South London’s Dry Cleaning marry intense, wiry, post-punk instrumentals with the nuanced spoken word vocals of Florence Shaw. Part of the wave of UK bands that utilise the ‘sprechgesang’ technique (between singing and speaking), her words juxtapose the surreal and the mundane, covering UK politics, the joy of playing video games, lost family pets, Meghan Markle and keeping in touch with distant friends. Musically they’ve been compared to Wire, Magazine and Joy Division.
Their second album, Stumpwork, was described by the NME as “a bold leap forward, one that sets the band apart from their contemporaries and defies categorisation.”
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