Luton’s Regressive Left today release their much-anticipated debut EP “On The Wrong Side Of History”, featuring four tracks of infectious, acerbic dance-punk recorded earlier this year in Sheffield with producer and musician Ross Orton (Amyl & The Sniffers, MIA, Add N To (X)).
The EP, out now via London tastemakers Bad Vibrations, has seen significant press and radio support for its singles from the likes of The Sunday Times, NME, DIY, Dork, So Young, Loud & Quiet, CLASH, Brooklyn Vegan, WAX, Under The Radar, Gigwise, BBC 6 Music and us.
In celebration of today’s release the band share a final video from the record, with an EP highlight in “The World On Fire” set to animated visuals by Dante Traynor. The band’s own Simon Tyrie had the following to say about the themes behind “The World On Fire”:
I don’t know if we’ll ever write a song that’s as obvious as this. It does what it says on the tin. We’re burning the world for the sake of investment portfolios, and hoping that so-called green stocks can save us, when the problem is the system itself.
As well as the new studio material, recent festival shows at the likes of Wide Awake, Great Escape and Best Kept Secret have seen sizeable numbers turning up for the band as word continues to spread on the strength of their live shows.
Earlier in the year the three-piece also toured in support of their friends BODEGA and Folly Group, and September will see their first ever headlining dates in support of the EP.
Catch Regressive Left live at:
SEP
26 Birmingham – Hare & Hounds
28 Glasgow – Hug & Pint
30 Manchester – YES
OCT
2 Bedford – Esquires
4 Brighton – Prince Albert
6 Margate – Elsewhere
20 London – The Lexington
In dark, troubling times, maybe the most instantly gratifying solace one can seek is a wittily barbed diagnosis of the situation. “The fox has his den. The bee has his hive. The stoat … his stoat-hole,” Stewart Lee once remarked: “But only man chooses to make his nest in an investment opportunity.”
Caustic retorts like this are what fuel the debut EP by dance-punk outfit Regressive Left, ‘On The Wrong Side of History’. For pervading through their dynamic and glitching music is a duty to report unflinchingly society’s ills. They are a staunchly political group, but far from your average po-faced by-numbers punk band. There is a gristly social commentary at the band’s core, but the songs themselves are characterised by a need to have fun, to find some kind of solace and escapism from the inevitable rapture.