Death Of Guitar Pop

Essex, U.K.-based Death of Guitar Pop emerged in the mid-2010s by channeling their ska-revival fixation through a Brit-pop sensibility, yielding clever, upbeat, and groove-oriented songs whose lyrics draw on the socially attuned observations of songwriters including Suggs, Damon Albarn, and Alex Turner.

Frontman Olly “Silky” Hookings first encountered music via a childhood gift from his father—the Divine Madness VHS—when he was five, even though his teenage listening centered on Green Day, Limp Bizkit, and Foo Fighters. Guitarist Jonny “Top Kat” Hick, by contrast, grew up with Beatles, Oasis, and Stone Roses albums constantly spinning at home. Each musician had previously led acts that gigged regularly around the Essex circuit. Hookings’ shoegaze-inflected indie-rock outfit States of Emotion originated in 2001 as a school-formed Green Day tribute; after enduring numerous industry setbacks, the band finally issued its debut album in 2016. Hick’s mod-oriented the Tomorrow Men followed a comparable path through the early 2010s, accumulating substantial live work without commensurate returns. A shared bill brought the two together, and their ensuing conversation—sparked first by the Stone Roses and then by ska—forged an immediate connection.

Momentum built quickly thereafter. An initial jam produced Death of Guitar Pop’s self-released debut single on White Room Records in October 2016, the same imprint that had earlier that year put out States of Emotion’s Black & White to Gold. Their March 2017 cover of the Melodians’ “Sweet Sensation” began attracting longtime ska-revival enthusiasts, after which Neville Staple guested on the follow-up single “Suburban Ska Club,” markedly raising the profile of both the track and the fledgling Ska Club Essex! label. A full-band debut at Oslo in Hackney further promoted the November arrival of their first LP, 69 Candy Street, recorded at Woods Lounge Studios under the Milk’s Mitch Ayling, who also contributed drums and keyboards. Although the group continued to present itself as a duo, additional musicians—including brass players drawn from the Style Council and Bad Manners, Hookings’ longtime schoolfriend and States of Emotion bassist Bonzai, and guitarist George Brown—supported live and studio work for several years.

The band resurfaced in August 2018 with the autobiographical “Ska Is the Bollocks” and again in early 2019 with “You’ll Be Fine Sunshine,” both featured on that year’s In Over Our Heads, an album that incorporated occasional songwriting input from keyboardist Martin Willoughby on tracks such as “The Squires” and “Choppers.” Their tongue-in-cheek 2019 holiday single “Feeling Like a Right James Blunt at Christmas,” issued in aid of CALM (the Campaign Against Living Miserably), enlisted James Buckley of The Inbetweeners. Post-2-Tone artist King Hammond co-wrote and appeared on the January 2021 single “DOGP Shuffle,” which preceded an April cover of Rancid’s “Junkie Man,” signaling an affinity for third-wave ska. The accompanying album Pukka Sounds became their first to reach the U.K. Top 30 and contained “When the Ska Calls,” written with Gary Knight of AKA the Syndicate. January 2023’s “Bosh!,” featuring local businessman and Apprentice contestant Tom Skinner, preceded October’s Be Lucky, which again placed the duo inside the Top 30.