I’ll spare you the whinge about my rubbish day at work, but it was bad… Fortunately enough, Honeyglaze were the perfect remedy for my sulk.
From the moment the South London band arrived on stage, they had myself and a sold-out Brudenell Social Club completely mesmerised.
Real Deal, the band’s most recent album, has found the trio selling venues out and playing on increasingly larger stages, a feat which hasn’t always been the case, as lead vocalist and guitarist Anouska Sokolow points out – the last time they played the Brude was to just “about four people”.
The crowd was split almost equally between factions of young indie kids and middle aged 6Music devotees, both troupes equally as appreciative and engaged, as the band drifted through their discography with finesse and impressive musical cohesion.
They took to the stage with a blistering rendition of I Feel It All before diving straight into Hide, which sounds like something At The Drive In might have come up with if they’d have just relaxed for a little bit. Sokolows guitar riffs glisten amongst the deep, sub harmonic tones conjured by bassist Tim Curtis, while drummer Yuri Shibuichi plays complex, intriguing grooves with almost metronomic precision. In between songs, Shibuichi uses some kind of futuristic wind instrument to create reverberating, ambient drones while Curtis uses a violin bow to sustain and add texture to the ever-evolving soundscape which compliments the performance.
While initially the ambient drones, interludes and general seriousness of the band may have come across as slightly theatrical, it wasn’t long before the fourth wall was broken and seriousness turned into laughter: Sokolow asked the audience if anyone had seen a movie before and with absolutely zero hesitation an audience member screamed ‘COCAINE BEAR’ which catches the trio off guard. They all have a short giggle before diving straight into one of my favourite tracks, Movies, which as per the rest of the set, sounds phenomenal within the live setting.
They run through Pretty Girls, which gets a great audience response, before admitting awkwardly that this is the part of the set where they never know what song to play – quickly deciding on I Am Not Your Cushion. Sokolow then makes time for a short humble brag about how next track Ghosts is Joe Jonas’ favourite song, having allegedly received a DM from the star where he claimed “Ghosts is my shit!”.
As a three-piece, from my own musical experience you can often feel limited in the scale of the sound you create live, but it’s clear that sheer creativity and willingness to experiment has favoured Honeyglaze – every song sounds near perfect and every extra element to their performance is thought out and executed with precision. For such a young band, they have an admirably mature live sound, clearly at home on stage together.
