Biography
They barely have three concerts under their belt, but the garage rock ‘n roll with sixties-styled melodies and psychedelic pop from this London-based quintet led by Simon (who was the front man of the marvelous THE LOVES in their time) have completely and irremediably won us over. With Sarah’s powerful and versatile voice in the lead, KNICKERS are releasing an EP with four solid songs, one of which is the huge hit, “My Baby’s Just A Baby (But I Love Him So)” with its rock n’ roll echoes, pushed on by the hallucinogenic synthesizer accents. It’s followed by “Are You Ready Girl?” (a cover of a Dave Davies song from the 60s that was originally thought of as a solo album for the integral member of THE KINKS, but which was never released until decades later on an album of oddities), a song that moves things in a different direction to show its tendencies toward the velvety soul of Sam Cooke and Otis Redding. “A Thousand Ways” begins and it seems like a THE BYRDS’ song but it winds up sounding like BELLE & SEBASTIAN decided to play some Northern Soul. The result? Colorful and emotional like few others. However, “Darling” leans toward the sweetest girl-group sound, twisted by distorted guitars and aggressive, dirty drums. It gets stuck in our ears with no hope of ever getting it out of our heads.
They are four very different styles, perfectly strung together, and united by a great melodic base that shows this group’s incredible ability with addictive melodies. It makes us think that KNICKERS are probably one of the groups from the current British scene who can reach the farthest, since any one of the songs included on this red-vinyl single that serves as their debut could be title tracks for the single and could fill the radio waves. Their name says it all.
