social conventions of phone conversation to road signs. Dry Cleaning’s songs are wrought with tension and un-resolving chord progressions reminiscent of Sonic Youth. Their writing appears inconsistent and some songs seem to lose the crowd, however, at their strongest, their grooves are hypnotic and encapsulating. The band play for half an hour, ultimately providing an enjoyable and fitting introduction to the evening.

Following this, BODEGA mull about the stage, setting up their own equipment. On taking stage, the band grab the audience’s attention straight away, with their distinctive brand of angular art rock. Interspersed with automated messages of “this is new BODEGA” and “heaven knows I’m miserable now”, the band rattle through a series of short, sharp and energetic tracks, the highlight of which is their album opener, ‘How Did This Happen?!’ The vigour of these tracks is matched by the band’s animated and engaging stage presence. The tribal drumming and frontman, Ben Hozie’s, chant-style vocals make for a musical style that mesmerises the audience, myself included. BODEGA wear their influences on their sleeve, with a British post-punk style, reminiscent of bands like The Fall and The Wire. Their slower tracks, such as ‘Boxes For The Move’, are stylistically comparable to The Velvet Underground and successfully maintain a brooding intensity.

BODEGA are a fairly new inception, forming in 2016. However, the 6music favourites have garnered a great deal of praise from critics in this time. Their self-professed mission is to “bring sexiness to rock music”. BODEGA’s satirical critiques of technology and the internet-age are frank and refreshing. The band’s message of dissatisfaction for modern superficiality and instant gratification culture appeals to both youth and older generations, which is demonstrated by the age range of the crowd. Their 2018 debut, Endless Scroll, was produced by Parquet Courts’ Austin Brown and the comparisons to the band are inescapable.

Snappy circa-two minute tracks such as ‘Can’t Knock The Hustle’ form the staple of the set. The band play a short series of new and unreleased tracks, which don’t disappoint. They later feature a drawn-out version of their track, ‘Name Escape’, that lasts for about 15 minutes, including further allusions to Smiths songs, as well as the Oasis classic, ‘Live Forever’, audible to those listening closely. The band do well to maintain the tribal energy throughout this song, however, the audience appear to be wavering by the end. This is followed by the crowd favourite, ‘Jack In Titanic’, allowing BODEGA to demonstrate their pop sensibilities. This was a joyous climax to the set, and was clearly their strongest ‘sing-along’ track.

During their encore, the band ask the crowd to hang out and have a drink with them afterwards, a sizeable portion of the crowd taking them up on this offer. BODEGA reek of a band that whole-heartedly embody and believe in an ethos and a message, inviting their audiences to share in this. They are subsequently at the top of their game and have left us excitedly anticipating another studio album.