Brighton quartet Public Body conjure propulsive indie-punk, which pulls influence from the most banal corners of our life, whilst creating something that is not only well articulated, but burning with forwards momentum.
In a similar vein to the off-centre post-punk of Home Counties and KEG, Public Body’s debut EP, Flavour of Labour (out now), is heavily focused on the subject of working and the relationships that we have with the notion of work. Considering our careers take up about a third of our time, Vocalist Seb Gilmore’s decision to turn his attention to this topic feels like something of a lightbulb moment. The boredom, our day-to-day office rituals and that ball of guilt that arrives alongside holding down a job that you don’t love whilst so many others are looking for work are all covered on a debut that is observational, wry and immediately likeable.
We spoke to Public Body before the EP made it’s way into the world!
Q for Theo: you’ve lent your production talents to the Flavour of Labour EP, as well as working with the likes of FEET, English Teacher and Home Counties. How would you articulate that unique energy that you seem to add to these tracks through your production?
Theo: I would say that the unique energy is just overly loud drums, I feel sorry for Julian Tardo who had to master this. Seb had a very specific vision that the snare should sound like a 90s metal record so we went full on ping on it. All of us are into metal so I guess this is our way of being in a metal band without playing metal.
The UK post-punk community seems to be an endless blanket of interesting guitar acts currently, which of your peers in this scene do you find yourself taking inspiration from?
Seb: I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again! Home Counties are bangin’, I love how kooky their songs are, the lyrics are pretty jokes too. Good bunch of guys! Really love Powerplant too, love that ‘A Spine / Evidence’ release they put out, I’m super into that lo-fi eggy vibe.
With such a knack for writing imaginatively about seemingly mundane subject matter, lockdown must have been an absolute gold mine of boredom to draw from?
Seb: It was perfect. I got to work from home, play guitar and just throw shit at the wall for a good few months. Although boredom did get to me. I’m always trying to write new stuff but usually nothing tends to stick, and then out of nowhere I’ll get a burst of creativity and write like 5 songs in a couple weeks that we end up using.
Have any of your colleagues heard the tracks ‘Reset My Password’ or ‘Hard To Concentrate’?
Seb: No they have not and I intend for it to stay that way! If anyone that I work with heard anything I wrote I’d be in a very awkward position and have to answer some very uncomfortable questions. So let’s not entertain this any longer or I’m going to freak out.
What are Public Body cooking up in 2022?
Seb: Well we’re planning on playing some more shows and getting to some new places we haven’t been before! We’ve also got our next release pretty much ready which is very exciting! We’ll have lots to announce in the coming months!
Flavour of Labour EP is out now
