Setting sail with The Regrettes

Fronted by Lydia Night, The Regrettes are small but mighty. This gig took place on Thekla in Bristol, a moored ship-cum-nightclub with a sailor vibe and plenty of atmosphere.

The band were formed from the ashes of two separate bands who came together to release an independent recording titled ‘Hey!’, which was eventually discovered by a representative at Warner Bros and led to this pint-sized band getting signed.

Listening to The Regrettes is like taking a step back in time, to the heydays of the girl band era in the sixties. All the songs were written by Lydia, a 19-year-old with a rich variety of musical influences and the ability to translate difficult human emotions into lyrics which promptly cut through any semblance of pretence or self-conscious holding back.

The band’s first full-length release, Feel Your Feelings, Fool! was released in 2017 to universal critical acclaim, with lyrical content spanning topics such as crushes, feminism and politics with wisdom beyond their young years and musical know-how providing killer melodies and harmonies.

Now back and touring with 2019’s offering, How Do You Love? The Regrettes took to the tiny stage of Thekla with all the confidence and self-assurance of bands four times their age. Despite their sugar-sweet offerings of punk-meets-60s garage, The Regrettes certainly pack a powerful punch, with mosh pits somehow materialising despite the lack of space onboard. Crowd favourites are of course the fabulous ‘Seashore’, which has the whole crowd screaming expletives some of them may even be too young to know (I joke). Other standouts are ‘Stop and Go’ and encore ‘Poor Boy’.

The thing setting this band apart from the rest of the pack, however, is their attitude. It’s refreshing to see such a politically-charged band on the scene from such a young age. In the last moments of the gig, frontwoman Lydia Night yells out to the crowd “Anyone who identifies as a man - to the back! All my ladies, all my girls, all my non-binary people to the front… Guys, if you’re thinking of moshing during this song, just don’t!”

The comparisons to Kathleen Hanna of Bikini Kill are apparent, of course. Even in the songs, The Regrettes have not shied away from speaking their minds. It’s a hopeful look to the future at a Regrettes gig. Rock ‘n’ roll is in safe hands.