|  Nick Harrison presents Rude Boy | | (As published for Push To Fire)
“Nick
Harrison – vb. the art of taking contemporary musical artists ‘Less
Than Jake’, and ‘The Libertines’, legendary reggae-inspired performers
‘UB40’ and ‘The Police’, blending until silky in texture, and serving
chilled under the hot 1980’s Jamaican sun. Derived from 23 year-old
UK-born musician and singer song-writer of the same name”.
This, of
course, is not an actual dictionary entry (yet) – although arguably the
most accurate way of defining the auditory handouts of up-and-coming
Folkstone-born Nick Harrison.
Admittedly, the title “Oi Rude
Boy” preconceived mental images of suits, shades, sweat, and
‘skanking’, all of which prompted an initially hesitant finger upon the
power button of my CD player. Yet, as open-minded as I try and convince
myself I am, the tray was subsequently opened, the disc placed inside,
and the play button depressed. There then spilled a succession of sound
waves, less ‘Bad Manners’, more a “street” ‘Bob Marley’ dwelling in
Camden’s murky suburbs. “Werd”.
The track progresses, exhibiting
intricately clean guitar interludes, a searing verse vocal reminiscent
of ‘Kooks’-famed Luke Pritchard (with genre-mandatory slap-back echo),
and an intermittent, “get-up-and-go”, unmistakably indie sing-along
chorus.
However, venturing onto the myspace of the self-proclaimed
“tune tailor” it became apparent that this track is quite unique, with
the online abode’s other offerings sounding much more ‘Arctic Monkeys’
or ’The View’.
Nevertheless, this exceptionality appears to have
been enough to secure the former drummer the theme tune to social
networking soap opera smash ‘The Secret World Of Sam King’.
It
would appear that the enthusiastic youngster might be onto a bit of a
winner with this jaunty gem. And with previous gig dates with ‘Iglu
& Hartly’, plus a forthcoming UK Autumn tour supporting ‘The
Automatic’, Nick Harrison seems set for household name-dom very soon.
Adam Scholey | |