And I finally got round to looking them all up. Here follows a quick summery of each band. I don’t necessarily like all of them but they might appeal to you so go check them out.
Dark Stares
Facebook – Dark Stares
Twitter – @Dark_Stares
YouTube – Darkstares
Soundcloud – Dark Stares
A group from St. Albans, UK
The songs I’ve heard on their YouTube and Soundcloud pages are quite good with a fair bit of instrumental stuff. There are some live videos on the YouTube channel and they don’t seem too bad live. I’m not sure about the singer’s voice; it’s not bad but it would grate on me if I had to listen to it for too long.
The overall sound is not unlike ‘Queens of the Stone Age’.
Paper Tigers
Facebook – wearepapertigers
Twitter – @PaperTigersUK
YouTube – papertigersofficial
All their tracks are on Spotify, don’t get them confused with a Danish band of the same name who are also on Spotify and Facebook.
A group from Staffordshire, UK
They’re really good. I prefer them to Dark Stares. Their sound reminds me a bit of ‘Young Guns’, although I don’t like any of their songs as much as I like ‘Bones’. This band is competing for a place on the Red Bull stage at Download this year. If they win I wouldn’t object to going to see their set. I listened to their EP on Spotify and was quite impressed by it.
Avelyn
Facebook – Avelyn Band
YouTube – Avelyn Band
Their facebook page is in German, which isn’t surprising as this band is from Stuttgart in Germany, but I can’t read German so I have no idea what it says about them. I watched the videos they had on their YouTube channel instead. There were only two; the tracks weren’t bad but I don’t think I could listen to them all day.
Call Off The Search
Facebook – Call off the search
Twitter – @Calloffcalloff
http://calloffthesearch.bandcamp.com
Called it a day in February and went their separate ways, until recently when three of them got back together and formed
The Reason I Failed History
Facebook – The Reason I Failed History
http://thereasonifailedhistory.bandcamp.com
Described as ‘post-hardcore emo’ or as they so poetically put it in their Facebook genre description ‘Emo ya dad used to listen to’. They remind me a lot of really early My Chemical Romance, which isn’t exactly a surprise I suppose.
They’re alright.
Crash Midnight
Twitter – @CrashMidnight
Describe themselves as ‘Boston’s bastard sons of rock and roll’.
I couldn’t actually listen to any of their music because their website is so awkward. Their debut album is supposed to be out this year; if it goes on Spotify I’ll try to listen to it.
Throw The Fight
Facebook – Throw The Fight
Twitter – @throwthefightMN
They also have Tumblr, Instagram etc, it’s all on their Facebook info page.
‘What doesn’t kill us’ (2012) and ‘The Vault’ (2013) are available on Spotify
These gentlemen describe what they do as metal-edged hard rock. They also have the most helpful Facebook page I’ve found so far. I listened to a few of the tracks from ‘What doesn’t kill us’ and all of ‘The Vault’ and I really like this band. They’re good. ‘Not so Hollywood’ is a very catchy tune; I can see what all the fuss on Twitter was about last summer. I think they sound very similar to Avenged Sevenfold.
Ready, Set, Fall!
Facebook – ready set fall
Twitter – @ReadySetFall
YouTube – readysetfallchannel
An ‘Alternative/Melodic Death Metal’ outfit from Genova, Italy.
Err, right, for a start I generally don’t go in for this end of the metal spectrum, I prefer songs to have more singing than shouting, but out of fairness I decided to give them a chance to prove me wrong about death metal and I listened to a few songs. Some of them were okay, but were all an awful lot like most of the genre that I’ve heard. If that’s your things, they might appeal. I’ll leave it to those with a greater knowledge of the genre to say whether they are any good or not.
Mercians
Facebook – wearemercians
Twitter – @mercians
YouTube – wearemercians (not to be confused with the Australian band also called Mercians – they sound quite different)
http://wearemercians.tumblr.com
A new addition to the list of my followers (I still can’t work out why people do that, I’m really not very interesting), this quintet formed last year in Staffordshire (so they really are from Mercia). They have all been in other bands. They describe the genre of their music as ‘Alternative rock, heavy rock, ambient rock’. They have an EP available for free download on their website until the beginning of May.
I listened to a couple of their tracks and they’re not bad at all. The tracks I heard on reverbnation were quite accomplished. The singer is capable and the rest of the band seems to know what they are about. The videos of their live performance in Birmingham last month on their YouTube channel certainly suggest they are quite good live although I did think the singer’s voice is weaker than I expected from the tracks I’d listened to. They definitely have something and considering how popular some of their influences are getting they should do well. They sound a bit like Don Broco, who they list as one of their influences.
And that concludes the tour of the random bands that follow my Twitter account.
Bye!
Rose
Everything Is Better With Dragons 