You don’t have to be Kate Bush’s current accountant to know that pop music operates in cycles. For an industry that is so self-conscious about trends, the whole machine sputters and dies without a constant spirit of change in the air. British guitar music in particular has seen it all over the decades: it’s a regenerative furnace of new ideas that sporadically dares critics to declare it dead once more, before mutating into some vital new form.
The recent domination of post-punk revivalists like Black Country, New Road, Squid and Dry Cleaning has brought great artistic highs, but there is no time to stand still and admire your work when there are a thousand new voices clamouring to make the next great statement. Several of the standout names from the new breed appear to be eschewing the self-seriousness of the aforementioned groups, in favour of an embrace of influences from dance and electronic music. Could it be that, with the likes of The Umlauts, PVA, Talk Show and