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Source: Birmingham Post
Subject: Live at Barfly supporting Stars

References to birds, trees and leaves are littered throughout the set by Birmingham five-piece Shady Bard. Look past the fondness for foliage and the great outdoors, though, and the quintet are capable of crafting the kind of slow-burning grandiosity which made Spiritualized critics' favourites.

Their simple, folk- pop melodicism also recalls Red House Painters at their peak, and in These Quiet Times - with its "Feed the birds in the wintertime" refrain - they have an anthem worthy of lighters-aloft fandom.

Simon Harper

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