Tuesday 01/04/08 Youthmovies, Lovvers @ Freebutt, Brighton

Despite the the Freebutt’s local reputation as a genuinely unique music venue, it does only hold about 100 people and you can’t help but feel that our headliners Youthmovies should be playing somewhere else – Royal Albert Hall, at least. Once Gigwise finally arrives at the heralded venue, we find out that two support bands have already passed, playing early hours.

Shortly after Lovvers enter the stage, and it’s obvious that whoever played prior to them simply couldn’t have given a performance as enthusiastic and aggressive as theirs. Sporting bleach blond hair, an abrupt performance from the lead singer is all the audience will remember – they go through songs like they’re flyswatting them, giving a much more brutal take on things in comparison to their recordings. Ultimately punk roots are overshadowed by a shot of anger and rapture.

They clearly get the crowd pumped as by the time Youthmovies take to the stage, Freebutt is a completely different venue to the one Gigwise first entered. Showcasing the best of overwhelmingly good debut album ‘Good Nature’, Andrew Mears voice soars through the bass-heavy sound settings, keeping all at ease and at the same time, willing to dance although nothing quite comes about. Youthmovies’ songs are better watched silently than danced drunk to, especially the triumphant ‘If You'd Seen A Battlefield’ and ‘Soandso & Soandso’, showing that they’re quite simply a game ahead of Lovvers and maybe even their “blood-brothers” Foals, in terms of making compact and complex music, there’s no-one better out there.

And it’s a shame to find a band with such potential having to wind their way through the mini venues just to get a decent reputation. But the enthusiastic reception they get from start to finish in their performance, is enough to make you believe that they’ll get somewhere much bigger in due time.