Music / Reviews
Review: Panic Shack, Rough Trade -‘An explosion of smudged mascara and female friendship’
Panic Shack grace Rough Trade’s stage at 1pm, although it doesn’t feel like it. Through the murky lighting and the fishnets, they run through a list of greetings: “How are we doing tonight?… This morning?… Today?” before landing on the improbable “afternoon”.
To be fair to them, this gig is a far cry from any “afternoon” that anyone in the audience could have experienced before. It is raucous and brazen and loud and witty, with none of the slumps or slowings of your typical midday.
They play their self-titled debut album Panic Shack from start to finish, beginning with the riotous Girl Band Starter Pack.
is needed now More than ever
It has the roughness of a riotgrrrl tune, with the immense fun of a 2000s pop tune – imagine if Bikini Kill made music to accompany a Mean Girls dance choreography. It is wild, unhinged and gloriously silly.
They, being a punk band, also have some incredibly political songs. Gok Wan, for instance, slings the famous “nothing tastes as good as skinny feels” back in the face of the diet industry.
Sardonic sneers of “wanna go down in history for being thin” and “I look good – this is all I do” ricochet around the venue space, cocooning the audience in a little pocket free from made up insecurities and expectations; they create an ultimate safe space.
This safe space never loses its giddy playfulness, perhaps due to the self admitted copious amounts of champagne consumed the night before, and We Need To Talk About Dennis is a perfect example of this.
About one of the members’ alter ego, it sounds like a drunken tale told by a stranger in a seedy-club-smoking-area, theatrical and slightly nonsensical, backed by few instruments, a muffled sound of the club within.
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This sparse sound is not common in their set though, and one song later they are back to the thick layers of rough guitar that define them with Do Something. It is fast and repetitive, driving manically towards each chorus, an explosion of smudged mascara and dirty cups and ill advised relationships.
Their penultimate tune is one that reminds us of the point of punk bands. SMELLARAT is an anthem against staying quiet, calling out the predators that everyone knows about but no one confronts.
It is bouncy, layered, but most importantly it breaks the silence surrounding sexual predators, reminding us once again of the safe space that Panic Shack invites.
The set ends with Thelma and Louise, an ode to female friendship, joyous, jangly and infectious. It is dancing on a pile of clothes before going out, it is giving your mate the “they don’t deserve you” speech, it is introducing someone to the little band you love, it is every coming of age film. Ever.
It feels weird to walk out of the gig into sunlight, and not a sticky lamplit streetcorner, but your eyeliner is still half way down your face and there’s an all-consuming urge within you to start a politically charged music zine, so whatever the time, that’s all that matters right?
Main image: Esme Morgan-Jones
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