Sleaford Mods: "You can scandalise people – but it’s got to be done right. It’s got to be interesting and have a point"

UK techno-punks Sleaford Mods have returned with UK Grim, a coruscating look at Britain’s current socio-political culture landscape, variously addressing Brexit fallout, economic turmoil, culture wars and the perennial crisis in the Tory party. If Boris Johnson’s spectacularly undignified departure seemed to signal a new low in British politics, the farcically short-lived tenure of his successor, Liz Truss, ran it a close second.

Whilst UK Grim reflects the Tory omnishambles, I wonder if Sleaford Mods were concerned that by the time the album came out, such disasters would have been overtaken an entirely new set of disasters?

“Occasionally I might reference certain people, but they’re all pretty much part of the same beast,” replies vocalist Jason Williamson, chatting over Zoom. “If you reference someone like Liz Truss, you’re referencing Boris Johnson, David Cameron – most of them. And I’m not just talking about the Conservative party, it’s applicable across the board, even to Labour. Politics as a whole has become homogenised in how it disappoints and alienates people.”

Do you ever get turned off by it all and want to check out for a bit?

“You do every day, I think,” considers Williamson. “It’s not important to put it in songs, but you feel inclined to, because it tops anyone else’s fuckery, doesn’t it? These people are constantly shaping the country and not doing a very good job. They’re not politicians, they’re just careerists.

“But I don’t think it will ever change. There’s a fabric of control in society – they have this idea of patriotism, and once you see the truth behind it, it’s a constant subject to write about. Because the beast keeps adapting itself and moving along, it never goes stops.”

Away from the lyrics, Sleaford Mods’ musical aesthetic – the shouty frontman flanked by an electronics wizard – strongly recalls pioneering NYC art-punks Suicide. Are the duo fans?

“Yeah, I got into them through watching stuff on YouTube,” says Mods groove technician Andrew Fearn. “They got beaten up loads of times at their gigs, didn’t they? Suicide were around at a more aggressive time, when doing something different was just not allowed. It’s good to see the live clips and how powerful their performances were – it’s mental to watch.”

Behind him in his room, Williamson has framed artwork for the Sex Pistols, the market leaders in punk provocation. In today’s sanitised musical landscape, it’s increasingly rare for artists to scandalise people in the manner of the Pistols and Suicide.

“It’s much harder to do though, isn’t it?” considers Fearn. “Bands like that broke down a lot of boundaries. Sexually, you can be quite extreme these days and no one really bats an eyelid. But it is difficult to push a boundary. You have to draw people in. The ’80s were very brash, you could be in your face. But that doesn’t really work anymore – if you’re in people’s faces, they just switch off.”

“Also, you can scandalise people, but it’s got to be done right,” adds Williamson. “It’s got to be interesting and have a point, and not be cliched and telling people what they already know.”

There of course exceptions, with rapper Childish Gambino’s brilliantly subversive 2018 video ‘This Is Not America’ a case in point. Still, it is harder to cut through the cultural noise these days. Perhaps Sleaford Mods should go on The X Factor.

“It’s sort of like The X Factor already,” laughs Williamson. “It’s just me and him, without a band to fill out to the visuals. And to a lot of people it looks quite awkward!”

STING & ROGER DALTREY

Speaking of compelling vids, Sleaford Mods have done rather a nifty job themselves with the clip for the ‘UK Grim’ single. An animated effort from acclaimed director Cold War Steve, it has a cheeky jab at classic rock heroes Sting and Roger Daltrey.

“People are going, ‘Why did you put Sting in it? He’s done nothing wrong’,” says Jason. “He’s done lots wrong! He just looks absolutely stupid, it’s like ‘What are you doing?’ I like exercising, I don’t think there’s anything wrong with it. If flexing your muscles makes you happy, that’s completely fine, but Sting is too much… Plus he made that fucking lute album!”

What’s this – a singer having a cut off another act? It feels like we’re back in the ’90s.

“And Roger Daltrey was sounding off about how Brexit would be good for musicians,” continues Jason, on a roll. “It was just really fucking naïve. If you don’t fully understand these things, and he really hasn’t, stay out of it. Because he’s got a massive platform and people listen to him. You’re one of the fucking figureheads from the heyday of rock and roll, what are you fucking doing?”

Brexit remains the issue that won’t go away. On the day of our interview, Rishi Sunak gave yet another speech addressing the dreaded Northern Ireland protocol. For Irish people, the Tories’ blithe ignorance of the effects of a new northern border was perhaps the most galling aspect of Brexit.

“This is what makes me so angry,” nods Williamson. “The idea that you’re some kind of fucking sub-human – you get that from them. This goes on and on. I might get carried away with this stuff sometimes, but I can’t help it. Johnson has openly missed being a xenophobic bastard when it comes to Irish people, and I would imagine most other people in the Tory cabinet are the same. Of course they are, it’s how they’ve been brought up.

“You kind of seal yourself away from it after a while, because the corruption, hatred and bile they’re stirring up gets so much. You have to step away and let them get on with it. That’s all you can do – you can’t take to the streets or you’ll get shot. I don’t want to get shot; I’ve got kids and I’m in a great band.”

How do you feel Labour are positioned to take out the Tories next time around? And will it make much difference?

“They’re solid centrists, so they’re trying to squeeze all the left out,” observes Jason. “It’s an interesting subject. A friend of mine said on Twitter the other day that, in the future, things are going to get a lot more authoritarian. I think she’s right, it’s almost going to be a one-party state.

“From the public’s point of view, there doesn’t seem to be much wriggle room between the Tories and Labour, apart from the extreme right wing ideologies, which I don’t think Labour are gonna possess that much. But I still think it’s gonna be there. It’s a tough one, I’m not inclined to vote to be honest.”

Moving onto less weighty topics, for today’s interview, Jason is resplendent in a mod-style top. Clearly, the mod vibe continues to be a significant influence.

“I suppose the style element was an attraction for me, though Andrew was into different shit,” says the frontman. “I guess a lot of people dismiss it, because the idea of it hasn’t aged very well. It’s still around in some respects – it’s not so much scooters and fish-tail parkas anymore. But to some extent, it remains prominent as a subculture.”

“It’s overlapped into fashion generally, hasn’t it?” says Fearn. “If it’s a good style, aspects of it will still be around, and you’ll probably look a bit mod without even realising it. I suppose at the time, the idea was that it was another word for ‘progressive’. It was about dressing smart when everyone was a dirty rocker. The parka jacket tied mod to a time, but the idea probably had a bit more substance.”

GROWING AUDIENCE

I first became a fan of Sleaford Mods having caught the cracking set they performed at the 2021 Latitude festival in Suffolk, when they filled in as last-minute headliners in the BBC Sounds tent in place of Fontaines D.C. I’m not alone in being a recent convert: now on the go for just over a decade, Williamson and Fearn continue to attract new fans, with their previous album Spare Ribs going top five in the UK.

Have the band been happily surprised at how their audience has continued to grow?

“We have,” acknowledges Williamson. “When it kicked off, we couldn’t believe it. It was an original project we felt worked, and we were convinced the songs were really good. The way it started to take off in Europe and elsewhere, and we started to make a living out of it, was a surprise. We’d got to a point in both of our lives where we didn’t really see things going that way for us.”

“I’ve been making music most of my life and never made any money out of it,” says Andrew. “A lot of artists don’t make any money out of music. When we started making 200 or 300 quid for a gig, it was like, ‘Fucking hell!’ And pretty much all our tours sell out, so it’s cool. That’s just cos people like what we do, which is great. You can’t really control that.”

In a novel and wickedly funny touch, Williamson pre-empts criticism of the band on the UK Grim track ‘D.I. Why’, listing a series of complaints which their detractors would no doubt agree with. It’s a probably a good strategy for a popular act: get ahead of the social media backlash before it happens.

“You have to brace yourself for it,” winces Jason. “That song talks about the people you don’t necessarily like. It’s not me being right or wrong, I don’t think. It’s just me going, ‘No, I think you’re a wanker. I don’t care if your venue needs saving – you’re completely turning me off any kind of positive interpersonal communication.’ It also discusses the idea that just because you come from a grassroots music scene, it doesn’t make you wholly right.

“You can still be a fucking cunt! I find a lot of these people are up their arses. Me and Andrew had to suffer a lot of that back in the day. They don’t change – they come out of the woodwork once a year, depending on what you say online. And it’s the same old naïve bullshit.”

No longer, it seems, can people simply agree to disagree – a conflicting view of any kind must result in the other person being destroyed. You’d hope we could move beyond it at some stage.

“It would be nice,” says Jason. “But because social media is just like everyday life, I don’t think people are moving on. Even now, we have people coming in and accusing us of being class tourist tourists. Why am I? ‘Because you’re rich.’ How the fuck do you know I’m rich?! Someone accused me yesterday of having £1.7 million pounds in the bank – and I haven’t. It’s fucking insane!”

UK Grim is out now.