Project Description

SKEGSS

@ THE TRIFFID

(LIVE REVIEW)

15/06/18

Reviewer: Alexandra Ainsworth

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Since following up the release of 2017 EP, Holiday Food, with latest single, Up In The Clouds, it seems as though it’s near impossible to not have heard of Skegss. The Byron three have been steadily gaining a cult following over the past couple of years, all of which have turned up to sell out their largest national tour to date.

The boys waste no time by opening up the set with Up In The Clouds, the opening riff giving the already antsy mosh all the encouragement they needed to start throwing empty beers and crowd surfing. There’s an obvious excitement that runs through not just the audience, but the band themselves. It’s their first time headlining the sizable venue, and they look, for a lack of a better word, absolutely stoked.

While it’s admittedly all too easy to let the four chord riffs and droning vocals glaze over, the brilliance of Skegss hides in plain sight. It’s the deceptive candour of tracks like My Face (Didn’t really wanna wake up this morning / So I hit the snooze and kept on snoring) and Got On My Skateboard (I guess I’m not getting any younger / Life flashes by just while we wonder) that catch you off guard, proving that it’s not all tinnies and sunshine all the time. These almost grimly honest tracks are sonically no different to the rest of the catalog, fitting in seamlessly with songs like New York California, which are quite literally and quite hedonistically, about absolutely nothing.

The setlist feels as though it’s entirely comprised of crowd favourites, with each track eliciting a response more raucous than the one prior. Skegss’ only downfall is that they run sets that are far too short. The majority of their songs fall under the three-minute mark and feel like they’re being played at time and a half. But maybe Skegss know that they offer a fleeting experience that always leaves you craving more.

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