Artrocker

Mike Title is one of the UK’s most under-rated hellraising frontmen.

At the turn of the millennium, as Michael Frankel, he fronted Sona Fariq, whose legacy is some of the most frenzied venue-levelling rock shows in living memory and a Warners-released album of hedonistic funk-flecked punk rock mash-up that still awaits discovery from the world at large. Then he - unbelievably - worked as the world’s most belligerent Santa Claus in a New Jersey shopping mall. The guy’s fucking nuts. But the fearful children of NJ’s loss is our gain, as he returns to his true vocation with new motley East London crew Dead Kids, who feature an assortment of underground ace faces, all harbouring deadly stares and a visibly muscular musical precision.

Thirty seconds into tonight’s show, on the hottest night of the year, and it’s party time. Mayhem time. Time to unfold your arms and get involved.

Straddling the chasm between dance, punk/post-punk and electro while still thankfully being a million miles from - urgh - Kasabian, tunes like ‘Fear And Flouride’ and the double-header of debut Fierce Panda single ‘Dead Wife Pills’ and ‘Ex Rays’ throb with dark ferocity - like PiL fronted by Bad Brains’ legendry HR, or Suicide minus the white-boy rigidity. It’s a panic attack of sound, a squall of feedback, a slow tightening of a fist around the throat.

And there’s Title himself, eyeballing innocent by-standers, shadow-boxing, yelping in the widest of wide boy Essex accents, ripping posters off the walls and acting like the guy at the party who freaks everyone out just as their collective drugs are kicking in. It works – brilliantly. Fear dissipates to be replaced wave upon wave of excitement. The Dead Kids stumble to the bar. Everyone is left smiling from their puddles of sweat.

This is punk rock, 2006-style.

There was a photograph of Mike Title by Danny North here, taken from his Flickr site here. It's now been removed at management's request - and replaced by one by Danny Rogers - but you should look at Mr North's site anyway. His photos are good.