The The are due to release their first album in almost 25 years, Ensoulment, next month, and mainman Matt Johnson fears that the world is even darker and more troubled now than it was when his band released its predecessor Naked Self in 2000. The bad news? He reckons that we're all heading even further into the abyss.
When Johnson's band released Cognitive Dissident, the album's first single, in May, he issued a statement saying, “We certainly live in interesting times. The world is becoming more inverted, weird and hallucinogenic by the day.” He expands upon this belief in a new interview with The Irish Times, saying, “Lies have become the currency of the day" and expressing his fear that the world is sleepwalking towards dystopia due to a rising support for authoritarian politicians.
Discussing the lyrical themes of Cognitive Dissident, Johnson says, “The truth is now so ridiculed and disbelieved and marginalised. We live in a society where the politicians lie, the media lie – about everything, all the blooming time. You can’t believe a word. That’s why the trust in politicians is on the floor. And why the trust in the mainstream media is on the floor.
“People aren’t stupid. Their instinct tells them, ‘This person is lying to me.’ Lies have become the currency of the day. Hopefully there will be a reaction. There is a reaction against it. People are getting fed up.”
Going on to label UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer “a Tory”, and predicting that the Labour Party leader is “going to be a very authoritarian leader”, Johnson goes on say that one of the central themes touched upon in his band's new single is that the members of society are fearful of expressing opinions in case they're 'cancelled' and publicly shamed.
“It’s very Orwellian, what’s going on,” he tells writer Ed Power. “They’ve expanded the parameters of hate speech so that everyone gets offended about everything. It’s very hard to say anything – or even think anything. Which is an Orwellian concept. Everybody’s doing it. It’s not healthy. It leads to a lot of suppressed feelings that can manifest in very dark ways.”
For further Johnson insights, Ensoulment - an album dealing with “the meaning of what it is to be human in the 21st century” - will be released on September 6, via Cinéola / earMUSIC.
