Drawing the younger and more indie target-demographic of Norwich, Sundara Karma eased their way into The Waterfront like a pair of recently-bought jeans; slick, attractive and with the promise of a cool image-to-come. Chelmsford-born band FREAK and small-time group Joy Room accompanied Sundara Karma under their wings for this tour and offered a decent and ever-so-slightly diverse warm up for the team from Reading. And this is a point worth raising, actually. There was a definite air of post-festival-vibes in the room; autumn is creeping in and when I saw Sundara Karma support Nothing But Thieves in April, I claimed that they were “most certainly the soundtrack to your summer break. Proper roll-your-windows-down-and-play-out-loud kind of band when you’re on your way to the beach or something”, therefore I was intrigued to say the least at how this evening would play out following such a massive performance on Reading’s main stage this year.
Alas, Joy Room commenced the show and despite the average audience member being a fifteen-to-seventeen year old girl, it wasn’t long before moshes started to break out in the centre. I’m willing to bet this is partly due to the large ratio between young teenage girls and testosterone-fuelled boys, post-festival season, with both parties involved slightly intoxicated. A bit jarring at first considering the indie nature of the line-up, but I can’t help but deny how awesome it must’ve felt for such a small band to be met with such a large and chaotic response, and there’s no doubting they reciprocated equal amounts of energy. They worked hard to promote their debut single, Late at Night, which is available to listen to on Spotify and it’s definitely worth checking out. I like to think they did themselves proud that night and I hope to see them about more in the future.
Shortly afterwards, FREAK slammed on stage and cranked the pace upwards, pushing the vibe of the evening into the punkier regions of music. Imagine if Frank Carter & The Rattlesnakes tended a bit more towards the indie/pop genre, I feel like the end result would be FREAK. Although one might argue that the sound contrasted the image a bit too much, if a band like FREAK are able to expose an audience to heavier sounds and be met with such a fierce and positive response, then another might argue that this goes to show how the crossover of genres is prevailing evermore, and I’m totally a fan. The heavier popular music can get, the better, I’d say. The only improvement I have to make is the band need to work on their stage presence and interaction with the audience to further cement the interest they give off. The lead singer dipped his toes in such waters, like stage-diving at the very front and so on, but they need to instigate much more interaction and celebrate a lot more personality to fully reflect the punk sounds they’re crunching off. “How are we doing, Norwich?” only works once or twice, for example, before it begins to wear off. Other than that, FREAK gave off a solid performance and I recommend you give them a look if you’re into your indie music with a bit more bite.
And at last, Sundara Karma graced the stage with their already iconic image, as I described in April “amidst the stage-smoke, complete with flowing hair, wavy shirts and limp arms” and, really, they haven’t changed much, but this time they control the stage with even more confidence and comfort. It’s like they were born to be there. They began their set with where their published music was born with Indigo Puff and subsequently took us through the selective discography of Oscar, Ally, Haydn and Dom. And this is where I have to congratulate Sundara Karma the most. It must seem weird seeing a band, that haven’t released a full record yet, headline a tour as their discography only contains a couple of EP’s and singles, yet this means that every track they play is a complete banger that feels like it was made to be played and replayed, to work its way through the charts and onto regular radio broadcasting. In seeing Sundara Karma as this time of year, we’re catching them after owning the main stage at Reading and Leeds and before their album actually comes out; we’ve seen them at their very best (so far) and it promises of even better things to come. I’m thick with anticipation. It’s also worth mentioning how interesting it is to see the summer-festival-sound of Sundara Karma translate to a small and sweaty clubroom. It confines their oozy sonic music to a smaller space and the grassy ground beneath you is traded for a sticky clubroom floor, but it didn’t seem to affect the mindset of the band at all. At first, I figured their summery vibes would only be appropriate for its respective target audience and season, but they seem to be a jack of all trades on this one.
This is where the congratulatory comments get stronger. It is without doubt a talent to be able to write a handful of songs that will literally never get boring and they’re played with such precision, it sounds like you’re listening to it straight off the record. Either that or it sounds like the production of the record itself has perfectly captured the live sound of Sundara Karma, not too different to Black Foxxes’ debut album ‘I’m Not Well’.
To make things even dreamier, Sundara Karma offered their own rendition of Luther Vandross’ ‘Never Too Much’ and it made perfect sense. It also helps that I’ve been obsessed with this song for the past couple of weeks; the stars and planets aligned and I felt like they were doing it for me. (Although it was dedicated to a friends’ birthday).
This marks the third time this year that I’ve managed to see Sundara Karma live and they’ve grown from a support act, to a main stage act, to a headline act – so who knows where they could be once their album is finally released. The sky’s the limit at this point.
They’re a beautiful bunch of men that seem to pull off the kind of style we all wish we could achieve, so I wouldn’t miss out on this band because I feel like we’re going to be seeing a lot more of them over the next year.
Words – Chris Hambling
Photography – Kayleigh Warren
