UK electronic-art-pop duo The Itch have returned with a new single, Space In The Cab, a bittersweet dance-floor elegy released through I OH YOU in partnership with Fiction Records. The track arrives ahead of the band’s appearance at The Great Escape’s First Fifty showcase in London on 13 November, marking the latest chapter in one of the UK underground’s most intriguingly unconventional rising acts.
Space In The Cab unpacks a uniquely British generational ache, with core members Simon Tyrie and Georgia Hardy lamenting the decline of the UK’s once-brimming nightlife ecosystem. Vocoder-treated vocals glide across a crisp electro-pulse before dissolving into a melancholy reflection on shuttered venues, dwindling club culture, and the loss of spontaneous late-night community. It is a song equal parts glitter and grit, celebration and funeral procession.
The single follows the duo’s double A-side The Influencer / Co-Conspirator, and their debut offering Ursula – an ambitious seven-minute epic inspired by Ursula K. Le Guin’s influential 1974 novel The Dispossessed. These early releases immediately sparked attention across the UK and Europe, culminating in The Itch selling out debut headline shows at The Social and later Corsica Studios, before vanishing deliberately from the radar and re-emerging this year with a clear vision, a record deal, and an even louder artistic identity.
Hardy and Tyrie’s non-conformist streak runs deep. The pair met in Luton, bonded by a shared desire to escape suburban limitations and create a scene rather than wait for one to arrive. Before forming The Itch they worked across various projects, including post-punk group Regressive Left, but it was a Talking Heads tribute night – the now-fabled “Byrne’s Night” at Hackney’s MOTH Club – that rekindled their creative spark.
That rediscovery of fun, spontaneity, and risk-taking became the DNA of The Itch. Early gigs often featured completely different backing line-ups, driven by the ethos that if Tyrie and Hardy could make the show, the show must go on. A kind of dance-punk anti-business manifesto, mirroring the very nightlife culture they now mourn in Space In The Cab.
Their stance arrives at a critical moment. As clubs close across the UK and Australia alike, nightlife activists and music communities continue to fight for tangible cultural space – the kind of scene that once produced icons and now risks becoming a nostalgic footnote. The Itch do not simply lament this loss, they build an alternate world in response: irreverent, deeply emotional, fiercely independent.
By signing with Fiction Records (home to The Cure and Kae Tempest) alongside I OH YOU (Confidence Man, Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever), The Itch now sit in rare air – championed by labels with modern indie pedigree and a legacy of nurturing outsider voices.
Space In The Cab is their clearest statement yet: the party isn’t over, it’s evolving, but it needs saving. The Itch are holding open the door to the last cab of the night, urging you to jump in before the ride and the city disappears.
The Itch – Upcoming Live
13 November – London, UK – The Great Escape: First Fifty
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