You may have chuckled and rolled your eyes on first hearing of Test Icicles, a shoo-in should they ever start handing out awards for the worst named bands in history.
Yet the punning moniker is smartly chosen. Puerile, ugly and naff, ‘Test Icicles’ encapsulates the group’s sound, a splurging, sprawling pile-up of hip-hop, industrial metal and sample-laden indie-pop.
“We kind of picked it by accident,” explains Sam Mehran, whose tattered howl is perhaps the only indication that the 13 tracks that comprise Test Icicles’ debut For Screening Purposes Only, are the work of a single band.
“At the time of our first gig we hadn’t really formed as a group,” 19-year-old Mehran recalls. “We were just messing about. Then we got the opportunity of supporting a mate’s group and had to come up with a name in a hurry. To be honest, we hadn’t really thought too hard about it.”
A dreadful name can serve as a useful calling card however and Test Icicles find themselves lauded as a potential breakthrough act for 2006. Like kindred pop brats Arctic Monkeys, the Nottingham trio are riding on a wave of grass-roots populism, using the internet to bypass the creaking machinery of the music industry and speak directly to their fanbase.
Chaotic studies in freeform, their live shows have become a celebration of catharsis. Test Icicles are ardently committed to ripping aside the veil between audience and performer. Gigs frequently end in stage invasions – at the behest of the band.
“It’s so old fashioned to say that the performer should be up there on a perch, apart from the audience,” says Mehran. “That’s just such a naff idea. It’s much more interesting, from our perspective, to get directly involved with the crowd.”
Such generosity does not extend to Test Icicle’s recorded output, which is often brutal and, it appears, deliberately unlistenable. Critics tend to find something cartoonish in Test Icicles’ sonic assault, suggesting the group has a fondness for mixing wildly incompatible genres (they are often said to sound like AC/DC and Massive Attack playing in adjoining rooms, at the wrong speed).
Yet the Icicles are no kindergarten noiseniks serving up unpalatable blasts of aggravation simply to annoy and perplex. Rather, they regard themselves as following in a tradition of art-house industrial rock. Their heroes include Big Black, Throbbing Gristle and Aphex Twin – artists that have challenged the most basic assumptions about the character and purpose of popular music.
“Music doesn’t have to be pretty or pleasant,” concludes Mehran. “ It should grab your attention. The worst thing a band can be guilty of is being boring.“