Music > Album Reviews

Sleaford Mods - English Tapas

22/03/17

Nottingham based Sleaford Mods: not young, not musical, not likely to be on the cover of Vanity Fair. The tunes though, those words, they are the writers of protest songs that matter, Snout and Carlton Touts ripping all the rhetoric away from important national dialogues like Brexit to reveal grim truths like “the future is a flag pissed on in a king-sized bag of Quavers”. Pointless patriotism is kicked to the curb, but not by the neo-liberal elite, it’s your mate from the factory. English life gets punched in the face and some fag ash tapped in its metaphorical pints. Drayton Manored and Messy Anywhere prick the balloon of adult recreational self-medication, although we can all relate to late nights navigating lager and blue Rizla shopping experiences through the line “Trip to Spar is like a trip to Mars”.

All twelve tunes have substantial bass, beats and cheeky samples, like a 100bpm grime without the swagger and bling but all the force of personality, humour and real life experience. Lead single BHS is a fist in the air banger, concentrating the reality of working class life like EastEnders never could. This Sceptred Isle has rarely been simultaneously under the microscope whilst being nutted so euphorically. Angry, honest, disarming and essential; to plagiarise George Orwell, “If there is hope, it lies with the Sleaford Mods”. I’m with them - who’s with me?

9.5/10