China Rats
Leeds boys China Rats have announced that their debut single '(At Least Those) Kids Are Getting Fed' will be released on the 8th October through Once Upon A time Records. They've also got a flurry of live dates booked in to go with it, including Huw Stephens' night at The Social.
If you asked a young, newly formed band to write a check list of everything they would hope to achieve in the first couple of years of forming, China Rats have probably ticked a fair few of those boxes already.
This is mainly due to the fact that after playing the tiny Villa Camp stage at Benicassim the night before the main festival started, they were asked to stand in for an absent Bat For Lashes, whose tour bus broke down and stopped her from performing in front of tens of thousands of people. China Rats, after wowing one of the bookers in the campsite the night before promptly stepped up to the bar.
Having already played at Live at Leeds and Amsterdam's 'London Calling' festival amongst a handful of other shows, they'd already shown that live, their music sounds fast and frenetic, their three minute songs have just the right mix of pop and punk that makes a crowd go mental - so what's the difference if that crowd is a headline one at one of Europe's biggest festivals. It's the stuff of rock and roll folklore.
China Rats formed in Leeds in the Summer of 2011. They released their debut EP 'To Be Like I' in April this year. This quickly earned the attention of Huw Stephens, which resulted in a spot on the BBC Radio 1 Introducing Playlist with an anthem called 'N.O.M.O.N.E.Y'. '(At Least Those) Kids Are Getting Fed' is the follow up single released on the 8th of October and is written, produced and mixed by the band.
The Leeds 4-piece find inspiration for their songs through real life encounters and experiences. About the new single, singer Graeme Thomson says "Recently me and Luke were living in Armley which has got a reputation of being a pretty run down part of Leeds. We loved it though and the band still rehearses there. We wrote a bunch of songs whilst we were living there including "Kids Are Getting Fed" which was influenced by the local kids who used to hang out on our street". The video for the track was also filmed in and around the Armley.
And so with still only a few gigs under their belts, China Rats play the Dance To The Radio stage at Leeds Festival this Thurs 23rd August, before playing a series of UK shows around the single release. Latest dates are as follows:
23rd Aug Leeds Festival, Dance To The Radio stage
27th Aug Leeds, Oporto (Quidrophenia)
29th August London, Old Blue Last
22nd Sept Manchester, FAC251 (This Feeling)
23rd Sept Hull, Fruit
25th Sept Glasgow, King Tuts
27th Sept Oxford, Jericho Tavern
28th Sept Southampton, Joiners Arms
29th Sept London, The Macbeth (This Feeling)
2nd Oct London, The Social (Huw Stephens presents...)
6th Oct Nottingham, Rescue Rooms