Buffet Lunch share "Perfect Hit!" single, from forthcoming album on Upset The Rhythm
Buffet Lunch
Share title-track from forthcoming album, "Perfect Hit!"
Watch the video here
Perfect Hit! is due 4th April on Upset The Rhythm
Live dates this spring
With third album, Perfect Hit! due 4th April on Upset The Rhythm, Scotland's Buffet Lunch unveil the title-track and accompanying video.
An expedition of curious turns, Perfect Hit! sees the band tackle more overtly personal themes - ancestry and becoming a parent - with their signature oddball observations intact (swordfish sightings, face tattoos).
Comprised of musicians based in Glasgow, Edinburgh and (sometimes) Newcastle, Buffet Lunch craft ramshackle odysseys of observational charm. Always catchy, often profound. Buffet Lunch have been previously described as a band that create 'a hodgepodge of noises’, and who are 'lyrically ridiculous'. Both claims are strongly denied by the group.
Perry O'Bray says of the single and video:
"Perfect Hit! was the first song that came out of a group writing session/jam with the new(ish) line up. It turns out the bass line was inspired by the theme to Steptoe and Son ("Old Ned" by Roy Grainer), information that was withheld until now from the rest of the band, and unwittingly it also seems to have inspired the multiple key changes in the middle of the song.
"The first half of the song is referring to relationships and limbs and the second half is a momentous swordfish sighting on Edinburgh's coastline a couple of years back. The lyric 'Brown waves in boys eyes' is sort of nicked off of Wire ("Outdoor Miner"). The mid section vocal is intended to be a sort of fitness vid style delivery, so potential for an accompanying dance I suppose.
"The video was filmed during the album cover shoot (photo taken by Jack Shearer) in Portobello Town Hall (who we are very grateful to). We are hoping that one day we can refer to our style of music as Nu-Music Hall so the first step in that direction was the big red curtain and Edwardian Town Hall. I have been creating drawn icons for our songs and parts of lyrics recently and thought that the short, simple words of the song matched well with the icons."
Buffet Lunch - "Perfect Hit!"
Youtube: https://youtu.be/KV_QHXMDuWw?si=bY-g1eZRQhbUXukr
Streaming Services: https://linktr.ee/upsettherhythm
Album Preorder: https://upsettherhythm.bigcartel.com/
Live Dates:
8th March - Edinburgh - Leith Cricket Club (supporting Conscious Pilot)
9th April - Sheffield - Delicious Clam (with Bean Weevil)
10th April - Nottingham - JT Soar
11th April - London - George Tavern
24th May - Glasgow - The Glad Cafe
25th May - Edinburgh - Good Vibes Instore
Buffet Lunch have released 3 EPs & 2 LPs to date, and just six months after self-releasing the album For Display Purposes Only return this spring to Upset the Rhythm for their stunning third album Perfect Hit!. A meandering masterpiece of low-fidelity musing, Perfect Hit! presents the group in upbeat mood, as ever casually melodic, only now with some more weighty subject matter to draw upon.
Perfect Hit! was recorded in the West Highlands, in the shadow of the UK’s Biggest Ben, during Leap Year week 2024. George Horler (Holy Loaf) joined the band as recording engineer, along with new members Matthew Lord and Jack Shearer plus founders Perry O’Bray & Luke Moran, to spend a week writing and creating the record. The majority of the record was completed in the studio, with as much recorded ‘live’ as possible and the week flew by. They had such a lovely time they forgot to go on a walk. They certainly make up for that with the music though, it’s a proper expedition of loose ends, winding ascents and curious turns.
Lyrically, the album contains more deliberately personal lyrics than previous records, with several songs addressing ancestry and becoming a parent ('Song for the Quarrymen', 'The Slowing of the Shoes'). The words for ‘Blue Chairs, Blue Floors, Blue Folders’ were mostly written in the waiting room of a maternity ward in fact. This deceptively carefree track, with its lengthy Shadows’ style intro, is packed with anticipation, it revels in waiting, enjoying the mundane surroundings that often accompany monumental changes. “Yes, it’s pretty real, spider climbing up the wall, until it falls, have you ever seen a plum coloured son?” ponders O’Bray amidst the chiming ellipsis.
‘Merchandise’ unfurls with languid guitars, lively keyboard flourishes and a conversational lyric that’s reduced to screamed exasperation. It’s a queasy rocker, cursorily about Scottish Presbyterian John Knox and his problematic polemic, yet seemingly set in a car park. It’s also a total bop. Elsewhere, songs deal with thorny issues such as identity & full face tattoos ('Another Face Entirely'), a swordfish sighting ('Perfect Hit!'), and the importance of kindness ('Blip'). ‘King Conker’ features a star turn from Jack Randall Lee, who you might know as the singer of Sydney slackers Beef Jerk. It’s a waggish yarn, washed in tumbled sounds and grappling with a potentially disgraced champion of the horse chestnut persuasion.
‘List of Walls’ is clangorous with dizzy dimensions. “Touch the stones of the wall, they connect you back to a time bonded brick” sings Lord in this song examining historical consciousness via the medium of Wikipedia. Bricks actually feature frequently as a lyrical motif across the entire album. Perfect Hit! is built from bricks, ideas and plots, melodies and hooks, each stacked upon the other. It’s a puzzle, much like life, you just keep adding to what went before, hoping for order and shelter. Buffet Lunch have grown into this attitude, you must wait until the end and then stand back if you want to see what they’ve built. Now knock on the door and come on in.
Previous praise for Buffet Lunch...
"Intriguing compendium of Caledonian quirkiness" - Uncut Magazine
“equal parts skronk and hooks” - Brooklyn Vegan
“a delightfully askew bit of pop skronk” - Raven Sings The Blues
“The band’s confidence in showcasing their inherent sense of fun results in a sound that is a much-welcomed remedy for these trying times.” The Skinny
"An unsettling encounter between impatient post-punk and cartoon electronic... mysteriously compelling." - NARC
Perfect Hit! Tracklisting:
1. Perfect Hit!
2. Blue Chairs, Blue Floors, Blue Folders
3. Merchandise
4. Another Face Entirely
5. The Local Void
6. King Conker Ft. Jack Lee
7. List of Walls
8. Songs for the Quarrymen
9. Blip
10. The Slowing of the Shoes
11. Whitsun Sound
12. Slug Circles
13. (Function Suite)
