2019 was something of a break-out year for Falmouth’s Holiday Ghosts. The band teamed up with PNKSLM Records to release their second album, West Bay Playroom, receiving widespread acclaim and touring all over the UK in support of it. One of our favourite records of the year, West Bay Playroom detoured into a variety of sounds from across the history of rock’n’roll, sounding equally enamoured with The Modern Lovers as it was with more modern contemporaries like Terry or The Goon Sax. Not wanting to lose any momentum, the band quickly started work on the follow-up, which emerged a few weeks back in the shape of brand new EP, Pros No Cons.
Recorded once again in their home studio, the West Bay Playroom, Pros No Cons is a record that seems to take elements of the Holiday Ghosts sound you know, and amplifies them. Take the opening title-track, it’s a stunning fusion of bluesy-riffing and swampy, Troggs-like swagger. Elsewhere, they dial up the lindy-hopping rock’n’roll, Hear Me Through sounding more like a Tennessee diner in the 1950’s than modern-day Cornwall.
If this is all sounding a bit too much like a retro pastiche, worry not, Holiday Ghosts are a band adept at bringing the past screeching into the present, for every nod to the past there’s something fresh and exciting. Even the EP’s instrumental aside, William Blake, seems to collide a host of good ideas into something delightfully difficult to pin down, equally parts Jacques Brehl and The Wave Pictures.
It might be something of a low-key return, the musical equivalent of a toe-dipped into chilly April waters, yet Pros No Cons finds Holiday Ghosts in an intriguingly creative place. This feels like a band working without pressure and reveling in it, arriving with little fanfare they might just have made their most intriguing record to date.
Today the band have taken some time to make us their isolation soundtrack, featuring the likes of Bo Diddley, The Beach Boys and Chain & The Gang, give it a listen below.
1. Freak Genes – Still Digusting
Freak Genes managed to predict the future here pretty well. This is like my current trips to the local Co-Op.
2. Sly And The Family Stone – Que Sera Sera
What can you do? Nothing. Just do nothing and what will be, will be. This is just a great version of this song , it’s like a celebration of no control.
3. The Beach Boys – In My Room
Some positivity for your time indoors. Keep your room clean, which could be your new job. Imagine what it could be like; let Brian be your guide.
4. Bob Dylan – You Ain’t Going Nowhere (Take 1)
This is a better version of this song for now. The other one conjures more outdoorsy imagery. This one has more of a clear instruction. Feed the cats.
5. R. Stevie Moore – I Like To Stay Home
This is self-explanatory.
6. Chain And The Gang – Can’t Get Away
Bump into yourself in the shower, bump into yourself in the kitchen, bump into yourself on the porch. Anywhere.
7. Bo Diddley – Crackin’ Up
This is for those whose relationships rely on a bit of alone time. What’s buggin’ you ? You are you fuck. Hang in there.
8. Moon Dog – Do Your Thing
Take some advice from my man Moondog. Hes a blind street livin’, Viking dressin’ , jazz icon. Couldn’t be better qualified for this time.
Pros No Cons EP is out now. Click HERE for more information on Holiday Ghosts.
For The Rabbits 