SOUNDTRACK: DRY CLEANING-Tiny Desk (Home) Concert #232 (July 6, 2021).
I thought I was familiar with Dry Cleaning, but I’m thinking I heard them discussed on an All Song Considered episode and maybe even heard the song they played. But that was almost nine months ago, and things were quite different then. So it’s interesting to hear that their music doesn’t typically sound like the way this Tiny Desk (Home) Concert sounds. [I really like the sound of this].
Up until now, Dry Cleaning’s post-Brexit post-punk relied on a robust dynamism of jagged, thudding lushness and a speak-song voice. It’s music that coos and quizzes at once. How energizing to hear Dry Cleaning recontextualize its established sound for a relatively subdued Tiny Desk performance from World of Echo, a record store in East London beloved to the British band.
Tom Dowse trades his effects pedals and electric guitar for an acoustic; its weird bends and weirder chords surprisingly complement the atmospheric keyboards and minimal beats of Nick Buxton, who’s normally on drums. Lewis Maynard’s bass doesn’t throttle at this volume, but still grooves.
It’s actually Maynard’s bass that you notice right away once “Her Hippo” opens. After a grooving riff, Florence Shaw starts speaking (not even really speak-singing, just reciting).
The house is just twelve years old
Soft landscaping in the garden
An electrician stuck his finger in the plug hole
And shouted “Yabba”
The acoustic guitars sound great in contrast here–soft and ringing–while Shaw sneers
The last thing I looked at in this hand mirror
Was a human asshole
Between songs they joke around a bit (which belies their more serious sounding music). Buxton plays some dancey music between songs as they get set up for the next track.
Brash and unusual (for an acoustic guitar anyway) chords open “Unsmart Lady” before the rumbling bass keeps the rhythm. This time Florence speaks even more quietly
Fat podgy
Non make-up
Unsmart lady
The middle portion is a terrific juxtaposition of unusual chords and rumbling bass.
Florence Shaw’s voice [is] an instrument of resolute deadpan…. Some might call her delivery wry, even disaffected — her lyrics non-sequitur — but here a sly inquisitiveness inclines a smile (“I’d like to run away with you on a plane, but don’t bring those loafers”) and burns a harsh memory (“Never talk about your ex / Never, never, never, never, never slag them off / Because then they know”).
For “Leafy” Dowse puts away his guitar and heads behind the keyboard for washes of synths. After a verse or so, the slow bass comes in adding rhythm to Shaw’s lyrics:
What are the things that you have to clear out?
Baking powder, big jar of mayonnaise
What about all the uneaten sausages?
Clean the fat out of the grill pan
This is the hardest thing I’ve ever had to do, now
Trying not to think about all the memories
Remember when you had to take these pills
Dowse returns to his guitar for “Viking Hair” (from an earlier EP). This song has something of a main riff and Shaw actually seems to be humming before the lyrics begin.
Stick up for me, do what you’re told
But sometimes tell me what to do as well
I just want to sexually experiment in a nice, safe pair of hands
Don’t judge me, just hold still
A lot of times, especially with pop bands, I like the way a band sounds in their Tiny Desk and don’t like their recorded output. But the blub makes me think I’d enjoy their original recordings even more. So I’ll have to check that out.
[READ: July 10, 2021] “Bravado”
(This story is about reprobates in Ireland.
It begins on Sunderland Avenue, where an Indian shop keeper is concerned about the group of five teens who approached the store. He is closing up and they give him a hard time. The three boys are nasty but the girls are silent (this is unusual–usually the girls are drunk and terrible). The shopkeeper pretends to be talking to the cops on the phone.
There were another two boys who had just left a club, they’d seen the band Big City. And even though the had a mile walk home, they didn’t mind because the show was so good.
The fivesome included Manning and his girlfriend Aisling. The other two boys, Kilroy and Donovan, were Manning’s mates. Ailsing found them harder and less enjoyable than Manning, but he hung out with them and she was stuck doing so as well. (more…)
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Back in February, Dry Cleaning had to reschedule their American tour until May. Back in 2022, a family emergency prevented me from going to this show. I was interested in Dry Cleaning who at the time were a kind of trendy British band. They are of the spoken deadpan vocal/wild guitar noise variety. I thought they’d be fun to see live once.
I Just Read About That... 