In matching cargo shorts, Sleaford Mods’ Jason Williamson and Andrew Fearn stroll on stage to the pounding bass of UK Grim, the title track of their latest album. Then the Nottingham duo hit the gas: Fearn’s drum machine fires off, Williamson shrieks like a bird of prey, and they begin a disgusted state of the nation report. “In England, no-one can hear you scream” he barks, both a threat and condemnation.
UK Grim is the post-punk duo’s fourth album to crack the UK Top 10. Fearn’s minimal electronics fuel Williamson’s nihilist, surreal verses about entrenched inequality, class tourism and total desperation. Against a backdrop of metal sheets, lined up like crash barriers on the motorway, the duo speed through a setlist that spans a decade of righteous anger, before turning their ire on themselves.
New song Smash Each Other Up is prime Sleaford Mods, sharp on the violence of austerity – “levelling up like a Tory twat!” – while ferocious bass shakes the building’s foundations. Another, DIwhy, accuses so-called punks of selling out, and hints at the tension in making outsider music while finding rising fame. “You’re in a shouty band, you’re not original!” Williamson bellows, presumably tongue-in-cheek, as Fearn dances with abandon, gleefully using his laptop only to trigger each track. The pace is furious, but a punishingly loud mix often leaves Williamson’s rage incoherent.
Talk is sparse, but twice Williamson declares a kind of mission statement: “We’re Sleaford Mods and everybody fucking hates us.” Even for two proud antagonists, this is truer than usual. Earlier in November, Williamson stopped a show after a fan in Madrid repeatedly heckled and threw a Palestinian keffiyeh on stage. Later he tweeted: “Don’t be asking me to pick sides for something I ain’t got any real idea about, at a gig. I’m a singer. My job is music. The only real thing I know about War is that I’m sick and tired of premature death like we all are. Of the murder of anyone, under whatever fucking belief grid.” Heated social media debate followed, even after Williamson put out a subsequent, longer statement, with some fans voicing bitter disappointment in a band usually so forthright. The dissent has clearly rattled them, and although Williamson puffs out his chest, tonight it’s not clear if “everybody hates us” is an indignant lament or a badge of honour.
