Scoundrels
London, England, United Kingdom | INDIE
Music
Press
The new EP from London rockers, the Scoundrels, is a wonderful mix of great rock rhythms and bassy blues with a delicious hint of Cajun and zydeco thrown in. Underlying the very up-for-it lyrics is an emotive message about past mistakes.
The Scoundrels put a lot of effort into getting themselves discovered by Seymour Stein, the man responsible for Madonna and The Ramones. Stein packed them off to a houseboat on the Louisiana swamps where they could gorge themselves on a diet of zydeco jazz, blues and modern rock. And it was there that their debut album was recorded (released in May on Bablegum).
To return to the EP…. Just Can’t see it Through plunges you headlong into something reminiscent of the frenetic pace of early Razorlight. One of the album’s slower tracks, Outta Town Blues reflects the southern influence. And Hangman’s Lament, the latest single, definitely deserves a mention.
But my advice is get along to Ronnie’s Bar on 5th April and sniff it up good, as the boys say on the title track – definitely the strongest on the EP. My guess is they put huge energy into a live performance and they look pretty cute too. I will certainly be there. - The Rock Club
What do I hate more than talented people?
Talented British people.
These fucking shitbirds don't know how to do anything but fucking chew with their mouths open, murder the English language that they supposedly invented, and then worship a King who actually has no fucking political power whatsoever?
YOU BAFFLE ME YOU BRITSHITS.
But then there's this band Scoundrels that my waifish friend Tilly sent me saying "Oof heef ah laff an bugga", and for the rest of us who don't speak Bork, she meant "You will probably want to suck these jagbags off after hearing their new EP".
And she's right. I do want to suck them off. But I want to murder them afterwardsies.
Bluesy blues-rock, riffy mcriffriff, vocal harmonies-tastic, musically mature - fuck Scoundrels. Fuck them "right and proper".
"Just Can't See It Through" is such a jammer I would expect the live version of this song to be even more murderous (AND I AM SUGGESTING TO THIS BAND OF FUCKNUTS THAT THEY RECORD THIS SONG LIVE AND SEND IT TO ME SO THAT I CAN SAY IN MY AMERICAN COCKY VOICE "I TOLDS YAS"). You can almost hear the lead singer jamming the fuck out and completely missing the microphone he's singing into because the chorus is such a jam vocally and guitarally (YES GUITARALLY) that what else are you going to do but writhe like a fiend? NOTHING. YOU WILL DO NOTHING BUT WRITHE GODDAMNIT.
"Sniff It Up" could be one of those fucking choruses that you end up singing aloud in inappropriate locations, like just now, at my kids's's daycare. I screamed "SNIFF IT UP, SNIFF IT UP, SNIFF IT UP, SNIFF IT UP GOOOOOOOD", and rather than rock n roll fingers thrown in my direction, the entire hallway cleared while people hid behind the glass partitions to stare at the creepy bearded fucker screaming drug references.
If I go into detail about all 5 songs on this EP, you will have no reason to fucking listen to it, and I think you are a dick for thinking that you will just read read read instead of listen, listensturbate and then ejaculisten.
If I could just say one more thing... Is that okay? (ENGLISH MANNERS BRAH, I GOTS EM)
The guitar work on "Hangman's Lament" is so fucking balls awesome, I literally want to punch these twatfucks in the fucking throats. - SYFFAL
School pals Scoundrels – the first signing to the re-launched label, Blue Horizon – are scheduled to release their self-titled debut album later this month. By their own admission, the band are heavily influenced by blues, and are at home with a record label that helped launch the careers of Blondie and Fleetwood Mac, but what can we expect from their own album?
Just Can’t See It Through opens this hotly anticipated debut and sets the bar very nicely indeed. A furious guitar riff that wouldn’t have been out of place on Franz Ferdinand’s debut back in 2004 makes this track impossible not to tap your feet along too. Sniff It Up brings a healthy dose of 70s inspired guitar with an irresistible dirty riff, a la Super Tramp, and provides the perfect juxtaposition to the mellow, laid back vocal.
Outta Town Blues is an array of hand-clapping, tambourine, violin, and perky piano, and is the band’s obvious nod to their blues influences. The saxophone effortlessly avoids being cliche, and gives a welcome jazz vibe. Loud N Proud sounds like a band trying to desperately finish a song before the CD player explodes, oozing a zesty energy that is bound to go down a treat live, and Porno continues this fiery train of thought perfectly. However, recent single and closing track, Gulf Of Mexico presents a heartfelt, almost dreamlike side, and is a track that you simply cannot avoid melting right into.
Scoundrels brings a great deal more than your average and obvious blues-inspired album. Cunning use of various styles, instruments and sounds, make it extremely diffciult to pigeon-hole this band, so you’re never quite sure what’s coming next – but you can bet that’s it’s gonna be something great! - More Than The Music
Discography
EP 1: Sniff It Up - 21st March 2011
Single 1: Gulf of Mexico - 20th June 2011
Album 1: Scoundrels - 27th June 2011
Single 2: Loud n Proud - 9th September 2011
EP 2: Sexy Weekends - 2nd April 2012
Album 2: November 2012
Photos
Bio
The suburbs of London are a long way from the swamps of Louisiana, and crossing the musical space between is the stuff that dreams are made of. But sometimes, when you concoct the right potion of talent, work, and magical circumstance, you will find that those dreams can come true. This is the story of Scoundrels, and how they got there.
For Ned Wyndham (25, vocals/guitar), Alex ‘Billy’ Hill (24, bass) and Josh Martens (25, drums) the journey had inauspicious beginnings. Being friends since their schooldays, they already shared the first magic ingredient to band chemistry, and a shared a love of 50s soul, roots, doo wop and classic rock led them all to London’s LCCM music college where they were able to hone their skills, putting on rootsy nights at Notting Hill Arts Club and The Troubadour and recruiting the final piece of their band jigsaw George Elliot (20, guitar) along the way. “College equipped us and it helped with our confidence,” admits Ned today, but they will admit that then, only two years ago, they had tendencies to play hour-long single-song jams peppered with renditions of the Batman theme. They picked their name simply “because it was better than Carpet Lickers.” Nothing wrong with that of course, but the real dream at play was to find and authentic British version of the kind of the kind of blues that existed in their record collections and their imaginations. And when they managed to do that, they would find things moving faster than they could ever have imagined.
Being enterprising types, the band had compiled a list of industry figures to which to send their demo. And in a moment of brilliant serendipity one of the first (in all likelihood one of the only) people to take the time to listen to it was the A&R legend of Sire Records, Seymour Stein, the man responsible for the careers of no smaller names than Madonna and The Ramones. The dreams of these four English boys then became the business of this American heavyweight who had a plan for them, as Ned explains:
“Within Seymour’s mind he came up with this idea, because he heard Cajun-ny vibes in there, and he waxed lyrical about South Louisiana, the scene and the music there, how it was this melting pot of blues, gospel and soul. He goes down there every year to get his musical hit. He said ‘you guys have got to go soak up the music and work in some of the fantastic studios they have down there.”
A few weeks and feats of management money-making magic later, and the band were on their way to their Beatles-In-Hamburg moment. They flew to the town of Lafayette (population 60,000) and were collected by a long-haired roadie with one tooth called Hart, who drove a 22-foot Lincoln Continental called the Cream Puff, accompanied at every stage by “a slightly bedraggled old stripper.”
There, they slept on a houseboat in the Louisiana swamps, lived on a diet of Crawfish and Gumbo, watched two or three bands every night, most of which invited them up onstage with them and gorged themselves on a diet of zydeco jazz, blues and modern rock. And by day they laid down the songs that were growing and evolving with every minute, growing rich in the Louisiana spirit. Some tracks, most obviously ‘Louisiana Song’ were written out there, but as Ned remembers “all the songs were played a certain way at home and every single one of them, when we got out there, was played a different way. One of the things was laying back on the groove. Everyone was so laid back, it was infectious the way they played beats out there.”
The sessions at Studio in the Country and La Louisianne might have opened out their music, but the warmth and hospitality of the people there had an effect on a band raised on the uptight London music scene that will stay with them forever. And this was not even to be the end of the Scoundrels American adventures. After six weeks in Louisiana they headed to Chicago to work with Steve Albini, whose organic approach of letting bands do things for themselves gave the record another flavour again.
The cat-loving lo fi impresario and cult rock Godhead left another indelible impression on the foursome. “He’s a really clever guy who knows so much about so many different subjects,” offers Ned, “he was a proper eccentric but really friendly. He wears a boiler suit to the studio with pens in his top pocket, round glasses and spiky hair. He’s very clever and quietly dry. After all the recordings he’d come and hang out and watch TV.”
Taking songs born from a British sensibility and stirring in two distinctly American approaches, Scoundrels’ debut mines a virgin sound. And saying a lot for the band’s unique identity, it is not immediately apparent which songs came from which sessions. The songs speak of youth and love and hope and hopelessness, putting an arched spin on the myth of sex and drugs and rock’n’roll.
‘Red Riding Hood’ puts a sexy, swampy spin on the predatory subtext of one of our most popular fairytales. ‘All On My Own’ ch
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