“Circle Square Triangle”
from the album For Screening Purposes Only
2005
iTunes
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Test icicle (v):
To test an icicle. Primitive men used to test icicles to ensure their sturdiness prior to using them as a stabbing weapon.
(source: theurbandictionary.com)
Test Icicles sound like everything, all at once, with little left out. Rory Aggwelt, Sam Merrann, and Devonte Hynez are three restlessly inventive dudes, with divergent backgrounds in hardcore, metal, hardcore metal, and hip-hop. They listen to every conceivable kind of music going, and when they’re done listening to it, they throw it in the pot. No compromises, no faffing, just a swampy mass of influences frothing and bubbling until it sounds nothing like its composite parts.
The band began in 2004, almost as a mistake. Rory and Sam spent time hanging out, inventing bands (in the best way possible — name first, songs later) and playing shows on the strength of an afternoon’s songwriting. “There were about thirty people we hung around with,” says Rory, “we’d come up with names for bands. Then we’d do something around it.” Dev was enlisted after an earlier incarnation, Balls (dress code: charity-shop tennis gear), were a man short for a show in Brighton after their singer, Ferry, fled to Indonesia.
To begin with, Test Icicles had only three songs, and only a vague knowledge of how they all went. By the time the quota was up to four, they were in business. Feverish, edge-of-disaster club shows were followed by support slots for The Unicorns, Year Future and, most recently, a UK tour with Death From Above 1979. By this time, a whole set had developed, record companies were chasing them, and, in Rory’s words, “it was all getting rather silly.”
The Test Icicles’ live revue is something of a spectacle. “It’s totally some real kickin’ shit,” Sam yawns, referring to their penchant for climbing speaker stacks, swapping instruments and vocal duties, and rushing the crowd. This year Dev’s foot was impaled on a stray shard of glass onstage at the recently-defunct Infinity club. Everyone thought it was part of the act, even as he collapsed. “It’s OK. I’ve just got a new way of walking now,” he says. He restricts himself to goading the crowd now, politely requesting they “fuck shit up.” Meanwhile, Sam and Rory are elsewhere, doing the splits, falling to their knees, screaming, or hanging from the ceiling.
The boys don’t restrict themselves to Test Icicles. All have solo projects. Rory is in a number of other bands (Dogger, Lock Horns), and Sam and Dev are part of NLS Crew (“Next Level Shit”), a grimey hip-hop/hair metal danger unit who occasionally sabotage Test Icicles shows and act as an umbrella organization playing host to upwards of 20 side projects.
Personnel:
Samuel E: Dangerr, (“Sam”), 19, was born in Miami and moved to Australia when he was 7 to begin a career in rap. He ended up playing in a bunch of punk and metal bands in Oz, moved to New York, and somehow ended up in London.
Devente Hynes, 19, was born in Texas, and moved to Edinburgh as a child. He has a planned side project “just called ‘Devonte’.” His first band was called Gel, who covered the Smashing Pumpkins. Then he heard Slipknot. “It changed my life.”
Rory Aggwelt, 25, grew up in High Wycombe and came to London for various academic tomfooleries, including an art restoration course. Plays in a new band, Dogger, and has just joined a male voice choir. “It’s a 15-strong vocal crew. It’s gonna happen.”