Young Knives - Sin City, Swansea

I spotted the bass player ‘House of Lords’ standing watching the support band, he was wearing a hoodie and trainers much to my dismay - the band are known for their geek chic. My upset didn’t last long, when the band took to the stage, House of Lords had changed into a shirt, tie and suit. His older brother, Henry the singer didn’t disappoint, with his shirt, brown cords and red braces and drummer Oliver also sported a shirt, tie and trousers. The banter between songs was amusing, sarcastic and surreal. We found out that Henry went to college in Lampeter and that House of Lords was looking for a girlfriend.

One of the first songs they played was the 2006 single She’s Attracted To. Any song with a repetitive chorus that goes “you were screaming at your mum and I was punching your dad” is bound to go down well on a Saturday night, and it did. They played most of the singles from their first (Mercury Nominated) album Voices of Animals and Men and a couple from the new album Superabundance which was released this month.

Highlights included Weekends and Bleak Days (Hot Summer) which reminded the crowd that we had a summer, once, and a brilliant cover of Adam Ant’s Stand and Deliver, which sounded a lot like one of their own songs. They finished their set with The Decision, and I think for one night only, the House of Lords may have genuinely thought he was the Prince of Wales when he was up there singing “I am the Prince of Wales”. Jolly good show chaps.