Where is the enola gay located
With his legs kicking to the beat, knees pointing one way, elbows the opposite, torso contorted, and, in what could be said to be the man’s signature stance, one shoulder hunched down with the microphone and a snatch of its wires clutched in a fist, he delivered his angry hip-hop influenced vocals mere centimetres away from the nearest ears.Īlmost like reality imitating art, the band has been through that many drummers in its short life-span that you’d almost be forgiven for thinking they were a Spinal Tap tribute. Resembling a slightly subdued Ian Curtis, there were times when frontman Fionn, with his erratic, jerky movements and quivering undulations, resembled a marionette of varying string lengths. After all, there’s no better place for in your face music than right in your fucking face, and the band held nothing back. This is without a doubt the kind of scenario where the band are at their best, where they are absolutely in their element.
The venue of choice for their end-February gig was a room without a stage, much like their other home turf show in McHugh’s Basement last November.
Not that you get a chance to when they play live. and Idles while hanging out with the likes of Evile, Rivers of Nihil, and Cradle of Filth in a modern metal playlist, all the while chilling out with some Melomania bands and electronica outfits, this is a band whose sound you cannot pin down. Listed on a post-punk playlist alongside Fontaines D.C. Several tracks were placed in a variety of official Spotify playlists, which served to highlight how the band’s sound, like Houdini escaping from a strait-jacket, defies categorisation and doesn’t sit neatly arranged within any given genre. Building traction, tracks of theirs, some of which were effectively bedroom demos, were played far and wide, launching them under several radars, including those of NME, the BBC, Fred Perry, and Iggy Pop. Writing tracks during and even about events that occurred during that time, Enola Gay also played a few live stream gigs for the likes of Irish Music Week, Eurosonic, and SXSW during the long stretch of time when live music was hibernating. But it didn’t knock the wind out of their sails or shatter their momentum. Just when they were getting started, the pandemic forced the band to put gigs on hold. Such is the frenzied hypnosis that the band ensnare their audience with.Ī phenomenal blend of thunderous, bouncing rhythms, overclocked guitar, furiously catchy vocals, pedalboard SFX, and general kinetic hysteria, this is a band unlike any other.įormed by Fionn Reilly and Joe McVeigh at the worst possible time in history, just when the band were writing material and gearing up to take the live scene by storm, a different kind of storm was waiting in the wings. From the expressions of sheer ecstasy on almost everyone in the room – undoubtedly some of them a result of certain eponymous sources that aren’t quite solely the music itself – it’s clear to see that, if the three stories of the undisclosed building in Belfast did end up falling in on themselves, there wouldn’t be too many people bothered, as long as the band kept playing amid the rubble. That force of nature is none other than Enola Gay, and their unique brand of noise fills the room, wall to wall, ready to shake the building right down to its foundations. Picture the scene: a dark, third floor attic-style room packed to the absolute rafters with bodies, all amassed in a writhing crowd, all eyes staring, through a haze of sweat and the occasional plume of cigarette smoke lit by the distant hues of neon tube lighting lining the walls, at the mayhemic, calamitous force of nature unfurling before them.