Cheekface | Martha | Contemporary
Academy 2, Manchester
nineteenth July 2025
Enter a coolness-free zone as deadpan LA quartet Cheekface co-headline in Manchester alongside anarchist indie-punksters Martha on the penultimate night time of their UK tour. Count on skilled crowd choreography, large choruses and the healthful embrace of nerdiness.
“There’s one other gig on tonight that you can’ve gone to,” says the chief of the Contemporary posse, Kathryn Woods, alluding to the penultimate Oasis present at Heaton Park. She pauses earlier than delivering the switcheroo. “The Cheeky Women are on the town.” This impishness pockmarks the London quartet’s set, who, a decade since forming, have three albums of fabric to attract upon. Plugging away for thus lengthy hasn’t diminished the band’s enthusiasm, with Woods having her nostril tickled by a bouncing cravat as she bunny hops throughout the stage throughout ‘Going to Brighton’ and ‘Revenge’. The addition of southpaw guitarist Joely Smith, who wrangles notes kicking and screaming from her fretboard, has honed Contemporary’s tunes to a lethal level, the right opener.
There’s a direct musical lineage from Contemporary’s joyous ditties to Martha’s melodic, blue-collar indie punk. Their chugga-chugga verses are mere vessels to hold us in direction of refrain after refrain, the place hooks tumble out in varied contagious configurations throughout The Void, Child, Does Your Coronary heart Sink? and Into This. Tonight’s co-headliners are by no means going to interrupt new floor, however they don’t must. There’s sufficient curiosity in exploring the bounds of what they do finest: songs that, when boiled down into their most concentrated kind, may double up as radio jingles.
They bat lead vocals between all 4 members with the blur of a desk tennis rally, with Sycamore inflicting one punter to virtually gyrate a gap via the Academy 2’s wood flooring. Not unhealthy for a 13-year-old tune, which, based on drummer Nathan Stephens-Gryphon, is “preparing for its GCSEs”, and has been hauled out of the archives for his or her new Standing The place it All Started assortment of singles and b-sides. Kathryn from Contemporary helps to around the set off by main a rampant sing-along of Bubble in My Bloodstream to hi-fives all spherical. If ever there was an advert for displaying off the capability of the human mind to retailer and retrieve info, it’s Cheekface’s Greg Katz. He blurts a cavalcade of sprechgesang syllables into his mic all through the night time in a titanic feat of reminiscence, and with some follow, he may little doubt reel off pi to 10 thousand digits for an adoring, paying viewers.
After taking part in back-to-back-to-back with Contemporary and Martha ultimately yr’s Manchester Punk Fest, Katz and his Cheekface buddies hatched a plan to reprise the lineup for this, their debut UK tour. The LA quartet make no apologies for being absolute goofballs. Whereas they aren’t a comedy band, their music celebrates the mundane through witticisms and wordplay the place the one pure response is to smile. The viewers of Cheek Freaks is on the gag. They comply with the dance steps with navy precision as Featured Singer morphs into Cha-Cha Slide. They belt out “No!” in all the fitting locations throughout Take heed to Your Coronary heart. No.” And so they flip a pit right into a mass group hug by the second of three successive renditions of Noodles. Alex ‘AJ’ Johnson on keys and percussion has the presence of a Butlins purple coat. He sometimes breaks off from his whirlwind of interpretive dance to whack a set of cowbells with a gusto not often seen exterior the snowboarding world championships.
In the meantime, Mandy Tannen – previously of Stellastarr*, who performed the Academy 3 upstairs with The Killers supporting again in 2004 – dangers RSI along with her dextrous basslines, whereas drummer Mark Edwards is so economical along with his actions that he may stability a stack of cash on his head with out them toppling over. The one trace that he isn’t an elaborate humanoid drum machine is the blur of his sticks as he goes at his hi-hat. With 5 albums to dip into, Cheekface have ample songs of their arsenal. You At all times Need to Bomb the Center East, We Want a Greater Dumpster, Artwork Home, and the closing Residing Lo-Fi ought to all be pageant staples, such are their infectiousness. An viewers member in Brighton known as them “probably the most American band ever” final week. They’ve a degree sound clever, however there’s a British sense of humour that permeates virtually every little thing the band does, making them distant cousins of The Beautiful Eggs and The Bug Membership, albeit for individuals who go to board sport nights.
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You could find Cheekface at X | Bluesky | Instagram
Phrases by Ian Burke
Photographs offered by Cheekface – credit score to Sonny Malhotra – web site right here:
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