Best of What's Next: Slow Club

Homepage photo by Ben Corrigan

Hometown: Sheffield, England, U.K.
Album: Yeah So
Band Members: Rebecca Taylor (vocals, guitar, percussion), Charles Watson (vocals, guitar)
For Fans Of: The White Stripes, Camera Obscura, She & Him

In the land of strum-and-sing folk rock, there is a line—let’s call it Too Precious For Its Own Good. Past it lies cliches easily described with adjectives like “cloying,” “saccharine” and “twee.” But just before the line is a sweet spot of harmonies and hand-claps and nonsense syllables, and that’s where you’ll find Slow Club, a seductively darling boy/girl duo from Sheffield, England. Slow Club sings about love and boys and girls and getting drunk and being sad, and it does so—despite song titles like “Because We’re Dead” and “Giving Up on Love”—in a way that’s actually pretty cheerful. Not too cheerful, though. Just enough.

Charles Watson and Rebecca Taylor met in high school when Taylor was drumming in a band that needed a lead guitarist. Watson stepped up and the two soon started writing and performing together on their own. “We were maybe about 17 when we played the first open mic night, and we were pretty terrible,” Taylor says. “I feel like we were pretty terrible right up until about now, but I think most people feel that way. Growing up and experiencing more things to write about makes a difference.”

Watson cites Bright Eyes and Tilly and the Wall as early influences (indeed, tinges of Oberst crop up in his vocals), but the band’s sound has evolved along with its members tastes; lately, Taylor is “horribly addicted to” Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours and Linda Ronstadt’s greatest hits. Slow Club’s full-length debut, Yeah So (out now via Moshi Moshi Records), is representative of this evolution. It starts with a nakedly acoustic track called “When I Go,” then launches into a string of songs—including “Giving Up on Love” and “It Doesn’t Have to be Beautiful (Unless It’s Beautiful)”—that sound like they belong in an indie remake of Peggy Sue Got Married. “The first half of the album is the latest recordings, which I personally like more, but I think that may be just because it’s new,” Watson says. “We spent more time on sounds in the later recordings, borrowing lots of gear from friends and experimenting.”

“Our process can be totally thrilling and exciting or completely soul destroying,” Taylor adds. “It’s what we manage to drag out of either that makes the cut. It’s great that we have each other to vet what one of us sat up at 3 a.m. orgasming about when in actual fact it’s a shitty song. It hurts at first but it’s almost always valid.”

On the strength of Yeah So, Slow Club is playing to increasingly large crowds across the UK (and, in January, will take the show to Australia). “I’ve really enjoyed the change since the album came out that we can play to an audience who really listens, sings along and has been looking forward to the show,” Taylor said, “instead of a crowd of laddy-lads shouting ‘Get your tits out!’ or ‘Play “Seven Nation Army”!’”

Speaking of The White Stripes, Watson and Taylor aren’t an item (nor are they secretly siblings). But their musical friendship is alive and well. “It’s good to have a relationship where you can be honest,” Watson said. “We spend such a huge amount of time together that it would be a waste of time to be anything else.”