'IF YOU HATE OUR BAND, THAT'S FINE'

Desperate for a youthquake with real substance? Meet sibling duo The Molotovs, a peroxide explosion of rebellious teen spirit who have already shared a stage with Blondie and the Sex Pistols.

- Lisa Wright

On an unassuming drizzly Monday night on Oxford Street, sandwiched between a branch of Ann Summers and a Japanese stationery shop, there's a youth rebellion going on.

The Molotovs - the brother-sister duo of 17-year-old vocalist/guitarist Mathew and 19-year-old bassist Issey Cartlidge - are ripping the belly of the 100 Club a new one. Mathew, tailored in a sharp brown suit and skinny tie, bleached-blonde Lego haircut cropped in a neat square around his face, looks like a young Paul Weller reincarnate. Issey, sporting a Libertines-style red military two-piece, massive swoops of eyeliner and an equally peroxide-soaked 'do that she whips with practiced expertise, stalks the stage pouting and glaring like a hybrid between Debbie Harry and Agyness Deyn.

It’s 2026, but the spirit of The Jam’s iconic 1977 set at this same venue rings out — not least towards the gathered throng of old mods and Fred Perry-shirted geezers clamouring for a glimpse of their teenage years, brought back to life. They're a large part of The Molotovs’ crowd for now, but the second-time nostalgists aren't the point of this operation. The two Putney-born siblings are here to stir something up in their own generation, much like Weller, or the Sex Pistols, or the first nights of Northern Soul did on this very stage in their own eras.

“We want young people to feel energised that they can get up off their arses and make change for themselves, and that spreads into the community and their environment and then throughout the country. We think that’s a genuine way it could happen,” says Mathew. “I don’t think music can solve everything, but it’s a good way of communicating those ideas to people. It becomes hard to be hopeful a lot of the time but you have to keep that faith going.”