Home Counties - In A Middle English Town Review

Smalltown wonk-pop on its suburban best.

With the 21st-century big city craze, everyone seems to push the small towns into dark. Luckily, there are some willing to take on the mission of mirroring and playing with the satire on suburban reality. They’re called Home Counties, the self-proclaimed wonk-pop pursuers. 

Originally from Buckinghamshire and Hertfordshire, formed in Bristol and currently resigning in East London, the band have always carried their rural sensibilities close to heart despite moving around the British land quite frequently. For the second time now, they’re ready to spread their love and laugh at that reality in their new EP, ‘In A Middle English Town’. 

To kick things off, Home Counties invite us for a lil bit of family-friendly time travel in the opening track, ‘Back To The 70s’. It’s an upbeat punk bop that both Britney Spears and Yard Act could feature on. Hard-hitting politics and disco fever come together in an unlikely union. Comradery for the coolest cats in a spacey dimension. We can’t decide if we want to hit the streets or the dancefloor.

‘If they say walls can talk, then so can gnomes/They fired the gardening staff’, goes christened after their name, ‘The Home Counties’. That cheerful pisstake rides on a somewhat minimalistic melody with a few siren-like twists and chippy bits. As if it was set on the freakily perfect suburban town’s set, straight from Edward Scissorhands. ‘Ad Gammon’ only dives deeper into that madness, discussing ordinary things in a wild manner. It’s freefalling experimentation where the small-town folk lets loose, getting into the murderous groove of the EP’s final track, ‘Village Spirit’. The song’s based on a book by historian Alain Corbin, ‘Village of Cannibals’. It explores a messed-up macabre story where villagers revolted against noblemen, tortured and murdered them. In between notes of Home Counties most gentle and melodic piece, hides a brutal commentary on crowd psychology and the shadow-side of any community.

Some strange and spooky things can happen in any superficially sun-beaming suburban village and this one is no different. ‘In A Middle English Town’ takes us to places beyond the imagination of common country folk.