The Royston Club – Songs for The Spine review

As a musician taking the decision whether to stick or twist sounds like it might be the most important one you can make, but instead of ending, your problems could instead just start there.

For The Royston Club however it marked a very conscious taking of a new fork in the road. It was a process that began with the 2023 debut album Shaking Hips And Crashing Cars, a record which had gestated over a four year period since a first gig in their home city of Wrexham and whose quality quickly ushered them into the upper tier of British indie rock.

For it’s follow up however the quartet operated to one simple approach, written up in the studio in case any of them forgot: “De-indie-fy”. Songs for The Spine in turn reveals writers leaning enthusiastically into the sophomore record problems which have plagued bands in similar lofty positions. In this mode they’re smart enough to feed the beast some familiarly raw meat in the guise of The Patch Where Nothing Glows and Glued To The Bed, but the anthemic opener Shivers delves further into angular post punk.

The real signs of musical progression however lie in the six minute plus closer The Ballad of Glenn Campbell and it’s piano heavy finery, whilst on the other hand Spinning weaves into the mix threads of Ok Computer era Radiohead. Illusion of choice or not, The Royston Club took the blue pill and the red one, defining themselves more uniquely in the process.

You can read a full review here.