Review By Michael Oates

You’ll have to forgive me I haven't done this reviewing lark for a long time.

I moved from the big smoke in 1990 to Manchester. My reasons were mostly financial as I'd just stopped writing for a national Music Magazine for whom I'd written for under a pseudonym and was falling out of love with the whole music industry. When I arrived in Manchester I thought I'd arrive into a sea of madness I mean, was this not ‘Madchester’ the home of looped baggy beats and wide boy teens?

The latter was true and still is but the music scene as I found it wasn’t quite what I'd been led to think it was. Everyone was really nice and I mean total strangers coming up to me at gigs saying “Hi how are you? ..”.

This just didn’t happen that often in Camden.

So why am I telling you all this I hear you ask? 

Well I’ll tell you. I visited a night spot called The Hacienda. THIS WAS THE PLACE. It was the place I'd been wanting to see spring up in London but it never did. Now by the time I got there the glory days were all but over but there was still a great buzz about the place.

A few years in Manchester and I'd stopped going to that club and got into my new media role as Artist Liaison for a rather large international record label and so my Job often took me away from Manchester and The Hacienda.

On one of my rare weekends home (this would be mid 90s) I went back to The Hacienda and saw a band that I could not describe to you even now.

First I heard film excerpts then some Derek & Clive and all of this going as four very ordinary looking blokes walked to their instruments. The crowed moved closer to the stage. The drummer perched on his stool and then … all hell broke loose. Amps were being flung right left and centre. The Singer sometimes sang a song, sometimes just danced around like a crazed maniac with the widest eyes I've ever seen I can still recall his insane looking face screaming into the microphone …

“If its in tune its all wrong and if it’s all wrong its alright by me”

I never forgot that night and soon after I believe this group, Gabrielles Wish were signed by one of the owners of the Hacienda one Mr Robert Gretton.

I moved away from Manchester but still that night, the sounds, were engrained in my mind, etched if you will almost against my will.

So I was delighted to find out the band still exist and even more delighted to learn that in the 20 years since they never stopped putting out first class music. Which brings me to the new single “Wandering The Streets”. It’s a far cry from the intensity and raw sound they had when I first heard them and for a single, maybe that’s no bad thing.

As a single it works great the hook is there instantly and the song does not out stay it's welcome.

The guitar harmonics are infectious although I can’t help but feel more in the way of lyrics could have enhanced the song but this is a minor quibble.

 ‘Wandering The Streets’ is a punchy melodic post punk romp all under 3 minutes. I loved it and if you enjoy any alternative bands like say, The Fall or The Damned then I think you’ll very much enjoy the work of one of Manchester’s best kept secrets and it’s about time that secret was known to the world. Its being released by Mancunian Record Label ‘Eromeda Records’ on the 16.12.13 via iTunes and if you spend a quid on anything that day, make it this single it’ll have been money wisely spent