In this angst-laden world do we want music that distracts and soothes? Or the sort that sets the bells ringing by chucking the filth back in your face?  Or do we need a bit of both? Step in this five-piece collective who are plying a path through the questions that count. 

Like the relationship between their home cities of Portsmouth and Southampton, the music can be melodious and discordant. Alternating guitars, incidental synth, driving bass and punchy drums are accompanied by a low, interrogating vocal delivery, generating vagabond sounds that stray further afield with the Franco-British backing vocals. 

At stake are lyrics that are occasionally poetic, but more frequently engaged in probing the grey areas of everyday life. They draw from nineteenth-century disorders and dilemmas that continue to afflict today.

The music can summon, it sometimes addresses, but never dictates. Depending on your port of choice, this can be potentially liberating, downright apocalyptic, or maybe something in-between. But wherever you place them, Noise Factory United's mix of toe-tapping/foot stomping redemptive possibility is there for the taking.