External links
- gay against you on Myspace
- gay against you on Bandcamp
- gay against you at Upset the Rhythm
- gay against you blog
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gay against you | |
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| Origin | Glasgow, Scotland |
| Genres | electronic, experimental, pop |
| Years active | 2005–2009 |
| Labels | Adaadat Upset The Rhythm |
| Past members | Joe Howe Lachlann Rattray |
Gay Against You (stylized as gay against you [1] or GVsY) were an electronic music duo from Glasgow, Scotland, made up of high school friends Joseph Howe (aka Oats Soda) [2] and Lachlann Rattray (aka Mr. Big Softie). [2]
The band formed in 2005 after Howe and Rattray moved into a shared flat, [3] having previously played together in various other bands. [4] They self-released a mini-album, [5] also named gay against you, in 2005. It became one of the most frequently downloaded records from the last.fm website. [6] The following year their debut full-length album, Muscle Milk, was released by the Adaadat label. [7]
The popularity of the band's first record on last.fm led to the group being asked to perform live at the Old Blue Last venue in Shoreditch for a last.fm/Presents event, which was recorded and released as a free downloadable album on the site. [8] Their second full-length album, Righteous Signals, Sour Dudes, was released on CD in 2009 by Adaadat, [1] with a vinyl version released by the Upset the Rhythm! label. [9]
gay against you toured the United Kingdom several times, also touring Scandinavia [10] and elsewhere in Europe. [11] They played gigs with the likes of Lightning Bolt, Dan Deacon, Shitdisco, No Age, Cutting Pink With Knives, The Blow and Eats Tapes. [6] They recorded radio sessions for Tom Ravenscroft's Channel 4 Radio show [12] and for Vic Galloway's "BBC Introducing in Scotland" show on BBC Radio 1. [13] They were also played by Radio 1's Rob da Bank and Steve Lamacq, and on Resonance FM. [6]
A rumour spread in the Norwegian press that the NME had called gay against you "the new shit", [14] leading to reporters unexpectedly attending their Norwegian shows requesting interviews; no-one knows where this rumour originated.
The band broke up in 2009 following the release of Righteous Signals, Sour Dudes. They issued a further EP posthumously, I Play Gay, consisting of covers of the band's songs by Dananananaykroyd, Dolby Anol, Agaskodo Teliverek and House Mouse. [15]
Both members continued to perform separately and released solo records. Howe used the name Germlin [1] for his solo work and has more recently performed and released skweee-influenced music as Ben Butler and Mousepad, [16] sometimes accompanied by drummer Bastian Hagedorn. Rattray has also performed and released as Yoko, Oh No!, [1] [5] [17] as well as playing in the band Neighbourhood Gout. [3]
The band gained attention for their flamboyant [3] and chaotic live shows [10] (often played with Howe and Rattray dressed in PE kits [9] [18] and on the venue's dancefloor rather than the stage [19] [20] ), prominent visual style, [3] [9] offbeat subject matter (with songs about unicorns, [21] lactose intolerance, [22] Lawrence of Arabia, breakfast cereal, [1] Magic Eye puzzles, [8] Jurassic Park and physicist Niels Bohr [11] ) and their diverse and experimental musical style. Their early work was noted as combining accessible pop melodies with unconventional, rapidly changing song structures [2] and disorientating bursts of synthesizer or electric guitar. [1] Later material was described as "slightly more... mature", with lush analogue-sounding synth and even psychedelic influences. [9]
Stated influences included Magma, Minutemen, [11] Devo, Cardiacs and BBC Radio 4. [1] The band garnered comparisons to artists such as The Locust, Melt-Banana, Animal Collective, [9] The Faint, Nintendo soundtrack music, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, Atari Teenage Riot, [2] The Mae Shi, Lightning Bolt [17] and The Pastels. [22] They were described by Terrorizer magazine as "[e]ither a council estate Butthole Surfers or just Japanese mimicry... odd and wrong", [23] and by Drowned in Sound as "a chiptune-gabba aerobics class soundtrack". [9] The Wire called them "prog, of a sort... though with manic impatience in place of pomposity", [24] while Fused Magazine described them as "[t]wo subterranean creatures dressed in primary school P.E. kits, complete with charcoal-stained eyes and badly-concealed erections, howl[ing] unintelligibly over spaz-core electronics". The Daily Telegraph said they were "absurdly-named". [25]
In an interview with Dazed & Confused magazine, the band characterised their own music as "filter pop", and "pop music with all the shit bits taken out: mostly no repetition, no wastage, and no fat". [3]
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