New as they are to NMC, when I streamed TOWN PORTAL’s latest single, ‘Crushed under something gentle’ at first I thought that I might have somehow got it at the wrong speed or that it was playing backwards.
It gets underway at a soporific and quite tuneless pace but when you’re about to give up all hope, about a minute in, it suddenly takes off into a runaway train of thing, then taking a break before exploding into all out war between guitars and drums.
It’s Godzilla vs. King Kong again, or perhaps that thing from Cloverfield, as huge drum beats become punches and kicks. You certainly feel you are being crushed under something but how ‘gentle’ it is, is debatable.
Then just as you are concluding it is going to go to a 15-round points decision, that tenderness emerges; a cascade of heavenly strings comes in, stage right, (courtesy of Lisa Marie Vogel and Nicole Hogstrand) like a soothing antidote to the turmoil below. Will Smith flying to the rescue in Independence Day and you know everything is going to be all right.
I mention these films simply because that is what ‘Crushed under something gentle’ is; a film score. It will turn up somewhere, one day. Trust me.
This is TOWN PORTAL’s first offering from their forthcoming and fourth album ‘Grindwork’ set for a release on November 7th 2025 via their own newly formed label Dream Bureau.
They say they don’t do ‘epic’ that often. I reckon they should.
If you are in Denmark they will play at Alice, Copenhagen on September 20th, followed by more at Aalborg, Aarhus and Haderslev in November and December.
TOWN PORTAL is:
Christian Henrik Ankerstjerne – Guitar
Malik Breuer Bistrup – Drums
Morten Ogstrup Nielsen – Bass
Find them on:
Website: https://townportalband.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/townportalband
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/townportalband/
Bandcamp: https://townportal.bandcamp.com/album/grindwork
Artwork by Mathias Gørtz and Andreas Halskov.
