I’ve seen Manchester’s Shaking Hand play live a couple of times now, most recently supporting Pale Blue Eyes where I was suitably impressed with their interweaving guitars and deceptively expansive sound. They’re the kind of band that if you see them, they’ll reel you in as they start to play and before you know it – lock you right in to their world – a mix of warm and slightly unsettling – but you’ll want to stick around and see where they take you. I like ’em. I wondered aloud if there might be something on record soon (there being no audio evidence at the time) and here it is – a self-titled debut.

I like it when bands have the confidence to get into a lengthy song and use a mix of repetition and surprise and SH deliver here – most of the songs pass the 5 minute mark. These aren’t Prog Rock Operas of course, but slowly evolving (post) rock full of chiming riffs with a little Sonic Youth detuning and maybe a more urgent sounding version of Slint or a less meandering Pavement. There’s a bit of Televison – check ‘Up the Ante(lope)’ where they git into a delicious bit of guitar mangling worthy of Verlaine mid way through. I don’t like labelling bands with influences – but what I hear is a young band with good ears, absorbing the past, mixing in the sensory overload of the 2020s and their experience of growing up in this unspeakable era -and so it goes.

It sounds good too, apparently recorded in a proper studio in Leeds with a live set-up which makes all the difference, this is no bedroom demo. There are lots of sonic surprises and moments where things lift off or something unexpected happens, dynamics abound- some clever chords and melodic shifts. Hear how ‘Italics’ switches mode from slightly goofy jangle into complex stabbing guitar chords and back again. Each song has enough musical ideas for three – but it never feels disjointed or trying to be wonky for the sake of it. Each note and rhythm shift belongs where it sits. There is something interesting happening here that, like their live show, keeps you engaged and intrigued.

‘Shaking Hand’ is on Melodic Records and available now in all good record shops.