Customer advice- get into this Laundromat now before the crowds show up. After two sold out EPs on Brace Yourself (‘Blue’ and ‘Green’), the label has just announced ‘Red’, a third instalment from Brighton musician Toby Hayes (a.k.a the above mentioned Laundromat), available digitally or as an appropriately coloured 7” from 23rd April.
If preview track ‘Flat Planet’ is dropping any hints, the signs are that he’s going to be completing his hat trick with another bundle of tightly focused, sharply observed low-fi punk pop brilliance. The cut is a perfectly scuzzy, sneakily bumping piece of indie funk, all bare minimum basslines and stripped back rhythms. Add to that the chunky guitar chops, cranked up fuzztones, garage farfisa chords plus vocals that slur with a weary disdain, and you get ‘Flat Planet’, a complete three minute package.
Sure there’s a nod to Beck’s slacker roots in Laundromat’s music as he draws on a similar wide ranging pool of influences that takes in TV trash and cult film, but Hayes is crafting his own singular agenda with this new project. He touches on everyday stresses, the deeply personal as well as the injustices, with the dry wit and musical suss of Baxter Dury at his most punchy. He’s been around the scene for a while now, fronting bands and taking on various disguises (remember Eugene Quell) but with the current momentum whirling around Laundromat, it looks like it could be his turn to deservedly clean up…
Track: Laundromat release the track ‘Flat Planet’ ahead of new EP, ‘Red’
