Meatraffle at Fighting Cocks

Fighting Cocks

If you were lurking around Old London Road in Kingston Upon Thames late Friday night, you would have stumbled upon the sweat of the socialist spectacular that is Meatraffle. Finding their way from the 'south side of the river called the Thames to the south side of the river called the Thames' (quoting frontman Zsa Zsa) they came to the Fighting Cocks with an aim to create carnage, but instead all the they got was a luke warm sway. However, although the crowd was tame, their performance was anything but.

Performing first before Meatraffle, and seemingly who most of the crowd had come to see, were non-binary trio The Misters of Circe, and yes they were a Sisters of Mercy tribute act too, nonetheless. The second were the shouty foursome Fightmilk, who sang about the drags of working in admin, and how they envy your girlfriend (apparently). 

Meatraffle/twitter

After struggling with technical difficulties and already rocking a sweet sweat shine, Meatraffle were ready to serve a fat slice of death ragga. With loopers and trumpet sounds in abundance, they created a sweaty leftist utopia that apparently only a select few of the crowd were able to feel- given that they were the only ones dancing. The constant wait for a crush of people seemed to be endless and anti-climatic, despite the fact Meatraffle's setlist was a creation based on a socialist's wet dream. Playing tracks from their album 'Hi Fi Classics', The Wickerman, The Horseshoe, and Madame Hi Fi, as well as Brother From Another Mother, they offered a trip more psychedelic than taking lsd in 1943.

Drawing a close to the evening, the band performed The Bird Song, sung by their bassist (also known as DJ Lady Gaga) which addressed the fact that 'no one is any one's "bird"' and that we are all just humans. Unfortunately it was a great shame that some members of the crowd ignored this fact and instead took advantage of being in a gig environment and completely violated the personal space a friend of mine. This kind of behaviour is a disgusting act of objectification of another human who is definitely 'not your bird'.

However, despite a relatively monotonous crowd, Meatraffle still pounded out tunes as if their fingers were hammers and sickles.

Buy your raffle tickets here, and get porked:
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Warmduscher X Meatraffle at The Windmill

The Windmill

If you were in the whimsical watering hole that is The Windmill on the 3rd of June you may have found a band who comes with a trumpet and a postpunk attitude, and another who's name needs to be typed into google translate in order to correctly pronounce it. With their roots planted deeply within the dirt of the weird and wonderful, Meatraffle and Warmduscher have come together to create a double-sided single that's so degenerately unorthodox that it deserved a party that embodied that very notion.

If you arrived fashionably late, you may have missed the first three acts of the night: NoFriendz, Fake Fur, and Suitman Jungle. However, that does not mean that you couldn't see them, on the contrary. In fact you were most likely to be moshing next to the singer of NoFriendz, who was unmissable given that he had pegs in his hair, and no doubt you also saw the singer from Fake Fur, as she was later on invited back on stage to give a second display of her lungs (and boy does she have a good pair).

Warmduscher

The first band, out of the pair of headliners, to greet the stage was Warmduscher. The band is made up of trio  Jack Everett and Saul Adamczewski (although he wasn't there on the night) from the Fat White Family, Ben Romans-Hopcraft of Childhood, and Clams Baker. It didn't take long for the mottly crew to prepare their set, nor did it take any time for the crowd to emerge from every crevasse to form an audience just as equipped for mayhem as the band was. With neon lights clouding their vision and anarchy coursing through their veins, it came as no surprise that the crowd became engulfed into the trippy dystopia that is the world Warmduscher.  And whilst it may take a certain kind of person to find solace in the sounds of Warmduscher, what they create is undeniably something special. Why, not just any band can successfully embody the dysfunctions of our morally diseased society and still make digestible music; however this trio can. They say you have to see it to believe it, and The Windmill definitely saw.

Meatraffle

Following Warmduscher were the mutinous Meatraffle, made up of a bunch of uncanny aliases, such as Zsa Zsa Sapien, Tingle Lungfish, and Fats McCourt, and whilst their names may be comical, their message is not and neither is their following. As almost a band in residence, Meatraffle are a beloved name around the South London area. Musically, the band refuse to be categorised, so they sit on the outside able to replicate the collapse of civility and morality as we know it. Their overtly political stand point and music, made for a performance that encouraged riotous behaviour whilst reminding you how important the dentist is. Their setlist was an entrancing amalgamation of sounds copy and pasted straight from their album to the stage. They are a band like no other and put on a show that everyone should see in their life time- APART from the Yuppies of course, you fuckers stay out.

The single launch was nothing less than success: the bands saw, came, conquered, and left everyone drenched in the expulsion of the socialist orgasm that the musicians created.

Buy the single here and reach the same climax from the comfort of your own home: Meatduscher.