Tender Claws: Inferno 
Self-Released
Out Now
This is a brilliant new song from the relatively new artist Tender Claws, with all the forward momentum of a Steve McQueen chase scene. Let this rattle the tinsel from your Christmas hair, MK Bennett shakes approvingly.
Second-wave feminism arguably took its time filtering down not just to the working classes but to the stranger and less academic kids, the kids on the spectrum, those on the outside, no one’s favourite pupil, the unnoticed and the unseen. They eventually found their tribe: Siouxsie clones, Patricia Clones, and Polly clones. Now, the children of the Nineties and Noughties bring their version, their vision to bear, an amalgamation of all that’s come before with enough strength in character to stand on its own.
Tender Claws is an alt-rock artist from Liverpool inspired by generational class, from Iggy to Pixies to Queens Of The Stone Age. With a classic goth edge (classic as in cemetery gates and black eyeliner), she is both a product of and a sound greater than, the sum of their parts.
Inferno is a sassy black tale of haunted mill towns and the ghosts that watch from your shoulders. Wuthering Heights reimagined by Nine Inch Nails, with a clever lyrical switch, it is reminiscent of Nirvana’s In Utero with the innocence, the unelapsed time of Bleach, a discordant and industrial flight of narrative simplicity, masking or not masking more biographical concerns. She uses talent relevant to local concerns, like Ben Harper on producing and mixing duties and Graeme Lynch mastering, a nice link of consistency from the second single, I’m a Leech.
The eyeliner game is completely on point, too.
Starting with an off-kilter acoustic strum that turns itself inside out before settling on a rhythm not dissimilar to Hole/Courtenay Love, grunge if grunge is now a genre rather than a movement, the two-part verse with added secondary strings works well, off-key and on edge. Importantly, it swings too, as all the best music will. Early PJ Harvey dropped into a hot vat of electronica, especially the chorus, resplendent in 90’s finery and noughties trickery. The vocals walk through growling sarcasm and repercussion and land on the high notes of near opera, a duality, two sides of the same conversation ending with the same conclusion. Even the synthesized and stylised guitar solo is excellent, both blues-based and modern, with enough filters to make it Tik-Tok famous.
With a cacophonous middle eight that runs right back to the intro, this is three-and-a-half minutes of controlled rage that would make anyone jump around a dancefloor. File alongside Delilah Bon, Wargasm UK, Nova Twins, Scene Queen and many other woman-led acts breaking into the broader scene. Rightfully, it should be released on a green seven-inch single and sold exclusively through the finest indie record shops known to man or womankind, but until that happens, find it here or any decent search engine.
Tender Claw’s Instagram | Facebook |Linktree
All words by MK Bennett, you can find his author’s archive here plus his Twitter and Instagram
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