Okay Champ: William Tell – Single review

Okay Champ

William Tell

Digital

Out now

Louder Than War’s Ioan Humphreys reviews Okay Champ’s latest release. 

Okay Champ  follow  their  visceral  post-punk  debut  single The  Party’s  Over  (Goodbye  Yellow  Brick  Road,  with  the similarly  menacing William  Tell. I reviewed their brilliant debut here.

Their latest single starts with military style drumming that runs throughout. An almost Gregorian chanting is layered on top and immediately you get the feeling that you aren’t in the same arena as their debut. Let alone Kansas. This feeling of disquiet and unease continues with the guitar layers that build up and up.

The track pummels on with layers of squealing guitar. Completely different to the approach and feel to their debut! But this is what is so interesting about Okay Champ. This is a band expressing themselves however they to and without any constraints. Just over 5 minutes later, they have just done that. It’s a deluge of sound that is full of menace and intimidation. A  propulsive, unending  drum  beat  sets  the  tone  for John  Edgar’s imposing  vocals  to  set  a  disconsolate  scene,  with gloriously  fuzzy  guitars  and  electronic  atmospherics  completing  a  hallucinatory  soundscape.

Okay Champ are quite the enigma at the moment. Yet I still think they are a worth a listen and could definitely be your favourite band. Have a listen to this and their debut to find out.

William  Tell  was  produced  by  Okay Champ  and  Will  Thornycroft,  and  is  being  released  via  the  band’s  own  newly established  imprint  Treetrunk Records  on  June  21st.

Live  Dates

JULY 15th  Newcastle  –  Cluny  2  w/  Blóm

16th  Bristol  –  The  Exchange w/Blóm

17th  London  –  The  Social  w/Blóm

18th  Brighton  –  The  Quadrant  w/Blóm

19th  Portsmouth  –  The  Edge  of  the  Wedge w/Blóm

22nd  –  Sheffield  Tramlines  Festival

Okay Champ can be found via Facebook, Instagram, Twitter and SoundCloud

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Words by Ioan Humphreys. More writing by Ioan can be found at his author’s archive. You can also find him on Twitter at @ioan_humphreys.