Single Review

IC1s – Beautiful Ugly

• 14th Oct 2013

Indie rockers The IC!s have come a long way in a very short time. The Londoners have been lauded by Alan McGhee, championed by Libertines drummer Gary Powel, headlined HMV’s Next Big Thing Festival and played on the Emerging Icons Festival Stage at last year’s Olympic Games. Now the band returns with the follow up to the well received debut single Growing Up, Going Down.

Beautiful Ugly was produced by Mark Wallis (Stranglers, The Smiths, U2) and is a slower track, but no less powerful. The guitars shimmer and the emotional vocals strain to evoke every passionate sentiment from the lyrics. It’s an anthemic and fervent song about love gone wrong and the big production fully captures the band’s youthful energy. There’s even a very nice guitar solo in there too. Basically it’s a damned good rock song.

So are the IC1s the next big thing? Perhaps their debut album, due in March 2014 will tell us. But for now this singe reinforces their great promise and displays the range of their talents rather nicely.

Venue: Beautiful Ugly
Support Band: Two Sisters Records