Hometown: Dublin.

The lineup: Paula Cullen (bass, vocals), Caoimhe Derwin (guitar, vocals), Lauren Kerchner (keyboards, vocals), Jessie Ward (guitar, vocals) and Sarah Grimes (drums).

The background: September Girls are named after a Big Star song, although when it appeared on the latter's 1974 album Radio City it was spelt September Gurls. Which possibly means that they aren't quite as big fans of Alex Chilton and Co as Katy Perry, or at least the latter's manager, who insisted that Perry's 2010 hit California Gurls came with a "u", as a tribute to the Memphis powerpop legends. They're from Ireland via LA – they live in Dublin but their spiritual home is the West Coast, and they often sound like a dark Bangles (who covered September Gurls and kept the "u"), a Bangles doused in some of the noise-dust sprinkled on My Bloody Valentine's early music by their mainman, Dubliner Kevin Shields. Maybe it's in that city's DNA: a compulsion to make 60s girl group pop sound echoey and strange: beauty caught through a blur, a blizzard, as though it's about to disappear at any moment through a fog of feedback and fuzz.



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September Girls formed in 2011 and on Spotify you can sample their numerous wares: the band have five releases so far, with a sixth out now and a debut album scheduled for release on Fortuna Pop! in January 2014. Their various EPs and limited-edition vinyl and cassette singles include one on the Haus of Pins label run by their soulmates, the Manchester band Pins, a three-track 7in for California imprint Matinée, and a self-recorded Christmas song called Hells Bells, as featured on charity record Granny It's OK to Experiment. Their debut album, Cursing the Sea, evinces a development in terms of production and songwriting for the band, even if we're not exactly talking the quantum leap from Strawberry Wine to You Made Me Realise. Suddenly, their jejune jangle becomes growlier, denser, less easy to dismiss, more sweetly sinister. The drums still echo for Ireland, reverb is never in short supply, and there's a general tendency towards the tinny, but the songs seem fuller and more, well, song-like than before, perhaps a function of the increased confidence of the band's four writers. Heartbeats reflects their increased maturity, with shades of the Smiths' Hand in Glove in terms of melody and momentum: they sound like a Dublin band aping a Manchester band copying an LA band. The subject matter has suddenly grown more ominous, too, with surging dirges about rape (Sister) and inner turmoil (the title track). It's as though they're haunted, dragged into the melancholy mire, by the lyric to the very song that gave them life. Altogether now: "I loved you – well, never mind/ I've been crying all the time."

The buzz: "Everything is looking good for September Girls so get in on the ground floor, folks."

The truth: Fine purveyors of noir jangle.

Most likely to: Get played on Radio City.

Least likely to: Have a #1 Record.

What to buy: Cursing the Sea is released by Fortuna POP! on 6 January 2014.

File next to: Pins, Bangles, Honeyblood, MBV.

Links: facebook.com/septembergirls.

Wednesday's new band: Fat White Family.