Hailing from Cheltenham, Gloucestershire, Up Shot will be a name familiar to those hip to the local music scene. Featuring members of Welcome Back Delta, Inkubus Sukkubus, and The Verity White Band, Up Shot pool their considerable talents to create an arresting sound, and one that could swing with the best. Having supported the likes of Massive and played at Frog Fest, Up Shot are about to unleash their debut album Corvid, and it’s a beast of a record that should garner them some nationwide attention.
Up Shot cite influences as diverse as Black Sabbath, Pearl Jam and Tool as making up their considerable arsenal and you can hear all three in opening track ‘Coat Of Arms’. It’s a bombastic sound that swings with wrecking ball force and throws its weight around like a heavyweight boxer. It’s more in tune with the NOLA scene and the swamps of America’s Deep South as opposed to leafy Cheltenham as the band push all the needles firmly in the red. Operating as a three-piece means that Up Shot are a tight unit, they display an easy chemistry which means they can stop and start on a dime, and like many bands who operate as a trio they create a sound far bigger than their constituent parts. It’s a monolithic sound and one that casts a long shadow, with all the needles in the red and the band painting their sound on every surface, Up Shot stomp like the proverbial bear with a sore head.
Up Shot deal in the heavy stuff, yet there’s plenty of variety on offer and the band can kick it up a gear on ‘The Long Walk’ or pull it down a few notches on ‘Torque Wrench’, but at whatever tempo they operate there’s always a focus on humongous riffs, pummelling drums and honey-soaked, whisky-croaked, oak-aged vocals. It means that Corvid isn’t made for the faint-hearted, but for those of hardier constitution who like that Sabbath swing with a TAD styled punch will find a warm welcome here. Both are combined to great effect in closer ‘Blackbeard’ and that makes Corvid the start of a promising journey.
Track List:
- Coat Of Arms
- Caution Politics
- Floorboards
- Jill
- Legs Of Fire
- Lions Eyes
- Marys Murder
- Winter Cell
- Torque Wrench
- The Long Walk
- Blackbeard
