Kiss Me, Killer hit the Old England, Montpelier, Bristol on Friday 26 May for an evening of blistering punk rock action.
Despite competing with sweltering bank holiday weather and the FA Cup final, plenty of punk fans descended on the pub hungry for rock’n’roll thrills. Numbers were swelled by the arrival of many of our guitarist Cat’s friends, most of whom were checking out the band for the first time and had travelled far and wide to be there..
The band were excited to play a radically revamped set, which featured two brand new songs, and tweaked, improved versions of two others. We swapped our previous opener, Narcisstistic Tendencies, an almost poppy stripped down old-school punk tune, for the eviscerating Snakes, which is altogether more face-melting and showed a different side to the band.
KMK was generally on great from, sounding punchy and forceful on the Old England stage, and the set order provided plenty of light and shade, plenty of twists and turns. I (David) nearly wiped out drummer AJ by starting Snooker at a frenetic pace, but generally even the newer songs were performed without noticeable errors. The penultimate tune was our new, eponymous song Kiss Me, Killer with its horror soundtrack doom intro, unstoppable anarcho punk riff and hints of b-movie psychobilly for good measure. It felt good to play live.
There was a brilliant crowd response, with Diego the sound man immediately purchasing one of by our now completely cult Soledad Miranda tshirts. Cheri, Bristol’s finest merch seller, did sterling work flogging tees, stickers, patches and badges. Meanwhile, Nat’s deft, pulsating basslines, and cool, unusual Vox-style Phantom Bass, were particularly appreciated and noticed by punters.
The band would like to say a big thank you to local promotor’s Custard’s Punk for putting us on with an lineup of great, great bands: TIE Fighter Pilot, Alaska Alaska and Destroy The Beast, Find The Baby who all absolutely smashed it. Also huge thank you to everyone who came along to support us, checked us out and brought merch. We were also lucky that KMK fan and huge supporter Ina was on hand with her camera – she produced some absolutely beautiful, timeless gig photography:
Our next gig is on 9 June at the Chelsea Inn, Easton with Fishlock Promotions. If you haven’t seen us before, or heard the new set, you need to get down there.