Burnt Tapes

support Hoi-Poi Farplane Wind + Forever Unclean + Dungeon Days
author PP date 12/10/19 venue Underwerket, Copenhagen, DEN

It's a banger of a punk rock lineup for a Saturday night in Valby. Not only do we have the local scene regulars Dungeon Days and Forever Unclean opening up the festivities, but we also have foreign visitors in the form of Hoi-Poi Farplane Wind from Greece, and gravelly emotional punk band Burnt Tapes at UnderWerket. In other words, the night is ripe for exactly the sort of basement punk show that the venue is renowned for.

Dungeon Days

I'm fifteen minutes late and a good couple of whiskeys down thanks to a late-running whiskey festival arrangement beforehand, so Dungeon Days are well into "Pray Away" by the time I get in the doors, one of the songs where the addition of Jakob Pries has made a real difference. It's followed by the romantic "Band Shirts" track, sung with passion by vocalist Anders, maybe more so tonight than many other nights considering it's about his wife who is here tonight. They air a new song that has a nice dual vocal dynamic, and joke around for most of the show in their trademark, laid-back fashion. For the most part, it still feels like an amateur show riddled with dad-joke material, but the new songs indicate that this band is continuously moving in the right direction.

Forever Unclean

Like Dungeon Days, Forever Unclean is introducing a couple of new songs to their set. The first one, dubbed as "Dream" on their setlist, has a catchy "We were meant to sing along" bit that captures you on first listen. Then "Woof" and particularly "Dinosaur" with its awesome "come on, race me to the bottom" bits get our heads bopping and mouths singing along, while the band is rocking out on stage in a particularly energetic fashion. "Worthless" features the usual sing along a capella segment that the small crowd readily shout back at the band, and "Words" displays their capacity to write ripping riffage able to compete on the international punk scene. Tonight is, in fact, a little bit of a dress rehearsal before the band embarks on a small tour and FEST across the pond, and based on what we're seeing here, the set looks ready to win those crowds over. Final song "Waves" should be as awesome overseas as it is here tonight.

7

Hoi-Poi Farplane Wind

Hoi-Poi might be the odd one out of the four bands playing tonight, yet their post-hardcore fueled alternative rock fits right in with the punk/emo scene. Their songs are lengthy, full of atmospheric segments that display desperation and emotion above all else, drawing parallels to mid-2000s post-hardcore bands like Finch, etc. The excellent songs draw your attention to them on first listen, and given their passionate performance of the carefully structured, progressive songs, I can't help but think back and remember that this is how the cult emo/post-hardcore bands of that time used to look like on stage. The depth-laden melodies showcase emotion and hypnotize the audience in a challenging soundscape that ultimately takes us back to the heydey of this genre. With few pauses, Hoi-Poi delivers a continuous string of solid alternative rock with a notable emo/post-hardcore twist to it.

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Burnt Tapes

I'm not gonna lie, tonight's main draw for me all along has been England's Burnt Tapes. There's just something about their brand of gravelly vocals and angular guitars that reminds me of Polar Bear Club at their best. The sound may not be perfect tonight, but opener "Never Better" sounds solid nonetheless. "Drift Champ '16" and particularly "Robert Cop" impress both, where the latter even draws a few small sing-alongs that I had not expected for a band on their first Danish show ever. On stage, they display exactly the kind of great energy that the album leaves you feeling when you pop it on your stereo, which rubs into the crowd that happily construct a makeshift human pyramid in front of the stage during one of the songs later. And who can blame them? There's a brilliant display of emotion happening on stage in front of us, and even though the sound is slightly muddy leaving their fantastic lyrics somewhat obscured in the mix, the gravelly roars and energetic performance wins us over. Expect big things from these guys.

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