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Fangclub – True Love (Vertigo Records)

Genre: Rock

There is something so deliciously seductive about Fangclub’s sound. They’re part dirty, grungy Dinosaur Pile-Up, a dash of singalong American Hi-Fi and a little stir of striped back The Xcerts and it all combines to create a beautifully melancholic, joyful, sad and intoxicating mix.

The Irish three-piece have got pure rock ‘n roll in their bones but they’ve got more than that. Just running faintly through most of their songs on five-track EP True Love is a slightly dystopian distortion, like the noise that would be created if masterminds behind The Hunger Games and Children of Men created a rock band instead of a bleak, bleak world.

Rock Sound and Kerrang! have both got behind Fangclub and it’s easy to see why. Smother has all the guitar hooks and easy to get behind vocals of the best American Hi-Fi track, all underpinned with a grungy guitar noise that’s driven post-Nirvana bands for years. It’s a clever track and it shows off the songwriting ability of the group.

Press to MECO chat their second album, nuclear destruction and NASA

Knife is probably the hardest song on the EP and the bassline growls through the whole track like a high powered sports car waiting for someone to hit the accelerator and burst it into life, which it does with a Song 2 type explosion of noise during the last 30 seconds.

This band have been hard at work since releasing their debut albums. A headline tour has been interspaced with support slots for The Cribs, Nervus and Milk Teeth while shows with Muse and Biffy Clyro have also kept the group busy.

And their incredible work ethic has translated into True Love. EP closer High is three minutes of catchy rock at its best and bring the new release to a close with a huge rallying call. It displays all of what’s good about this band: it’s endlessly singalongable, it has those little twists in the background to keep keen listeners on their ears, it has that dirty rock noise to delight the rest.

RUSHONROCK RATED: 8/10 This is true love.