Leaves: Leaves EP

While 2024’s new release schedule has been dominated by the more better-known acts around the world – in the U.K. at least – perhaps the same can’t be said for new, up-and-coming bands. Granted, new acts are emerging all the time throughout the country, however so far this year, few have been able to land the decisive blow.

It’s hardly surprising, considering the dire circumstances many artists face in this country; not least the brutal effects of Brexit. From shipping costs for merchandise to playing shows outside of hometowns, the latter, almost pointless unless you’re ready to lose a couple of hundred quid in the process. And given the cost-of-living crisis, unless you’re from privilege, who’s got that sort of money to burn?

I often wonder how many bands fuck it all off because of this ominous landscape we find ourselves in. Is it the primary reason why the number of new recording artists feels like it’s slowly in decline? Perhaps it’s difficult to answer, but more and more, it feels like you’re having to dig deeper to find new artists releasing music worthy of column inches. Sure, that could be two-fold, for it is down to opinion and taste. Plus, at the end of the day, the digging is essentially why sites like this exist. It’s worth it too when you can unearth a rough diamond like Leaves.

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Hailing from the country’s Southwest, the band comprises of John Davidson (vocals/guitar), Tom Stephens (guitar) and Tom Gilbert (drums), and to little fanfare, they released their debut self-titled EP at the end of March.

Recorded, mixed, and mastered by Gilbert, Leaves is a product born out of deep record collections, mixed tapes, and magazine culture. Lifers that are clued-up on the ’90s American underground and the burning influence it maintains to this day.

Take opening gambit, The King. A song that is the homage to everything before it. Wiry post-hardcore swept up from the floors of Electrical Audio studios, and coupled with the lo-fi noodling recently mastered by the finest band out of the current U.K. underground in All Structures Align, from the off Leaves sink their hooks in.

And speaking of A.S.A, the tangled mess of The Ladder and galloping drive of closing cut The Shiek are the kind of tracks that wouldn’t look out of place on a Wrong Speed Records compilation. (Think of the mongrel offspring conceived by Enablers and Self Defense Family.)

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Meanwhile, Give and Give Again is a song you think you’ve heard before, but Leaves expose a new element to slowcore with something that feels earthy. Here, the band flips the script on the American landscapes of the ’90s for something far closer to home.

And that’s where Leaves remain with This Garden. A relentless take on post-hardcore, with ear-splitting harmonics and thunderous drums, the shackles are well and truly off in what is the EP’s standout moment.

“Hold me and show it can all work out / Even if you don’t believe it can,” sings Davidson on This Garden in what feels like the EP’s fundamental message. Injecting a new energy into many of the touchstone artists they echo, Leaves is a solid start from a band that will hopefully move on to bigger and better things in the near future. And for the current independent U.K. music landscape, it’s essential that bands like Leaves remain a part of it for as long as possible.

Leaves is out now via No Luck Audio. Purchase from Bandcamp.