It’s shaping up to be a fine summer of rock & roll all-dayers in London, with our own Joyfest weekend still ringing in our ears we’re looking forward to extended shows from pretty much all of our favourite London promoters – Frauds, Some Weird Sin and Brixton Hill Studios will be throwing shindigs at The Windmill, Loud Women will be taking over The Dome in Tufnell park and We Can Do It will host a whole weekend at The Lock Tavern.
Another of our favourites, Roadkill Records, have made The Lock Tavern their home for several years, and they’ve got another astonishingly good line-up planned for this year’s Roadkill Summer Weekender, taking place at the soon to close Camden venue this weekend. We caught up with label boss Josh Cooper to pick some tracks from the bands who are playing:
When we formulated this line-up a few months ago we had no idea it’d be our last time at our favourite venue The Lock Tavern, but now it seems like the most fitting bill we could have picked.
It started with the booking of Baba Naga who we’d been keen to get for some time (bloody ages) and once that confirmed the line-up fell into place relatively easily, the likes of Swedish Death Candy and Psyence were no brainers – the former we’re big fans of over at team Roadkill and the latter have played for us before (actually, Psyence and Cannibal Animal are two bands we invited back from our first ever weekender). These bands ensure that the show will be overrun with psychedelic feedback, soaring ethereal guitars and reverb drenched vocals, and we can’t wait.
One thing we always strive to do at Roadkill is keep it inclusive, I have a great deal of respect for the 50:50 gender balance movement at gigs and it’s important for us to keep this in mind. So for all our weekenders we’ve made sure our headliners represented this, and Ghost Car were our very first choice for the Sunday. We’ve keenly followed their eccentric, awesome sounds as well as their empowering message and we couldn’t be happier with the two powerhouse bands we have topping the bill this year.
Elsewhere we’re happy to be inviting back some of our closest friends to play. Roadkill’s own Muertos, The Sly Persuaders and Enemy Of The People as well as the likes of Noise Noir, Two Tribes, Gaygirl, Sit Down and more. This is all the more important to us now that we’ve been informed that due to an ownership change, we’ll no longer be hosting shows at our spiritual home The Lock Tavern. Many friendships, collaborations and musical relationships were formed in that little room and I feel like it’s important to all of us.
It also reinforces the idea that we should be making the most of our favourite venues while they’re there, as even the most successful ones can be taken away at a moment’s notice.
We’ve got the bands it needs to give the Lock the proper send-off it deserves, and we look forward to seeing everyone at the bar. Here’s my list of some musical highlights alongside some single sentence summaries to make it easy for you.
Baba Naga
Mind-bendingly hypnotic guitars from godlike psych stalwarts
Ghost Car
Powerful punk grit with gut-punching riot girl riffs
Black Doldrums
Groove-tastic shoegaze with a hauntingly gothic twist
Swedish Death Candy
Your acid trip pressed to crackly vintage vinyl
Psyence
Infectious 60s garage meets 90s brit-rock and blues with killer solos
Cannibal Animal
Dangerous noise-rock bringing the full force of Hull
Gaygirl
Post-punk romantics with glorious melodies and a dark edge
The Sly Persuaders
Our favourite sharp dressed rock n’ roll good guys
Muertos
A full sonic assault of feedback, riffs, duel vocal harmonies and Mexicana
The Roadkill Weekender takes place at The Lock Tavern, Camden on Saturday 4th and Sunday 5th August. Entry is free.