Thursday 05/10/06 Snowfight In The City Centre @ Barfly, London

The fact that Snowfight In The City Centre, a Manchester six-piece currently reshaping the notion of sledgehammer anthemics, are sharing the bill tonight with ace urgent-pop outfit Winter Kids is an Arctic-sized link not lost on frontman Adam Jennings, who starts digging his own snowy grave when asking the crowd if they can think of any other bands associated with all things cold. Cries of, er, Coldplay and Snow Patrol are met with the response “You’ll have to shout a lot louder than that, I can’t hear!”, which is brilliant (Gigwise assumes Adam is being sarcastic, and is not just mildly deaf). It’s a level of self-awareness that you wouldn’t normally expect from a band already tagged with some hefty, admittedly obvious influences; and yet Snowfight aren’t afraid. Neither do they lack ambition. They know who they sound like. They know that opening with forthcoming single ‘Listen’ is less a marketing opportunity, more a command. This a band who are so sure of themselves that guitarist Matt Cocksedge is listed on their website as playing “ethereal soundscapes”.

So to say that their sound is akin to being hit over the head by second-hand Verve albums whilst standing in the middle of a turbulent blizzard, is a little beside the point, as well as being possibly one laboured metaphor too far. Some light and some space, some respite from the insistent crash of keyboards and pounding drums would be welcome, but we’re convinced that such delicacy and subtlety will come with time, as the venues that Snowfight play grow in size to accommodate such a huge sound, as they realise that not every song needs to run by the formula: ‘Stirring verse’ + ‘Exploding chorus’ = ‘Finish that makes Arcade Fire sound like Peter, Bjorn & John’. For there’s a glistening heart to their songs fighting to get out; once the instruments stop attacking each other it’ll be there waiting, and then there’ll be no stopping them.

So in short, at the moment Snowfight In The City Centre have one trick. But they pull it off very, very well: you almost wonder how it’s done. Gigwise leaves enlightened, vowing to never use another snow-related pun in a review ever again.