The Garden (consisting of Wyatt and Fletcher Shears) are perhaps the most unorthodox, and undefinable, musical offering around. Directing their stage-show to an excitable crowd in Bristol, the full-frontal sonic approach of the Shears twins is put into immediate effect with the drooping and pummelling sound of U Want The Scoop?, accompanied by acrobatic stage antics from Wyatt and Fletcher.
Exercising a wild energy that is often quite hard to come by, throughout their set The Garden took to launching themselves off the drum kit, leaping from one side of the stage to the other, and enacting mild flips in the air. Commanding the crowd like conductors, the presence of Wyatt and Fletcher was well known as they lunged into Prodigy-esque track All Access, and afterwards, accompanied the perplexing and bombastic Call This # Now with obstreperous pacing around the stage.
New single No Destination reverberated around the venue with astonishing clout; sounding like what I can only describe as ‘neo-acid house’, it was most definitely the most atmospheric and pulling song that The Garden played, and is promising of a new avenue of sound to come from the Californian two-piece.
With a set very heavily orientated towards their 2015 album ‘Haha’, there was no inclusion of any tracks from earlier albums. To give them their dues, this was an excellent show of musicianship from The Garden, as they manufactured an arena of sound that packed a staunchly different punch to the standard of their earlier punk rock approach. Chucking in rowdy tracks like Red Green Yellow and Clay, the Shears twins exercised their rite of musical direction, and directed the crowd into a frenzy.
The Garden’s set finished indistinctly, after All Smiles Over Here, Stallion, and Egg merged into the dimly lit, empty, and ominous looking stage. All of this added to the mystery of The Garden twins, and after a rampant display of weirdness and a divine showcase of musical prowess, the venue was left with an air of want and bafflement.
Words by Jasmin Robinson
