Speaking of so called hot wind here’s the Leeds based Norman Records round up of 2013 which I am forever grateful for. These guys, Boomkat, Piccadilly Records and a few others here in the UK are great to keep tabs on for new music from new & old artists…they know their records and keep you updated on new and rare pressings coming in all the time. boomkat.com would be more up your street Peligro…they’re always getting in limited stuff from the likes of Mika Vainio and Nurse With Wound and a ton more artists you love but don’t realise yet. These people are not “middle class journalists” who would like you to think MGMT are the greatest band since the Beatles…they are music heads just like everyone here. And there’s a good mix of them to appeal to everyone’s tastes.
10/10 according to Brian (Norman Records) on Mon 25 Nov, 2013.
In 13+ years of my bouncing off the thick, slimy walls of Fort Norman there’s not been an album that’s split the office, hatchet-like, into two quite like this grimy fucker of a platter.
I mailed Phil the week it hit - “Yo, Mix Master P, Wassup? No-one check Sleaford Mods?” Fellow remote staffer Ant-Zen had asked approximately the same. Apparently, members of the in-house posse for the day had been so appalled by the opening tracks of ‘Austerity Dogs’ that it was refused point blank back onto our wheel of steel. At any cost. So the story goes…
“So why is it your Album Of The Year?”, you scream? Because some of us are obstinate, stubborn and true to what we believe, regardless of whether it may be palatable to the masses (or even to the talented, active musicians that earn a small crust here in t’Towers). It’s only one of more than 50 great albums released this year, but it’s arguably the most genuinely “punk”, “urban” and “street” UK recording out of the whole bunch. ‘Austerity Dogs’ is the most furious blast of noxious whiteboy thug rap, hilarious social commentary and sparse, brittle DIY electro-punk you’ll hear in 2013, and possibly until this Midlands duo see fit to write a proper follow-up.
They’re the kind of band that could easily have a cameo spot in a Shane Meadows film, say down a seedy backstreet Working Men’s Club. Jason Williamson’s earthy, aggressive street-poetry fits the rumbling bass, skittering drum machine and skeletal samples/rhythms like a glove. I strongly believe there’s something downright thrilling about this music. It jumps out of the speakers and squares right up to your face, an eyebrow cocked, an acute feral intelligence in tow. It’s more confrontational than most UK hip-hop I have ever heard, and hell-cleverer than the singer’s guttural regional snarl may suggest to some.
I’d like to pick a stand-out song, a particular cheeky lyric that makes me laugh like a drain. But that’d spoil it. There are too many. Don’t even just check the soundclips out, they’ll not do this justice. Please buy the wax if you can. ‘Austerity Dogs’ is an unhinged, greasy blast of realism gobbing at a dying world staffed by utter tools.
If you dig the cynical, parochial, outsider attitude of acts as diverse as MC Pitman, The Fall, John Cooper Clark, Half Man Half Biscuit, et al then you’ll recognise the unapologetic, uncompromising mettle present here. Like the aforementioned acts, Sleaford Mods have got a fabulous grasp of the mechanics of penning a raw, manic pop tune. Yes: this is somehow an incredibly catchy album under the grit and spit. The lyrics are often unpleasant, but in the same strike come over as blatantly ironic, observational prose. This isn’t sour provocation. It’s downright toxic genius!
Sleaford Mods are what happens when you hail from Thatcher’s hometown. The angriest band in the country just mugged you. So why are you smiling?
10/10 according to Nathon (Norman Records) on Sat 16 Nov, 2013.
Months ago, back when I first started seeing this album on this site, I had it judged by its cover, title and band name. “Brilliant,” I thought, “more wannabe ‘Mod’ twats selling that line about how important it is in working class culture to wear a sharp coat.” Fully expecting it to contain the latest forgettable rehash of crappy Mod nostalgia, with some lazy political observations thrown in, I got mildly annoyed…until I read the press release, and got interested.
Sometimes press releases don’t lie. This is, by far, the most interesting album I’ve heard in years. In an age where everything seems to have been done before, where so many bands seem happy to tread over old ground, and where as a listener it sometimes feels a bit like you’re grateful to just find a band that at least treads over that old ground with new shoes, ‘Austerity Dogs’ is a kick aimed squarely and with extreme firmness up your musical arse.
There’s no escaping its sheer, withering, relentless roughness, evidence of which soon mounts up. The word ‘cunt’ is used within the first ten seconds of the record, in an aggro spoken-word opening that sends an immediate signal of what’s to come. A sparse bass line is joined by a cheap-sounding drum machine, introducing the brutalist instrumentation that the record never departs from. The dirty, homophonic pun of the track title (“Urine Mate”) is quickly revealed, before the lyrics turn to even darker fare: pimps beating up women outside the bookies (“What have I ever done to you?!”), fronting up to the BMX-riding estate kids (“Smash yer face, cunt, back into next week”), the possibility of catching chlamydia from using the “only phone on the road”. Mike Skinner, this is not.
So, it took all of ten seconds to obliterate my ‘Mod’ misgivings. If anything, this is more like punk. I also think it’s fair to say that this is a highly lyrics-driven album, and that if you don’t get those lyrics - and many people really won’t give a shit about the subject matter here, which is kinda the point the Sleaford Mods are making - you will struggle to find anything to like. Similarly, if you need to hear singing, or guitars, or pretty much anything that resembles ‘normal’ music then “jog on”, as Jason Williamson (the lyrical genius behind all this) might put it. If you’re looking for a few reference points, then imagine a stripped-down cross between John Cooper Clarke (minus the literary), Mark E Smith (minus the stream-of-consciousness), the street-punk likes of Cock Sparrer and Oi! (minus any racism), and maybe a touch here and there of Wu-Tang (minus, well, anything American whatsoever).
In other words, it’s highly aggressive, highly intelligent, and utterly of its time and place. I’m sorry to bang on about the lyrics, but they are the main draw here (and that’s not to diss the backdrop provided by Andrew Fearn’s minimalist electronics which are the perfect accompaniment and similarly thrilling). Whilst I genuinely hope I never have to defend this line to the man’s face (because he looks fucking hard) there’s been a vacancy for that ‘voice of the proles’ role ever since Shaun Ryder’s muse upped sticks, and Williamson does make me wonder what Ryder (another lyrical genius) might have come out with if he’d been faced by David Cameron’s sly and vicious continuation of Thatcher’s vision rather than the E-drenched culture of the late 80s / early 90s.
Williamson also has plenty to say about the state of the current music scene, specifically, it seems, all the poser-based London shite and various forms of rock nonsense that we can’t seem to escape on this island. Something else that puts Sleaford Mods on that side of punk. All in all, I find myself in full agreement with Ant (fellow Norman Records type):
“I can’t think of a band that’s emerged in recent years with more to say than them. They just totally nail it. They’ve got more punk attitude than any punk rock band I’ve heard in many years.”
Indeed, so pitch-perfect are Sleaford Mods in their vitriolic take-down of austerity Britain that part of me worries that’s it all just some satirical prank, and that when ‘Austerity Dogs’ hits the end-of-year best-of lists (as it will) Williamson and Fearn will be found “laughing their tits off” with Mumford and Sons whilst blowing coke up each other’s bumholes or something.
Anyway, Ocado are here with my shopping now so I’ve got to go. (This is true.)
10/10 according to Mik on 22nd June 2013.
I thought this would be some Weller style Jamie Oliver friendly bullshit. Couldn’t be more wrong. The whole mod thing is a complete blind alley. This is early, speed fucked Mark E Smith spitting invective in unashamedly chav language. And by that I don’t mean chav like middle class shitwits mean it, as a snobby insult. This is the language that you hear when you don’t have a job and spend time amongst other lads who don’t have jobs. The language of the cheap skunk smoking classes.
No doubt they’ll get fucking nowhere because music like this never does. It’s just shouting right? It’s not real music, right? It’s not “tight”. The songs aren’t 10 minutes long and full of proper musicians playing proper instruments like Dire fucking Straits did. We, the public school mafia, have decided against this! This is just just some chavvy uneducated type with a chip on his shoulder and unfortunate access to a microphone!
I think the other reviewer nailed it to be frank. If you don’t get this then you’re part of the fat Tory problem with this country. If you can’t see why Sleaford mods are justified in their anger and that expressing this anger really isn’t going to fit in with any of the current musical trends then just don’t bother?
9/10 according to matt_g_b on 30th December 2013.
The only record I’ve ever owned that contains the line ‘You smell’. Brilliant.
9/10 according to Citizen kane on 24th January 2014.
“Austerity Dogs” is one of the freshest and most interesting albums of the last five years. Sleaford Mods are kinda doing to rap what Kill the Vultures did a few years ago, but in a less cerebral way. They are aggressive but don’t seem to take themselves too seriously, so all the tunes end up sounding extremly catchy, in a weird way. I don’t know, for me, it was love at first hearing.
10/10 according to Craggy on 25th November 2013.
Thank you Norman Records for making this your Album of the Year 2013. Proof that their is still life in UK punk! Sleaford Mods are producing the only music that is relevant today. It is that simple. Steal this record if you have to.
9/10 according to Chris on 26th November 2013.
Sleaford Mods! Sleaford fucking Mods! Can’t believe someone has finally given this band and this fine record the accolades its due. Well played by Norman Records. Hands down the gutsiest choice I’ve seen in any list so far this year.
10/10 according to Bile Council on 12th April 2013.
Sleaford Mods don’t sound like anything else. Sleaford Mods are the realest band out there right now. Sleaford Mods ARE right now. And if you think “Mod” is just about dressing up like “page 7 Weller” and boring on about Small Faces all day and night on yer reissue 60s Vespa, then don’t bother mate. If you don’t “get” Sleaford Mods you are one of them, “the enemy”. Seriously the best music/act to come out of this spoilt, over-saturated musical farmyard we call the UK since the Pistols. Yep, that’s right.
