One of the bands who walked away from CMJ with the hype in their back pocket, was Brooklyn’s Sleigh Bells, who I also managed to miss completely while I was there. It hardly mattered though as word of mouth meant I checked them out before I left and like plenty of others, I’ve been very impressed with what I’ve heard.
The duo of Alexis Krauss and Derek Miller play lo-fi/electro/B-more/punk-dance music which sometimes sounds like a garage rock band playing the Chemical Brothers. Apart from the abrasive and fun energy of ‘Crown On The Ground’ and the crunch bass-heavy/wailing ‘A/B Machines’, they’ve also got a sweet little ditty called ‘Ring Ring’ that Aoife played on her 2XM show last week. There are no releases yet but it seems like they are more than a one-trick pony. Sleigh Bells, motherfucker. Sleigh Bells.
Watch them blow up. Listen to three demo tracks here and a live video of ‘Infinity Guitars’ is after the jump too. Photo above by Kyle Dean Rutherford.
MP3: Sleigh Bells – A/B Machines
MP3: Sleigh Bells – Crown on the Ground
Niall Byrne is the founder of the most-influential Irish music site Nialler9, where he has been writing about music since 2005. He is the co-host of the Nialler9 Podcast and has written for the Irish Times, Irish Independent, Sunday Times, Totally Dublin, Cara Magazine, Red Bull and more. Niall is a DJ, co-founder of Lumo Club, event curator, Indie Sleaze club promoter, and producer of gigs and monthly listening parties & events in Dublin.
The name might work against ’em come January eh? But ‘crown on the ground’ what a womper. Deserved song or the week or whatever they were giving it on p4k.