Preview: Kitty, Daisy & Lewis

Not everyone can get away with sporting a quiff and a vintage cowboy shirt at primary school, but Kitty, Daisy and Lewis did. Just. They may have been gently teased about their threads back then, but now most musicians would kill to be this cool.

Kitty, 18, Daisy, 22, and Lewis, 20, are obsessed with the music and fashion of the Fifties. A talented, multi-instrumental, brother-and-sister trio (plus mum and dad for the live shows), Kitty, Daisy & Lewis play toe-tapping, traditional rhythm and blues, hillbilly swing and country. Between them, they sing and play drums, ukulele, piano, banjo and guitar, while Daisy plays a mean harmonica.

Back in 2000, when they started playing at a rockabilly and country jam with their parents, Kitty was just seven years old. Since then, there’s been a Blue Peter appearance (that Kitty would rather forget), support slots with Coldplay, Razorlight and Richard Hawley, and their own sold-out tours. Fast forward to 2011 and they’ve still got that gawky teenage charm but now they’re all old enough to vote and look like Hollywood pin-ups.

Their latest album Smoking in Heaven is a hip-swinging homage to Elvis and Carl Perkins but with flashes of reggae and boogie-woogie thrown in. Just as with their first release, the band stuck two fingers up at the digital age and recorded the entire thing in their vintage home studio. New to this record though, is a smattering of catchy pop. ‘Messing With My Life’ is a radio-friendly sing-a-long, while ‘I’m So Sorry’ has lovely flourishes of sleazy ska trumpets that’ll have you sprinkling talc on the floorboards and digging out your Northern Soul collection. It still doesn’t beat the hand-clapping magnificence of their 2008 single ‘Going up to The Country’ but there’s still plenty here to keep those feet moving.

Sala Apolo, September 30th, 2011.