MOVIE

Dalston Victoria

MOVIE is an outfit that can only be described as a band from another era. Musically, visually and aesthetically they stand out from the crowd of London-based bands by being easy to draw comparisons to, yet hard to define. They seemingly materialized from a parallel dimension in which every art school graduate and every pop and cultural phenomenon from the 60s to the 00s has been synthesized into an era made of endless zeniths.

After a string of audio and video material trailed their way through the past year, the band has finally released their debut EP Tusk Vegas, a collection of cool-headed flair and timeless records. The release, being a good reason to celebrate in Dalston’s Vic, gathered an eager crowd on a freezing Monday night into the solitary East London pub.

Quartet Shiners preceded Movie, playing their debut show with cheeky confidence and more than a nod to Blur’s baggy and alt rock origins. Tracks like Just Got Paid exuded kitchen sink drama and autobiographical empathy which, set against the backdrop of caustic riffs and old timey accordion-esque keys, were quite the accurate personification of the crowd attending the gig.

Movie took to the stage with their backs to their oblique logo in thick black lettering laid over a bright tickle-me pink. Dressed in an array of clothing that seemed to be picked from Roxy Music and Bowie’s past glamour, the band played coyly through a muscular 8-track set.

Aside from showcasing most of the band’s electrifying EP, including the proto-genre-bending title track, there was room to introde freshly recorded material for a future debut album, and amongst the bashful banter, the gluttonous salaciousness of unreleased track Fat Bacchus emerged victorious from the inebriated atmosphere of the venue.

Movie’s lyrical content, is steeped in neorealism, with a graphic and evocative language that expresses the underlying feeling of inadequacy of their own and their peers’ lives. It is sexual frustration, anti-conformism, emotional detachment and other common themes, which seem easy to forget once under the influence of the band’s pulsating grooves.

Musically, Movie are sharp and unassailable. The rhythm section, with its compact design of cowbell-gifted disco and funk-filled bass lines and drums, accompanies the abstract movements of the glamorous new romantic synths with the multiple personalities of the guitar riffs. From detached and prickly, to warm and luxuriating, the guitars collate Movie into an unstoppable electric beast. The crowd’s voltaic reaction to Mr. Fist and Ads just goes to confirm that Movie are the pop powerhouse we’ve been missing.