There’s not much that unites the Shout4Music.com staff, other than willingness to take up offers of free booze, and an envy of dogs, for being able to lick their own downstairs, but we will never get bored of telling you how good a band Pulled Apart By Horses are.

We told you how good forthcoming single ‘High Five, Swan Dive, Nose Dive’ (out Sep 6 on Transgressive Records) was. We even blew our working class credentials by admitting that we’d read The Guardian, and that they liked it too. So it is with some delight that we can show you the video for it just underneath here. And if you like that, you can search them on this here site and find out what venues they’ll be bringing their brand of all-out-mental-bastardosity to next month as well. More fun than attempting to copy your dog. That hurts.

“Growing Pains for me is a statement on how I’ve felt over the last year or so I guess. Trying to figure out who I am as a person growing up. Trying to get the right band together. Trying to make a first record with little money in a time when rocking guitar bands aren’t really in fashion. It’s all kinda been a ‘growing’ in to a reality that I wasn’t totally aware of I guess. I used to get growing pains as a little kid a lot, and my whole situation reminded me of that feeling; me trying to grow into my own body…”

After 18 months blood, sweat, coffee, Back To The Future DVDs and hard rocking pop’n’roll shows, Dinosaur Pile-Up are finally ready to give the world the fearsome debut album it has been waiting for. You might already know the story of Matthew Bigland, and how he founded DP-U from the ashes of seminal Leeds outfit Mother Vulpine (in which he played with Pulled Apart By Horses frontman Tom Hudson). You may remember how after a period dubbed ‘Leeds Best Kept Secret’, the timeless east-coast pop-rock of the demos leaked out into wider consciousness, leading to one of the most frenzied rushes of excitement to greet a new guitar band in recent years. And then you’ll certainly remember how they styled out the hype and the whispers of a ‘grunge revival’ with fantastically infectious debut single ‘My Rock’n’Roll’, which made them one of UK press and radio’s hottest-tipped acts. A second single ‘Traynor’ followed, as did tours with the likes of Pixies, Future Of The Left, and The Automatic, and performances at Bestival, T In The Park and Reading/Leeds; the nascent band cut their live teeth in explosive style. There was only one problem; the world fell so fast and so hard for Dinosaur Pile-Up that they hadn’t yet had the chance to make an album.

Wisely, Bigland chose to retreat. Where an artist with less vision might have rushed out something substandard to capitalise on the buzz, DP-U’s debut had to be perfect. To make things even tougher for himself, he had a singular vision; like his idol Dave Grohl, he was determined to compose and play every single song on the album that would be ‘Growing Pains’. He hooked up with scene production shaman James Kenosha, decamping to his residential studios, The Lodge in Bridlington. There, they spent an intense two-month period finessing the vision and laying down the ideal manifestation of Matt’s vision.

“It was cool,” he remembers, “we had the whole space to ourselves and set it up so all the instruments were pretty much in a big circle in the live room. We’d wake up at 9am, make coffee, and record until 3am solidly. It was pretty exhausting, and with me doing all the instruments and him doing all the recording there were kind of no breaks. Often it would just end up with me running round the room recording different bits of different songs and then singing till my throat hurt.”

The results were worth it though and can be heard all over the crisp, summer-ready songs on ‘Growing Pains’. As band signature tunes, ‘My Rock’n’roll’ and ‘Traynor’ survive to the final cut, but Matt’s songwriting has expanded, spreading out to widen the DP-U canvas. The fizzing lead single ‘Birds And Planes’ sees Matt fly off on a fantasy stream of consciousness that recalls the vintage twisted highs of Weezer and Pavement. ‘Never That Together’ incorporates Berlin-era Beatles into the DP-U vision, and ‘Hey Man’ scales new heights of emotional melodrama, lurching from pin-drop quiet into a huge, lurching grunge beast.

Oh yes, the ‘G’ word, which has followed the band round since their very inception. Nothing wrong with being compared to some of your favourite bands of course, but that isn’t even half the story. Matt best describes his vision as follows; “I guess I’d describe it as equal parts heavy and pop. I love melody so I think it’s pretty ‘sing along’ also. Compared to today’s market maybe it’s alternative? But at the same time kinda heavy, whilst still being kinda pop. I don’t know – Heavy Alternative  Pop?? Can I say that? I liked the idea of people to be able to sing along to the songs, even if they were slaying or I’m singing about being hated or upset. I love bands like the Beatles and the Beach Boys so I think a bit of that got in there. I wanted to make a record that kicks people in the face whilst getting stuck in their head. Which for my music taste; so little does either these days. I want to knock people’s teeth out with a riff or a kick beat, but at the same time leave them humming a melody for the rest of the day. If that happened I’d feel pretty happy.”

DP-U has undergone a number of line-up changes since it’s inception, and the band returns with two new faces in bassist Harry Johns and drummer Mike Sheils. Mike replaces Steve Wilson who has since joined Japanese Voyeurs, while Harry (formerly of Old Romantic Killer Band) replaces bassist and long time friend of Matt, Tom Dornford-May, who has taken his musical vision in a new direction.

From the instant ecstatic reaction of anyone who’s heard ‘Growing Pains’ thus far, it looks like Matt is going to be happy for some time to come. It takes a special talent to take so many favourite, yet disparate elements of music and combine them into such a unique, fully formed whole. But that’s exactly what Dinosaur Pile-Up have done. And while Matt will find that the end of one set of growing pains is just the beginning of another set, the satisfaction of getting the record out to the world is a win on every front. “This record means a lot to me obviously, because it a record I’ve been trying to get made for such a long time. Not specifically these songs, but this debut as a whole. And I’m super happy that it’s finally done.”

LIVE DATES

SEPTEMBER

18        Norwich           Arts Centre (warm up show)

25        Skipton            Culture Shock Festival (warm up show)

OCTOBER  (headline tour w/support from Turbowolf)

6          Stoke               Sugarmill

7          Wrexham         Central Station

8          Liverpool        Masque

10        Birmingham     Hare & Hounds

11        Exeter             Timepiece

12       Bristol             Cooler

13       Brighton           Coalition

14       Southampton   Joiners

16       Sheffield                      Plug

17       Nottingham      Bodega

18       Cambridge      Haymakers

19       London                        KCLSU

21        Manchester      Ruby Lounge

22         Crewe            The Box

24        Edinburgh        Cabaret Voltaire

25        Glasgow           Nice N Sleazy

26        York               Stereo

27        Leeds               Cockpit

Emerging as one of the most acclaimed and talked-about breakout acts of 2010, Leeds quartet Pulled Apart By Horses return this September 6th with the release of ‘High Five, Swan Dive, Nose Dive’, the second single release from their critically acclaimed debut album. First single ‘Back To The F**k Yeah’ exploded all over Radio One, no mean feat for a jarring, screaming two minutes and forty seconds of noise! ‘High Five, Swan Dive, Nose Dive’ is equally – if not more – explosive. The vocal hook is instantly infectious, yet the riffs will melt the skin from your

“It’s a celebration of fired up dancing and the slapping of human palms connecting with one another,” explains guitarist James Brown. “It was penned to unite its listeners via the medium of discordant wailing and flailing bodies. We hoped to infuse dance floors and peoples legs with its reigning rhythm. It’s good for your health to party, so here is a musical invite to ours!”

The track has already been singled out by The Guardian in their 4/5 album review (‘High Five, Swan Dive, Nose Dive’ should sound amateurish, but is – like the rest of this rip-snorting debut – brutal, noisy, fun.”) and is released on 7” and digitally (the B-side is cover of Sky Larkin’s ‘Somersault’).
The band are also set to support Foals on their UK tour and are also pleased to announce a headline appearance at The Garage in Islington on December 2nd.

Confirmed dates are as follows:

August
7// Hevy Festival
27 // Reading Festival
29 // Leeds Festival

September
4 // Manchester LCCC (supporting Muse)
5 // Hainault, Offset Festival
6 // Southampton, Joiners (14+)
8 // Truro, Wig & Pen (18+)
9 // Newquay, On The Rocks (18+)
10 // Plymouth, Eagle
12 // End Of The Road Festival
14 // Cardiff, Clwb Ifor Bach (14+)
15 // Oxford, Academy (14+)
16 // Guildford, Boileroom (16+)
22 // Liverpool, Shipping Forecast (18+)
23 // Birmingham, Flapper & Firkin (14+)
24 // Bristol, Croft
25 // Cambridge, Portland (18+)
26 // Gloucester, Guildhall (14+)

November
10 // Norwich,  UEA (supporting Foals)
11 // Lincoln,  Engine Shed (supporting Foals)
12 // London,  Brixton Academy (supporting Foals)

December
2 // London // Garage

Record Label: Friends Vs Records

Download Single:

Our Rating:

When Leeds rockers Mother Vulpine took indefinite hiatus in 2007, bassist Tom Hudson went off and formed Pulled Apart By Horses, who you should know by now to be terrifically noisy and wonderful (or crap, depending on your point of view) of song title, having given us ‘Meat Balloon’ and ‘I Punched A Lion In The Throat’. What’s indisputable is that they’re really really fun. Singer Matt Bigland embarked on solo project Dinosaur Pile-Up, which unfortunately isn’t. Bigland’s a self-confessed Dave Grohl obsessive, and while he employs a full band to play live, he does all the writing and studio playing himself, meaning there’s nobody to tell him that when you take the constituent parts of a Foo Fighters record – primal drumming, over-metallicised twang on the bass, drawly vocals – and don’t add any inspiration of your own, you end up with a Foo Fighters record. Black Rebel Motorcycle Club did much the same thing with the Jesus & Mary Chain – but crucially, today’s teenagers won’t remember the MaryChain, and that way they sell some records. A bit like the Vince Vaughn remake of ‘Psycho’, where the entire film was shot verbatim to the original, just starring different actors – there’s nothing inherently wrong with the plan, but what’s the bloody point?

‘Growing Pains’, the debut album from Leeds trio Dinosaur Pile-Up, will be released via Friends Vs Records this September.

Led by the single ‘Birds And Planes’, released on digital download and limited-edition 7” vinyl, available just prior to the album on July 26, ‘Growing Pains’ is the sound of a one of the UKs most exciting bands hitting their stride. It comes, following a handful of introductory independent releases over the past year and a bit, after which the band’s frontman and creative force Matt Bigland entered Bridlington’s Lodge Studios with producer James Kenosha to record the debut, taking place over January and February this year. The result is a storming rock powerhouse of big pop songs driven by the kind of wall shaking undercurrent only a three piece can muster.

Bigland says of the album: “I know it sounds bent but I liked the idea of people to be able to sing along to the songs, even if they were singing about being hated or upset. I wanted to make a record that kicks people in the face whilst getting stuck in their head.”

Their career to date was led by the January 2009 debut 7″ single ‘My Rock N Roll’, followed by a second single ‘Traynor’, and last year’s summer release, modestly titled ‘The Most Powerful EP In The Universe’ – which spawned songs such as ‘Summer Hit Single’, ‘Beach Bug’ and ‘Cat Attack’.

Their live plot to date has seen them tour with a rich cast of bands including a UK/European jaunt with the Pixies in December, and a French tour with Violens for the coveted Les Inrocks tour last Spring. On the festival circuit the band has shared stages with Them Crooked Vultures on the Radio One tent at last year’s Reading and Leeds festivals, and they headlined NME’s Halloween spectacular at Koko last October. Elsewhere they have performed alongside Future Of The Left, Pulled Apart By Horses and The Automatic, and last summer stormed the festival circuit performing at Bestival, Oxegen, T In The Park, and aforementioned Reading and Leeds festivals.

They will return to the live stage this September with a headline run ahead of the album’s release. ‘Growing Pains’ will be available digitally and on CD / Vinyl.

Dinosaur Pile-Up on tour:

Sep 13^th York Stereo

Sep 14^th Manchester Ruby Lounge

Sep 15^th Notts Bodega Social Club

Sep 16^th Bristol Cooler

Sep 17^th London KCLSU

Sep 19^th Exeter Timepiece

Sep 20^th Birmingham Hare & Hounds

Sep 21^nd Liverpool Masque

Sep 22^nd Edinburgh Electric Circus

Sep 23^rd Glasgow King Tuts

Sep 24^th Leeds Cockpit

Sep 27^th Stoke Sugarmill

Sep 28^th Brighton Coalition

Sep 29^th Cambridge Haymakers

Sep 30^th Sheffield Plug

Oct 1^st Crewe The Box

Record Label: Transgressive Records

Download Album:

Our Rating:

Having heard all about Pulled Apart By Horses’ mighty live reputation, this reviewer was interested to see whether the Leeds foursome’s spirit could transfer intact to their eponymous debut album. Short answer: yes. The first three songs – ‘Back To The Fuck Yeah’, ‘The Crapsons’ and ‘High Five, Swan Dive, Nose Dive’ – provide solid proof that PABH’s balls-to-the-wall indie rock/pop metal is firing on all cylinders. Tom Hudson’s raspy shrieks combine with deliciously meaty guitar riffs and hi-octane drumming to create a triumvirate of immensely catchy, hook-filled tunes any one of which could cut it as a single. It’s also good to see that ‘Pulled Apart By Horses’ isn’t a one-note affair, with styles ranging from the anthemic explosion of ‘Back To The Fuck Yeah’ to the pop-tinged ‘Yeah Buddy’ and ‘Meat Balloon’ to the straight up metal of ‘Den Horn’, one of the few songs on the album to significantly top the three mark. More mental than experimental, PABH’s debut is dumb as a box of rocks and proud of it; the ideal album to put on at someone else’s party, where you don’t have to worry about the spilled beers and broken glass.

Pulled Apart By Horses, the debut album from the Yorkshire quartet of the same name, is due for release through Transgressive Records on 21st June 2010.

Led by the single Back to the Fuck Yeah, released on digital download and limited-edition 7” vinyl, available just prior to the album on June 14^th, Pulled Apart By Horses is a blistering document of a band that manages to rock extremely hard yet still remember the importance of vital hooks and incredible songwriting (and having fun).

Produced by James Kenosha, and recorded in Bridlington’s Lodge Studios, ‘Pulled Apart By Horses’ will be available digitally and on CD / Vinyl.

The band’s highly-anticipated debut album will not disappoint those lucky enough to witness their incendiary live shows over the past months. ‘Chaotic’ is a massive understatement for the nuclear-powered PABH live experience, their every show a violent whirlwind of noise and acrobatics – of the body as much as the guitar. In a much kinder sense, the band’s onstage antics echo the medieval execution technique after which they were named. Certainly, the members have the scars to prove it. Guitarist James, who had a tendency to jump on his knees, ended up in hospital on a drip after an infection turned his leg into a gigantic yellow balloon. “The Doctor said if I’d left it a couple more days it would’ve spread to my balls, and once it gets to your balls it spreads everywhere.”

At last year’s Leeds Festival, vocalist and guitarist Tom knocked a chunk out of his shin and ended up with a ‘spurter’. It wasn’t until the end of the show that he even realised his jeans were black with blood. “I thought, I’ve smashed my leg and broken my guitar strap, I may as well crowd-surf. I got back onstage and realised I had a bloody hand print on my shoulder,” he laughs.

Tom’s girlfriend will no longer watch the band live through fear of what might happen, but none of this has made them tone down the intensity. “That’s what it boils down to,” considers James, “because when we play it’s just what happens. It’s not something we plan or think about it just happens because we enjoy it.” And as their reputation grew, they found themselves princes of a new UK underground as support band of choice for aggro-rock’s ivy league, racking up tours with Future Of The Left, Biffy Clyro, Glassjaw and The Bronx.

The album expertly captures the cavalcade of their live shows while expanding the sound into that of a proper gleaming rock record. Capturing this energy was the most crucial thing. Says Tom: “Most of the takes that we kept were from a bit later on when we started to loosen it a bit. If there was any bum notes or fuck ups, if the energy was there then we kept it as it was.”

“We were very aware that when you have a reputation as a live band then your album will be judged against your live shows so we knew we had to do the live show justice. But we’re very happy with it.”

Indeed, from the breakneck shriek of lead single ‘Back To The Fuck Yeah’, through the pure-pop-with-teeth of ‘Yeah Buddy’, the screeching hardcore jam ‘The Crapsons’, down to the lurching heavy-metal thud of ‘Den Horn’, this is an album that brilliantly captures the surreal thrill that makes Pulled Apart By Horses what they are.

Pulled Apart By Horses on tour:

June 14^th Manchester – Deaf Institute

June 15^th London – 100 Club

June 16^th Nottingham – Bodega Social Club

June 17^th Glasgow – King Tuts

June 19^th Leeds – Brudenell Social Club

Pulled Apart By Horses are:

Tom Hudson(vox/guitar)
James Brown(guitar)
Lee Vincent(drums)
Robert Lee (vox/bass)

Download four-track bundle for free from www.transgressive.co.uk/liveatleeds

Transgressive Records are proud to announce the second equine related band to their stable. Over the course of 309 gigs in 12 months Pulled Apart By Horses have cemented their reputation as one of the greatest, most visceral yet uplifting live experiences in the country.

From launching themselves off PAs at Brixton in support of Biffy Clyro and Glassjaw to destroying Europe with Blood Red Shoes and literally bleeding from their knees at Reading/Leeds, PABH, as the shorthand reads, are an awesome experience for fans of Mudhoney, Queens of the Stone Age, Refused and Butthole Surfers, bringing together a cavalier approach to songwriting with lyrics covering gypsy ghost trains to Zelda-quoting explosions of colour.

Transgressive are on a roll at the moment with forthcoming key releases from Foals and Johnny Flynn.  And through their publishing wing have had recent success with Two Door Cinema Club and The Noisettes with the new album from Mystery Jets coming soon.

Following the success of the first Transgressive Foals release (a highly collectable limited edition live 12”) the label are celebrating their glorious new union with Pulled Apart By Horses by releasing a live album on 12″ vinyl exclusively for Record Store Day.  The album, recorded at the band’s spiritual home “The Packhorse”, Leeds, is called “Live At Leeds” and limited to only 500 copies.  In further homage to The Who’s classic the package will include the set list plus one exclusive photo taken at the gig (with five different photos available to collect).  Each vinyl will also be hand stamped by the band.

The set, featuring fan favourites such as “E=MC Hammer” & “I Punched A Lion In The Throat” alongside new tracks “Yeah Buddy” & “Get Off My Ghost Train”, captures the incredible live energy of this exciting new band.

Upcoming live dates//

27 April // NOTTINGHAM // Rock City w/The Bronx

28 April // LIVERPOOL // Masque Theatre w/The Bronx

29 April // NEWCASTLE // O2 Academy w/The Bronx

1 May // LONDON // Camden Crawl – Electric Ballroom

2 May // CARDIFF // Solus w/The Bronx

3 May // READING // Oakford Social Club

13 May // BRIGHTON // Great Escape – Concorde 2

Record Label: Big Brain/Friends Vs Records

Download Album:

Our Rating:

The similarities to Nirvana-isms can be drawn instantly; a grungy rock trio, the foppish mane of frontman Matt Bigland, chunky riffs, punchy percussion, the list is endless. And with the crunching power chords of opener ‘Summer Hit Song’ and ‘Opposite’s Attact’ Dinosaur Pile-Up are pointing so blatantly towards Cobain‘s ‘In Bloom’, if he was still alive, he may well be one eye down. They hold bar with Pavement, Dinosaur Jr, Foo Fighters and Weezer too. ‘Melanin’ is a hooky, monotone Foo’s number after being sedated for some while in a mental hospital. The grungy ‘Beach Bug’ finishes the EP, that in evaluation is full of raw vigour and passion akin fellow Leeds band and mates Pulled Apart By Horses. And its been a year of evolving for this Leeds-based trio writing these spiky grunge numbers that are now elevating them above the ‘New Band’ status that’s been hanging off their coat tails for sometime now. Their lo-fi 90s Seattle college-rock sound reverberates quite profoundly in a dingy college bar with swilled beer on the walls, the only problem is we’ve just got to get ourselves in to witness their visceral onslaught so much the hype that Dinosaur Pile-Up have circling them right now. It’s maybe not the ‘Most Poweful EP In The Universe’ but it packs quite a punch.