IRKED - The Grievance IRKED

We first met IRKED at The White Hotel in Salford. They were first on the bill. The venue is a repurposed warehouse on an industrial estate, cold on hot days and a dampness in the air even when it’s dry outside. As with all great bands they made the venue theirs. The White Hotel is the perfect space for a group to OWN when they're on fire and IRKED were on fire. We think playing live is still the best way to make friends and IRKED make lots of friends when they play. We kept in touch, hassling them to record the songs we’d heard and loved.

First came a One Sided 12" (pressed twice, sold out twice) after which they were invited onto the Marc Riley / Gideon Coe BBC 6Music show to do a session. Then came a Tour 7" (in time for their UK dates with Pigsx7, also long sold out).

They've gone up and down the UK numerous times – playing with the likes of Uranium Club, Part Chimp, Benefits, Hey Colossus and Swami John Reis as well as festivals like Manchester Punk Festival, NOISE ANNOYS, Clamlines, our own Wrong Speed Fest, Twisterella, Summer Streets and Rock Against Racism. Their enthusiasm for being in a band is genuine and infectious.

The Grievance is born out of this excitement for playing live and the noble desire to rip it up. However, as with all the best party music there's a mission statement too. Dancing to Betty Davis or Syl Johnson or Bikini Kill or Public Enemy is all well and good in the clubs, but when you really dig into it, you are taught and inspired as well as entertained. As the title suggests, there is spleen being vented here, just as when Huggy Bear vented, or Dead Kennedys vented, or X-Ray Spex vented. IRKED’s rage might be tempered by wit and killer hooks but it’s still laser focused. The Grievance is genuinely righteous music made by people embedded in their local community and rightly enraged at the world around them.

We’re not here to tell you how to file this record or what type of music it might be. We’re here to tell you that IRKED belong alongside anyone who wants to bring a zest to a room, who wants to question what's going on, and who wants music played by folks who aren't cosplaying. We're done with that. We can spot it. The Grievance is inspiring, raging, uplifting, sometimes-hilarious/sometimes-brutally honest, catchy-as-f*ck punk rock and you’re going to love it.