Stricken City
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Stricken City

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"4/5 album review"

"Indie in the old-fashioned 'look at us we design our own t-shirts and our guitarist learnt to play in a week' sense, Stricken City's sound recalls all sorts of lovely things put out by Rough Trade and Postcard in the mid-80s. 'Songs About People I Know' oozes with fun and spontaneity, like 'Gifted', an a capella ditty recorded on a London bus, or the wonderfully bouncy, Orange Juice-esque 'Five Metres Apart'. Scratchy guitars are complemented by Rebekah Raa's syrupy vocals, fragile and slow burning like Alison from Young Marble Giants on 'Sometimes I Love You', yet hiccupy and Bjorky on 'PS'. A bit more of this and we could easily fall in love with Stricken City. Kind of wonderful.

(4/5) - The Fly


"4/5 album review"

Save The Record Industry Theory Number 2,978: release each album with a DVD! What? People can download DVDs too? Oh bugger. Over to theory 2,979 then I guess. Mind you, that clearly hasn't put off Stricken City, who've released their debut album along with a DVD of experimental movies, all shot on VHS/Super 8 format. Sounds tasty - and it's just the kind of idea that compliments the sound of the group too. What we have here is essentially a youthful and experimental indie band, taking the arty attitude of groups like Camera Obscura, but adding a layer of muscle to the grooves and aspiring to a wider variety of audio adventures. Opener 'Pull The House Down' mixes up the tragic/uplifting pop of Bowie's Low album with a more outdoors Duke Spirit vibe, while the bass makes for a psychedelic manchester groove underneath. There's a childlike innocence to singer Rebekah Rah as she stumbles along discovering her own emotions in the wonderland of sounds of 'Small Things'. Single 'Five Metres Apart' is catchy and romantic, while closer 'Terrible Things' dusts down the grand piano for a peaceful and shimmering finale, recalling the strange and beautiful atmosphere of My Summer of Love. There's enough restlessness here to suggest that Stricken City will work hard and throw some evolutionary shapes in the future. For now however, this is an effective get-up-and-go record - perfect for the first day back at school.

(4/5) - Artrocker


"Dollars To Pounds"

So why are we in East London today?
Rebekah Rah: We’re at the House of Strange to record the live DVD for our EP which is out in September.

Iain Pettifer: We wanted to put out a 12-inch but were told that was a silly idea. So we had to make a CD. We don’t like CDs so we thought we’d make it a DVD as well.

RR: Make it a bit special at least.

IP: It’s our first proper release with no label backing or money behind so we thought, yeah, let’s make it a DVD and put a live show on it.

How long have you guys been together?
IP: Our MySpace was created in 2005 so this is the fourth year of Stricken City. I met Rebekah at school.

RR: Yeah, we were school friends. Kit responded to an advert.

IP: He’s our third drummer.

Kit Godfrey: The third and the best.

IP: Mike’s the forth bassist and tenth person to have been in the band.

Mike Hyland: My time must be up soon.

IP: Yeah, you haven’t got long left.

I was trying to explain your sound to my hairdresser this morning. I said you sound like The Sugarbabes, but what I meant was you sound like The Sugarcubes.
IP: Yeah, we’re a bit like the Sugarbabes.

RR: Haha! I sing exactly like the blond Sugarbabe. Exactly like her. We sound more like Girls Aloud, actually.

IP: We’re an indie band but everyone gets really angry if you describe yourself like that. They expect you to be the Kaiser Chiefs.

So what do you think being indie means?
RR: We’re indie because we do everything ourselves.

IP: We’re a guitar pop band. We’re not like a major label rock thing.
RR: We all have jobs. And I design our t-shirts.

The EP is called Songs About People I Know. Who are these people, and do they know you’re writing songs about them?
RR: No, they’d probably be cross if I told them.

IP: We were going to make all the song titles the names of the people…

RR: …but I thought that’s too much. I wouldn’t have any friends left. I don’t have very many as it is! It just fascinates me. People’s characters. Sometimes you’ll remember someone you used to know and think, I’ll write a little song about them. It’s no necessarily people I still know.

IP: The idea came from our song “PS”…

RR: It’s about this girl that I HATE.

IP: It’s the bitchiest song ever. We wanted to write something that used that kind of Gossip Girl language.

I heard you like Gossip Girl. Do you think Chuck and Blair’s love will last?
RR: I hope not. I hate Blair.

Leighton Meester [who plays Blair] is leaving to become a pop star.
RR: What? Nooo. I hope that means Blair will die spectacularly.

IP: Our song “5 Metres Apart” was originally called “The OC Song” because it sounds like something that would play over the credits. I wish we could’ve played it in The Bait Shop.

You’re a pretty well documented band, I like your tour videos.
IP: I studied film. So I take my Super8 camera on tour and shoot a reel every now and again. It’s silent which is good because it means we don’t have to talk on camera.

I just watched Obsessed. It’s amazing. Beyonce headbutts that bitch from Heroes. What films do you recommend?
IP: My favourites are Pierrot Le Fou—a Jean Luc Godard film which is really funny—and Breaking Away, an American film about high school kids. It ends with an epic bike race. I dare you to watch it. By the end you will be cheering and crying. It’s amazing. And Dennis Quaid’s in it.

Pre-order Songs About People I Know here. Stricken City will be touring the US later this year. - TheFader.com


"Pitchfork album review"

Songs About People I Know, the glassy, slightly grimy London-based post-punk foursome Stricken City's debut, sits somewhere between an EP and LP. Featuring 24 minutes of reverby guitars and spluttery drums careening around singer/keyboardist Rebekah Raa's hook-heavy character sketches, it's a fine record; despite its length, it's fleshed out and full of flourish. If anything, it's all over way too soon. If only they knew more people.

There's something wonderfully ramshackle and even a little weird about the songs on Songs, from the creaky Victrola of opener "Gifted" (apparently recorded in a London bus) to the unspooling C86 haze that covers the rest. Bleary guitars, tricky rhythms, and Raa's ascendant vocal melodies seem engaged in a tug of war, and even the odd ballad feels, well, odd when cast in their able amble. The best tunes here aren't too fitful to be unruly or even undancable, yet their muddled construction always seems to threaten a topple. It's Raa who holds it all together, her voice dipping and soaring over these tunes, a little like a looser Sue Tompkins from Life Without Buildings. Even with an oddball backdrop, an unlikely vocal melody, over an unruly pile of guitars, Raa finds a way to captivate, and without much apparent effort.

The intimate portraits promised in the title don't quite materialize-- most songs are about people you know, y'know-- but the legit pangs of longing in Raa's voice lead one to believe she entered the booth for every tune with somebody specific in mind, even when the sentiments feel a little general. The accordion-led "Sometimes I Love You" leans that way-- sometimes she hates you, too-- but, on the strength of its unique arrangement and Raa's resigned vocal, you'll barely notice. Stark closer "Terrible Things" smacks of PJ Harvey's bleak White Chalk, and Raa, much like Polly Jean Harvey, conveys an awful lot even when she doesn't seem to be saying much. There's just so much ground covered here that throwing something else at them, like a more complicated lyric, might prove their tipping point. As it stands, though, Songs is a series of small successes in slightly askew songcraft.

— Paul Thompson, February 9, 2010 - www.pitchfork.com


"New York Times review"

Most of the songs on Stricken City’s debut album, “Songs About People I Know” (The Kora), chime like late-1980s new wave. Rebekah Raa overdubs her wholesome voice into pop harmony choruses while her keyboards, and Iain Pettifer’s guitar connect for galloping, celebratory riffs. But the splintered words she sings are more contentious, full of tensions between parent and child, between friends, between lovers: “Broken people breaking ties give cause to doubt what’s seen as right,” she sings over a jaunty march beat in “Tak o Tak” (whatever that means). Now and then the misgivings surface in the music too — particularly in “Terrible Things,” a cryptic warning set to piano and very few other instruments — to show there’s depth behind that chipper exterior. - www.nytimes.com


"BBC review"

As perky pop debuts in 2009 go, London's Stricken City make an impressive bow here with maiden (mini) album Songs About People I Know. Led by distinctively-voiced singer Rebekah Raa, the four-piece channel a wide palette of influences into an energetic art-rock that – crucially – still manages to sound all of its makers' own creation.
Icelandic chanteuse Björk's idiosyncratic vocal delivery and Blondie's knack with a new-wave pop chorus are certainly the principal, and oft-invoked, touchstones underpinning the more straightforward radio-friendly moments here. But at their more understated and introspective Stricken City channel the delicate strains of Young Marble Giants, much like fellow London dwellers The xx, offering two contrasting, and equally rewarding, sides to their work.
This latter mood is particularly apparent on choppy single cut and album highlight Killing Time, which – in contrast to the majority of their oeuvre – throbs with nervous tension rather than ecstatic release. Elsewhere, similarities with cult Glaswegian indie-rockers Life Without Buildings, particularly their singer Sue Tompkins' manic vocal tics, are apparent; PS's unhinged energy, buoyed by Kit Godfrey's propulsive post-punk drums, which are exemplary throughout, being a good case in point.
What makes Stricken City stand out from the bunch of new UK indie bands currently attempting something along similar lines, though, is a palpable sense of belief and passion about their music married with a willingness to experiment beyond the sometimes narrow confines of the genre. The plaintive Sometimes I Love You, for instance, is built around a decidedly French-sounding accordion motif, while a capella album opener Gifted was recorded by Raa during a bus journey, and is presented here as-is.
Moments like these and their order in the sequencing (which incidentally works to a tee) leave some valuable breathing space for the listener on what could otherwise have been a busy listen; such variety only serves to heighten the impact of the big guitar-and-synth pop moments like Small Things and 5 Metres Apart, and leaves Songs About People I Know a thoroughly engaging listen from start to finish. - www.bbc.co.uk


"The Times - Track of the Day"

See, now in this age when the concept of indie is little more than another category for Woolworths to file their Cds under, it's nice to have a reminder, no matter how small, of how it used to be; a time before the seismic cultural shift of Manchester '89, when there truly was a line in the sand that split the glossy mainstream and the rough-edged margins.

Stricken City have a floppy, just-short-of-fully-formed form that is beyond endearing and reaks of tiny records labels, the Festive Fifty and musty record shops down back alleys. Obviously, the entire world has decided that taking cues from the Eighties is the only acceptable modus operandi, but along with the du jour post-punk touches, the band also offer a number of other signifiers - maybe accidentally - that aren't getting rinsed at the moment; the untreated, simple guitar sounds of The Wedding Present and the innate, almost-accidental groove of the Sugarcubes are manna to the ears and a ctrl-alt-delete on the musical torpor that is always so close at hand.

Starting out with a proto-keyboard riff that may very well have been used on some obscuro piece of east European animation and welding it to a solid metronomic beat, Tak O Tak effortlessly unfolds as a gorgeous three minutes of lens-flare pop, made all the more palatable by Raa’s voice, which achieves the perfect balance of being exemplary without drowning in its own excellence. More please. - The Times


"Q - Track of the Day"

In those innocent days before Pro Tools, click tracks and laptop recordings, the eighties produced a generation of studenty bands with a simple DIY ethic and only rudimentary musical skills who strummed away on effect-free jangly guitars and a simple hi-hat and snare rhythm. Stricken City are a splendid throwback to more innocent times where enthusiasm and the joy of being in a band counted for everything. Thankfully they also have some jolly tunes to back it up.

Formed in the Midlands and now based in London, the quartet is fronted by the jittery, just-got-out-of-bed-haired goddess Rebekah Raa who seems to have a thing for Jim Kerr’s meaningless hand gestures and feather headgear redolent of an Elton John dress outfit.

Tak O Tak combines the yearning simplicity of The Sundays, particularly in the vocal phrasing of singer Rebekah Raa - although you will be hard-pushed to work out what on earth she is on about with barely decipherable lyrics. There are touches of the Sugarcubes with Raa’s Bjorkish hiccups and the band’s C86-friendly indie guitar pop is tickled with vintage synth. Other tracks reveal some slowburn dynamics and Poscard-style pop nuggets. - Q Magazine


"The Fader"

We stumbled across London's Stricken City while doing our regular check up on Adventures Close To Home and had a hard time initially deciding whether we were going to get into them or not. Ultimately, lead singer/Korg-er Rebecca Raa's awkward dancing and rad voice led us to do believe that, yes, we will get into it. And our committment was rewarded with a free copy of Stricken City's debut EP, which includes "Tak O Tak" as well as the pretty great, pretty mellow "Bardou" and "The Traveller" on it. As if that weren't enough, we found a couple more excellent demos on their MySpace, both of which you can download too. And then you can stop being greedy. - The Fader.com


"8/10 album review"

"If this was the early 80s, Stricken City would be label-mates of Orange Juice, as this mini-album features eight of the the prettiest, shambling C86 style pop nuggets since the Postcard era. Intentionally angular and amateurish, Pull The House Down, Five Metres Apart and Killing Time offer skittish, playful guitar lines, fidgety bass and one finger keyboards, all deliciously cut with Rebekah Raa's striking, spectral chirrup, which is more than a little reminiscent of Sugacubes-era Bjork. With gawky, naive charm in abundance, this will be an album to make many a student sigh dreamily as they lovingly scrawl 'I HEART STRICKEN CITY' onto their pencil cases in Tippex.

(8/10) - NME


"8/10 album review"

“You're so boring / You're so normal” spits Rebekah Raa on this this extraordinary mini album that feels like the innocence of youth mixed with the cold indifference of unrequited love over a glass of brandy. Stricken City, emerging from the rubble of riot grrl and britpop triumphantly bring something fresh and exciting to modern music with their enthusiasm, snappy poetic lyrics and, unlike other art bands, a warm welcoming heart which has already melted everyone who bought a copy of their limited 7inch late last year. Within 24 minutes it's all over, and about as thrilling as anything you will hear this year. This is music of a different class.

(8/10) - Clash Magazine


Discography

Tak o Tak / Bardou - released on limited 7-inch on 28th July 2008 - ACTH Recordings - available for free download at www.strickencity.com

Tak o Tak received plays on BBC Radio 1 and 6Music, XFM playlist, regional radio playlists, video play on MTV TWO and NME TV. Video was blogged around the world including on TheFader.com / MTV2 US Subterranean Blog / Gorilla vs Bear / www.perezhilton.com where it received 45,000 plays in 12 hours.

Lost Art / The Traveller - released on limited 7-inch on 17th November 2008 - Blue Flowers Records

Lost Art received spot plays on Radio 1 and BBC 6 Music and another XFM playlist slot. Video reached number on on the MTV TWO Myspace Chart.

Outside the UK the band have been played on radio in LA (Indie 103 FM - passport approved), Cincinatti (WOXY.com), France, Germany and Canada. TheFader.com

"Songs About People I Know" released in the UK on 12th October 2009, with a US release on 2nd November 2009.

In the lead up to the release the band performed a live session for Huw Stephens on BBC Radio 1, a Black Cab Session and, whilst at CMJ, a live session for www.thefader.com

Photos

Bio

When Iain Pettifer (guitars) first met Rebekah Raa (vocals/keys), they were wearing exactly the same clothes. “How could they not form a band then?”, you’d think, only the pair were actually in high school, in a math class. Nonetheless, as painstaking algebra lessons repeated themselves every week, it soon became apparent that while Raa and Iain couldn’t have been less bothered about square roots, their love for romantic guitar music couldn’t have been better suited.

It was a couple of years later that the pair first began writing together, sparked by Raa’s boredom at university, which resulted in the singer spending her student loan on a guitar and an 8-track recorder. Originally the plan was for Stricken City to consist of just two, until they quickly decided that something was missing and pulled together a full lineup.

While Goldsmiths music student Mike Hyland is the band’s newest member – having taken up bass duties in August of this year and playing his first gig for the band in the back of a taxi – Kit Godfrey has been Stricken City’s long-standing drummer since 2006. “We liked him straight away because he was a drummer called Kit,” says Rebekah, “there was no need for an audition.”

Drawing on influences from The Slits, Life Without Buildings and Young Marble Giants, the band’s new wave, spiky, jangling pop earned them support slots with Mystery Jets, Friendly Fires and Love Is All. Maximo Park personally requested the band to support them on their 2009 UK tour.

In November 2009 the band followed their limited edition debut singles (‘Tak o Tak’ / ‘Bardou’ and ‘Lost Art’ / 'The Traveller') with their debut mini-album "Songs About People I Know", which has received critical acclaim on both sides of the pond, from Pitchfork, NME, The New York Times, BBC, Fader, Spin, Uncut, Clash Magazine and countless blogs.

The band are currently completing their debut full-length album, to be released in early 2011.