Geraldine Montgomerie shares her view of ‘Bird Watching Accident’ ahead of the release and a UK tour.
It’s been two years since the formation of Leeds indie pop rockers, Family Art Club, and they are celebrating with the release of a new single and a UK tour.
‘Bird Watching Accident’ opens with recorded bird song, then leans in hard to their 1990s influences. Coming in at just under three minutes, there is a general feel of US band Pavement in their ‘Slanted and Enchanted’ era, with a hint of Noel Gallagher’s guitar sound around the time of the Oasis debut album ‘Definitely Maybe’ and just a touch of free jazz with some tuneful brass.
Vocalist, Evan Usher, does not sound like a Leeds lad, but despite this he has a quirky and compelling way of storytelling that goes down well. Here, the new single follows in a tradition of cute, twee, naive lyrics that carry on where last year’s single “Worms (1881)” left off. This time, members of Family Art Club take their place with artists who sing of the possibility of better futures, imagining peace and calm that culminates in death by bird watching.
While an album is still in the works – and one to look out for – if this bittersweet cosiness sounds right up your street, why not catch a tour date? You can hear the band for yourself at Leeds’ Hyde Park Book Club on Thursday 4th June.
Photography by Oliver Desbruslais
Evan Usher explains: “‘Bird Watching Accident’ is a song to process past and future and the way they come together to form the confusing present. I wrote the words for it during a big transition period and I was thinking a lot about the death of childhood and my place in the world coming out of it, trying to make sense of the time I’d come into and all of its flaws and darknesses, whilst also trying to love it and understand it.”
Marking their first release since their debut EP Friends From Home arrived last year, ‘Bird Watching Accident’ reintroduces Family Art Club as one of the burgeoning Leeds scene’s cosier exports, for fans of Westside Cowboy, cats on the street and a sturdy pair of boots. The single also acts as the lead single from the band’s forthcoming sophomore EP, ‘Pigeons When I’m King’ which is set to arrive later this year via Private Regcords.
Family Art Club have also announced a run of headline tour dates in support of the new single this June, kicking things off at The Grove in Nottingham.
‘Bird Watching Accident’ artwork
More About Family Art Club
Family Art Club have been described as the most wholesome indie-rock band of all time. Their shows have a home-baked feel, straight out of the living room oven. They like their music colourful and joyful and a bit melancholic, sometimes silly and sometimes earnest.
Taking lyrical inspiration from the ramblings of Neutral Milk Hotel and Laurie Lee and fusing it with their love for the musical worlds of Pavement and Jeff Buckley, Family Art Club’s folky-jazzy-emo musings find them muddling through life and how to make sense of it.
*****
Live dates:
3rd June – The Grove, Nottingham
4th June – Hyde Park Book Club, Leeds
5th June – Factory Floor, Sheffield
6th June – Finsbury Picture House, London
7th June – Prince Albert, Brighton
8th June – Cafe Kino, Bristol
25th July – The Other Festival, Sheffield
Tickets will be available here.
