Tuesday night saw the Strong Island Recordings launch party for the first single release, ‘Conspiracy Podcast’ by London group Arrows of Love. Sadly the Pie and Vinyl acoustic set had to be cancelled last minute (apologies) but the Edge of the Wedge in the evening was home to not only Arrows of Love but also local bands Is Bliss and Battery Hens. Despite it being a shockingly cold school night a crowd quickly assembled, sheltering around the stage and quickly warmed up to the rough, raw and heavy sound of Battery Hens. The band included a couple of new songs in the set and ended with a rawkus breakdown with feedback twisted by the three piece with each of them playing their huge pedal collections by hand.

Next up was Is Bliss, fresh from a recent show where they played as a three piece for the first time, this new lineup seems to have, counterintuitively, increased their intensity. This set was something special. Be sure to see them live again in Southsea at The Wedgewood Rooms on Wednesday supporting Nine Black Alps (more details HERE).

Last up was Arrows of Love who from the get go got involved with the stage becoming the whole of the Edge of the Wedge, with a free shot of port too if you were lucky/unlucky. The set perfectly fluctuated with bi-polar like heights of intense, savage movement and sound of songs like Honey down to quiet, fragile depths with The Knife.

The single ‘Conspiracy Podcast’ is available to buy digitally on iTunes and from Amazon with the amazing b-side ’80s Matchbox B-side Disaster’. Very limited edition 7″ vinyl will be available in early January too. Strong Island Recordings is also working on some upcoming releases with both Is Bliss and Battery Hens, more on that soon.

Photographs from Tuesday night are by Josh Knill (Often Hover) and a selected few are shown below. You can see a large set of photos from the night on the Strong Island Recordings Facebook page too. We’ll have video from the night up soon as well.

A huge thank you to everyone who made it down and showed so much support.