One of the best albums you will hear this year comes from the Tubs. Released in March, Cotton Crown (REVIEW) marks an impressive evolution for the UK band as they incorporate influences of power pop, post-punk, Celtic music, and pub rock. Frontman Owen Williams’ has vocals that veer from the smoothness of artists like Richard Thompson and Robert Smith to more burly and brash howling. The combination of all these things makes The Tubs stand out in today’s indie rock scene. Since the release of Cotton Crown, the band has been on the road almost constantly. On Monday, October 13th, they brought their North American headlining tour to Portland, Oregon, for a charged-up show at Polaris Hall.
Perhaps it was because it was a Monday night or because the concert schedule is generally pretty packed during October, but the crowd at Polaris who came out to see The Tubs was on the smaller side. The band seemed to acknowledge this by creating an intimate and informal atmosphere throughout their hour-long performance, beginning with the way they all sort of meandered on stage for a quick soundcheck and then launched straight into the exuberant, driving rock of “Round The Bend.” In between tunes like the jangly, Rickenbacker-laden “Dead Meat,” the punchy “Two Person Love” with its soaring, catchy vocals, and the supremely power pop number “Narcissist,” Williams and drummer Taylor Stewart bantered back and forth while Stewart humorously berated the audience in his thick Scottish accent. For all his horsing around and trading jabs with the crowd, Stewart proved himself to be an absolute powerhouse drummer on tunes like “Sniveller” – complemented by Dan Lucas’ proggy, twinkling guitar work – and the buoyant rocker “Freak Mode.” “One More Day” was a standout tune with its pub punk urgency that rocked out ferociously, complete with the kind of cheesy medieval guitar breakdown from Lucas that would make the members of Spinal Tap smile.
The audience may have been intimate, but The Tubs’ sonic presence was anything but. When the band really gained momentum by segueing one song into another, they proved to be adept at unleashing an expansive, powerful sound. The culmination of this happened during the one-two punch of “Illusion” and “Illusion, Pt. II,” where Max Warren unleashed a swirl of rhythmic bass lines complemented by Lucas’ head-spinning, dreamy guitar, all with an underlying post-punk tone. “Chain Reaction” continued in a similar vein. Stewart finally got his moment in the spotlight with a rowdy, crooning cover of the classic Undertones tune “Teenage Kicks” with surprisingly strong vocals before Williams took over with a version of “I Don’t Know How It Works” that rocked in grandiose fashion and came to a cacophonous, jammed-out conclusion. In front of the appreciative crowd, The Tubs were able to balance the approachability and funny banter that you might experience at a house show with complex and poignant songs that felt big enough for a festival or arena.
