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Following the split of Leeds post-punk / afrobeat outfit CISSY in June 2011, in the weeks following their live BBC session and subsequent radio play on BBC 6 Music, three ex-Cissy members Matt Dixon, Gav Montgomery and Matthew Woodward formed the band AZORES in Leeds in July 2011. AZORES played their first show in October 2011, sharing the stage with Zun Zun Egui (Bristol) and Runners (Leeds).
Azores occupy a unique space somewhere between afrobeat, psyche rock and post-punk, with influences ranging from the No Wave movement pioneered in New York during the 1980s by bands such as Liquid Liquid, James Chance and The Dance, to 1990s US bands Heroic Doses and Golden, Afrobeat players such as Ebo Taylor, Victor Uwaifo and Fela Kuti and Sublime Frequencies bands such as Group Inerane.
Into The Azores High starts with a four-to-the-floor Afrobeat dance then twists and turns through heavily syncopated time shifting post-punk, eventually climaxing with all-out punk rock riffing. Straight Outta Tokyo works in much the same way, and both songs share similar space to that occupied by bands such as Zun Zun Egui. The psyche-rock of My Way Or Steve Highway suggests a more direct influnce from Golden's Recital (Spindac Volare) from their 2000 album Golden Summer.
Azores' songs possess an innate, playful post-funk rhythmic momentum, as if Gavin Montgomery's bass guitar itself is hooked around Matt Woodward's drum kit to form a single instrument, propelling the sound forward with a joyous syncopated and polyrhythmic fervour. Matt Dixon's guitar playing sounds equal parts D. Boon, Alex Minoff and Billy Dolan, sometimes plucking punk funk or soloing on one note, other times centred around African Bikutsi melody.
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