Pete and the Pirates

One thing’s for certain: if Let’s Wrestle were actually any good, they’d be really fucking good. Oh don’t screw your face up like that, you know exactly what I’m on about. They’re the band the maxim ‘here’s three chords, now start a band’ was invented for, a band to stop all the bickering and the name-calling and make you realise why you made music your girlfriend in the first place. Punk in the raw, although you’d better whisper that in light of the crimes committed under that banner in the past.

DiS has been a little bit obsessed with this dysfunctional trio for a while now, but tonight’s Levi's Ones To Watch bill, culling acts from the impressive roster over at Stolen Records, is the first time we’ve hauled our sorry asses to a gig of theirs. They’re clearly suffering from nerves, which could be down to the size of the audience (they’re supporting Pete & The Pirates, more on them later) or the fact they look about as comfortable with their instruments as if it were stillborn infants they were clutching instead of guitars.

But these are mere trifles when you have tunes and diffident charm by the bucket-load, and with Mike’s surly bass riding ridiculously high in the mix, that’s exactly what Let’s Wrestle deliver – from the furious pop scribble of 'I Won’t Lie To You', 'I Want To Be In Husker Dü''s scrappy tantrums and on to signature tune 'Let’s Wrestle' which sounds like Status Quo smoking scrapings from banana skins found at the bottom of a dustbin.

'Joel Reddington, You'll Be The Death Of Me', from forthcoming EP In Loving Memory Of..., is another gem-in-waiting, WPG taking time out from his Partridge-with-his-foot-on-a-spike drawl to deliver a wordless falsetto that suggests a third dimension could be just around the corner for the band. "Calm down, we’re only an indie band,", deadpans WPG between slopped mouthfuls of warm Guinness, and no-one takes the blindest bit of notice.

Pete & The Pirates have an upbeat energy about them not seen since round these parts since Britpop lost its bounce - a good thing, in the main, though a little more pace and personality would be appreciated. Visually it’s all Pete and no Pirates, just four skinny hombres in T-shirts playing tightly-scripted tunes to chase away the fleapit dinge, eschewing punk pyrotechnics to let the generous melodies shine. New single 'Mr Understanding' has a chipper insouciance which is way redolent of early Supergrass, and big things may beckon if debut LP Little Death gets the airplay it deserves.

Bright as a button, roughly as generic, and 75 per cent as necessary.