Anybody can set up a record label these days; if you don’t believe me, just ask former Leeds Student music editor Tom Goodhand who, in between writing for a number of other publications (some of which actually pay him for his services), playing guitar with the magnificently-named Unexploded Shells and putting on gigs with his mate James Brown under the Leeds On The Bone moniker, has now decided to branch out into releasing music as well.

The good news is that this debut release, like the Dance To The Radio! and Engine Room compilations before it, offers almost a full score of weird and wonderful tracks by local bands for the price of a couple of pints of gassy continental lager, without the threat of the dreaded ‘cotton mouth’ afterwards.

Some of the artists featured on this collection may be familiar to those of you who regularly attend gigs in some of West Yorkshire’s smaller venues, others less so, but there is enough variation to gratify most people who like the sound of guitars (sorry, trance fans, you’ll just have to deal with it).

Standout contributions come from Sheffield quartet Smokers Die Younger (think a furious Young Knives), The Lodger (happy music, sad lyrics), worriedaboutsatan (atmospheric post-whatever) and The Acutes, whose ‘Man In Me’ sounds like that ‘She Hates Me’ song from a couple of years back, re-imagined by criminal masterminds.

And whilst not everything on here will rock everyone’s proverbial socks off, there’s very little filler to speak of, and you can be sure that there is much more to come from Leeds’ coolest alumnus.

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