Words by George Gray
Last Friday I went to a comedy gig in Nottingham. The comedians were good and the atmosphere was great, but around half way through I suddenly became distracted. “It’s my birthday!” a fellow audience member shouted at the MC, modestly kickstarting some interaction. The MC, looking slightly bemused, asked him his name and there was an eager reply “Lee.”
“Real tree Lee is a real mother looker. He likes the older women he’s a dirty old mucker…” echoed round and round my head. It was the infectious opener to ‘Real Tree Lee', a lead single from Adult DVD’s eponymous album dropping that same day.
You see that’s what makes this debut album from the Leeds quintet so exciting. Their lyrics are as catchy as they are clever and their dance punk-sound seems to find a way into each corner of your imagination, ready to be triggered at any moment. So it’s hardly surprising on this debut LP they kick things off with an atmospheric opener that certainly grabs your attention.
As first tracks go ‘Do as I please’ might as well be the theme song to the band’s opening credits, introducing “the start of the night as they say” in their own words. Think the energy of an emboldened Nathan Barley, bursting on to a scene brimming with self-serving individualism. It’s certainly a testament to how well Hanson and Lonsdale’s screenwriter approach to lyrical storytelling is paying off. With its brazen vocal distortion, echoing refrain and powerful riffs, the lads immediately mark their territory. It’s a musical manifesto of what’s to come and on track two they follow through on their opening punch.
Blending punctuating synths and punk-rock sensibilities, ‘Coffin Dodger’, takes from legends of the dance-punk game and adds the lyrical obscurity of 2026 indie rock. Just imagine a combo of The Prodigy’s ‘Everybody in the place’ and the frontman energy of a Yard Act or Fat Dog, the track is brimming with direct energy. It’s a foot-tapper and just as quick as it gets going, it’s gone, a feeling that continues as the album goes on. Each song zipping in and out, as if someone were flicking through reality TV channels, each with their own eccentric personalities and unsettling storylines.
This transient feeling is only emphasised by the use of voicemail samples in next track, ‘Cold Caller’, which seamlessly transitions with a dial tone into the ramping sounds of ‘Minimal Criminal.’ At only two and a half minutes it's a short and punchy interlude that finishes just before you want that big drop, but that’s alright, because the subsequent ‘Jesus Christ Superstar’ delivers exactly that.
Bursting with synths and a heavy chorus, ‘Jesus Christ Superstar’ cranks up the energy before slipping effortlessly into ‘Cowboy On Aisle Three’. Together forming a perfect launch pad for the album to gear up a notch. The first half may draw you in, but with the aptly named ‘The Steaks are High’ signalling the end of side A, things are only getting started. Next up, the effortlessly catchy ‘World’s Best Boss’, followed soon after by the thumping bassline and crashing drums of ‘All I Need'.
As the final three tracks hit, it’s obvious why the boys describe the album as an exercise of letting go and taking life a little less seriously, as their lyrical obscurity slides into some dancefloor heaters. From the breakbeat of ‘Ghillie Suit’ to the acid house finale ‘Rolling Face', (that feels like it could be an Orbital cut in its own right), it’s the perfect finish to a full gas album, one that comes swaggering in and crashing out.
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