Have a thing for 70’s rock songsmithery and laid back 90’s Britpop? Yeah, so do we.

So imagine how excited we were when Hoodoo Scoundrels‘ new EP (”The Witch Song EP”) dropped into our postbox yesterday and delivered a glorious 12 minutes of pure power pop goodness. Each of the four tracks is only 3 minutes long, but hasn’t gone down the Scouting For Girls / Hoosiers route of paint by numbers. Oh, no. They’ve still got their balls intact.

Originally, Hoodoo Scoundrels were called simply “The Scoundrels”, but were persuaded by the legendary Brian Eno to change their name after he caught them live and their footloose fans caused him to rename them.

Opener “The Witch Song” is a funk-laced colossus that could draw comparisons both with elements of the Kooks today and Thin Lizzy back in the day when they had Phil Lynott at the front. “A Touch Far” sees the Scoundrels blast out some proper “Saturday night down the pub” vibes, and sees them at their strongest - catchy, anthemic sing alongs with funky guitars.

Closer “Shame on You” is an ace closer - short and sweet at just 3 minutes but reminiscent of Arctic Monkeys’ “Fake Tales of San Francisco” (well, to me anyhow!).

Hoodoo Scoundrels are on tour at the moment. Catch them at the below tour dates for a great night out:

Tuesday 14th October - London Macbeth
Friday 17th October - Chatham Tap N Tin
Saturday 25th October - Southampton Joiners
Friday 31st October - London The Troubadour (Hoodoo Hop)

Hoodoo Scoundrels’ “EP 2″ is released on Monday 20th October on Hot Sauce Records.