Muso's Guide - Displaying items by tag: Rough Trade East

Fink @ Rough Trade East, London (Live Review)

12 June, 2026
Published in Live

Fink

Rough Trade East

Wishing For Bluer Skies: Fink Bring Warmth to a Rain-Soaked Rough Trade East

London had spent the day dressed in every shade of grey imaginable. Rain, drizzle, more rain. The sort of weather that makes you question leaving the house at all. Thankfully, Fink had arrived at Rough Trade East armed with a remedy.

The album launch show wasn't some grand spectacle. No dazzling production, no dramatic reveals. Just three musicians seated on stage with acoustic instruments and a room willing to meet them halfway.

The trio eased into opener ‘Wishing For Blue Sky’ and immediately settled the room into their pace. A palpable warmth radiated from the stage. The acoustic bass — a rarity these days and a charming sight in itself — provided a deep, resonant thrum that seemed to travel through the floorboards and into the audience. Whether intentional or not, its low-end hum became one of the afternoon's defining features.

Outside, East London looked determined to drown beneath leaden clouds. Inside, ‘Wishing For Blue Sky’ felt like a small act of resistance.

The relaxed atmosphere wasn't accidental. Introducing the material, Fin Greenall admitted, "It's only the second time we've played any of these songs." There was no attempt to hide the rough edges. With no guitar tech waiting in the wings, tuning breaks became part of the performance. "We're not going to regale you with anecdotes," he joked, "talk amongst yourselves." The audience laughed, though few seemed interested in talking. They were too busy listening.

A twelve-string guitar took centre stage during ‘Memorise Your Senses’, its finger-picked patterns dancing over that ever-present bass. The sound was rich without becoming cluttered, each instrument occupying its own pocket while still contributing to a remarkably full acoustic arrangement.

What stood out most wasn't technical prowess, though there was plenty of that on display, it was the ease between the players. They carried themselves less like seasoned veterans launching a new record and more like friends playing together in the corner of a pub on a dark winter evening. Drinks sat nearby. Heads nodded throughout the crowd. Even the musicians seemed unable to keep still, their feet bouncing in exaggerated rhythms beneath their stools like a Looney Tunes character thumping the ground after receiving an unexpectedly enthusiastic kiss.

By ‘I Buried All The Answers’, much of the audience had their eyes closed, allowing the music to wash over them. There was little need for visual spectacle when the songs themselves held the room so completely.

After four new tracks, Greenall announced, “This'll be the last one from the new tunes and then we'll do a couple from the old set”. ‘Two Magpies’ brought the debut run of new material to a close and showcased the understated confidence running throughout the afternoon. The newer songs sounded strong when stripped back to their essentials, their melodies and textures carrying the weight without any need for embellishment.

Meanwhile, Rough Trade's famously informal atmosphere continued to produce its own side stories. At one point, a small child appeared to have wandered backstage and into the photo pit, armed with a plush toy and a sippy cup, coughing cheerfully at my feet as though this was the most natural place in the world to spend a Saturday afternoon. Nobody seemed particularly concerned. Least of all the band.

When the familiar opening notes of ‘Not Everything Was Better in The Past’ arrived, the audience responded with appreciative whoops. The title itself felt oddly fitting for an album launch show — a reminder that nostalgia only gets you so far and that there is still value in looking forward.

The afternoon closed with ‘Looking Too Closely’, delivered in a mellower arrangement that traded some of the studio version’s tension for reflection. It proved the perfect ending for a performance built on intimacy rather than spectacle, sending the crowd back out into the East London drizzle with heads still nodding and melodies still lingering.

This wasn't the kind of performance that leaves a venue buzzing with adrenaline. It wasn't trying to be. Instead, Fink delivered something rarer: an hour of warmth on a cold, wet London day, played by musicians comfortable enough in both their songs and their company to let the music do the talking.

Sometimes that's more than enough.

The Hoosiers @ Rough Trade East, London (Live Review)

20 May, 2026
Published in Live

The Hoosiers

Rough Trade East

Words & Pics by Captain Stavros

Big choruses, bigger merch pitches

There’s a very specific kind of London in-store crowd: diehards pressed shoulder-to-shoulder beneath low lighting, clutching fresh vinyl copies like sacred texts, already mouthing every lyric before the first chord lands. Some bloke next to us spent the opening minutes humming what few lyrics he could remember to Phil Collins’ ‘Easy Lover’ louder than the venue playlist itself while his son complained his free pint was “too cold” before abandoning it on the floor. Secretly, we wanted to volley it clear across Rough Trade East. By the time Irwin Sparkes shuffled onstage at Rough Trade East for their album release show on Friday night, the room was already won over. The queue had wrapped itself into absurdity long before doors and inside was a strangely wholesome cross-section of people — older couples, indie kids, thirty-something nostalgics, first-timers dragged along by friends. Packed out, but notably free of the usual aggro. No shoving, no beer-launching alpha behaviour. Just a room full of people ready to sing every word back at the band.

Which they did. Loudly. Constantly. Sometimes louder than the PA itself.

That enthusiasm carried the night further than the performance did.

Support arrived in the form of one lone guitar-wielding wanderer, Irwin Sparkes, pacing the perimeter before eventually taking to the stage like a busker who’d accidentally stumbled into a label showcase. Technically, he was solid: sharp guitar work, clean sound, all nervy energy and falsetto elasticity. The crowd bought in quickly. Even sceptics had to admit the musicianship throughout the evening was mostly tight.

Mostly.

Because, for a band launching a new record, the actual music often felt secondary to everything orbiting around it. A glance at the setlist suggested at least 11 tracks planned, yet barely half seemed to materialise in full. Songs were repeatedly interrupted by sprawling bits of banter, self-congratulation and increasingly relentless merch pushing. Vinyl. Cassettes. Downloads. Tour plugs. More plugs. Another reminder to buy the album — an album most people in the room had already purchased in order to attend. The irony hung thick in the air.

And while frontman charisma can usually paper over pacing issues, the pauses here became terminal. After just two songs came a drinks break. Between tracks, momentum leaked out of the room in real time. Audience participation was encouraged so often it started feeling less like connection and more like stalling for time.

At one point the duo asked the crowd what they wanted to hear, only for the illusion of spontaneity to collapse almost immediately: “Oh yes, that’s the one I wanted to play.” It summed up the evening’s biggest issue. Nothing felt particularly malicious — just oddly manufactured. Every gesture of inclusivity or compassion came with an undertow of calculation.

That tonal whiplash became increasingly difficult to ignore. One minute: earnest speeches about the state of the world and the importance of kindness. The next: sarcastic cracks about firing crew members or exhausted-tour-life moaning after less than a week on the road. The messaging zig-zagged wildly between heartfelt and hollow. Even songs framed as emotional revelations about finding their “voice” sat awkwardly beside lyrics about Hollywood excess and big-booty girls in LA.

Still, when the band actually played, glimpses of why people connected with them in the first place came flooding back. The crowd knew every line by heart. Choruses detonated around the room with genuine warmth. There’s clearly affection for this band that time hasn’t eroded. And instrumentally, things were competent enough, even if the Alan Sharland’s drumming occasionally stumbled over fills and missed cues that threatened to derail otherwise polished arrangements.

The audience were already there with them, invested. Every chorus came back twice as loud from the crowd, every pause filled with cheers and applause. They didn’t need selling to. But between the endless plugs for vinyl, cassettes, downloads and the upcoming autumn tour, the night slowly stopped feeling like a celebration and started resembling a particularly upbeat shareholders meeting. Had the band leaned into the music instead of trying to constantly manage the atmosphere around it, this could’ve been something genuinely moving. They didn’t need to be sold to every three minutes.

Instead, the night landed in a frustrating middle ground: a technically decent performance undermined by bloated pacing and strangely disingenuous crowd work. The fans supplied the heart; the band kept interrupting it.

Maybe that’s the danger of nostalgia gigs in intimate spaces. Sometimes proximity reveals too much. Sometimes “never meet your heroes” isn’t cynicism — it’s quality control.

Stick with the album.