Comfort, a punk band that tackles issues such as trans rights, are set to perform in Carlisle next week.
Comfort is a word that implies safety, convention, and its connotations are parental, soft, and neutral. For a band whose music and live performance is deeply original, emotional, and challenging, the innocuous band name is an initial challenge to expectations.
Sibling duo Natalie and Sean have a shared passion for music and political activism, sending each other track ideas online as they lived in separate places. They moved to Glasgow with the intention of forming the band, and there they found a supportive music scene despite sounding different from everything else there.
Comfort’s simple setup of Sean on drums and Nat as magnetic frontwoman,
backed with industrial soundscapes and off-kilter electronic sub-beats
is anything but conventional, and they have a genuine desire to inspire
other people in Glasgow to express themselves confidently.
With a largely instinctual working relationship and family bond, they do not discuss writing beforehand and the progressions occur organically during a practice, requiring no words or pre-planning.
Their debut album, Not Passing, was released in 2019 and ever since they have been working on new music.
Citing hip-hop, politics and dance music as their main influences, Comfort are something entirely idiosyncratic.
The confrontation in their music is a sheer reflection of anger at the world’s intense injustices as well as a free outlet for self-expression. The assertion that all art is essentially political runs through their work and Comfort’s anger comes from the injustices they see around them constantly.
They said: "Silence implies that there is no problem, the status quo is fine, it works for you, so why bother talking about it? We do not make music to be nice, or sit easy with people, we are angry, and we mean every word. Things need to change, and if music is to reflect the times, then it must reflect that today."
See Comfort at The Brickyard for just £8 on Friday, November 18 at 7.30pm, with support from Robots With Souls, Kev Bovin and The Groove Shaman.
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