‘We answer to nobody’: duo Bob Vylan on humility, hell-raising – and punk hypocrisy
Bobby Vylan attended his first proPalestine protest at the age of 15, escorted by a friend’s mother. He remembers the “feeling of people coming together and using their voice to say that they don’t stand by the actions of this country”. Nearly two decades later, the singer and guitarist of rap punk duo Bob Vylan has found himself marching again amid the escalation of destruction in Gaza since October 2023. He has also been calling out bands that describe themselves as leftwing but haven’t shown solidarity with Palestinians: at a show in Dublin in November, he castigated Idles and Sleaford Mods for their “cowardice”. (Idles subsequently voiced their support; Sleaford Mods’ Jason Williams said he is “horrified by the atrocities committed in Gaza and Israel”.) When I meet Bobby in Shoreditch, he reiterates his disgust for any act that stays silent despite having a radical aesthetic. “You might want to think of a new angle for your next album,” he says.
A burning sense of rage against injustice amplifies his fearsome but beautiful roar on stage and in the studio. Bob Vylan sing music that draws as much from grime as it does hardcore and tackles themes from the cost of living crisis, unscrupulous landlords and toxic masculinity in explicit, cursing, mocking fury. On the one hand, their abrasiveness makes their popularity seem remarkable – their last album, Bob Vylan Presents the Price of Life, reached the UK Top 20 – but they also couldn’t be more attuned to the state of the nation, their visceral live shows a jolt out of the doldrums: no wonder people are paying attention. They’ve formed their own scene far from the UK’s postpunk orthodoxy, collaborating with the likes of avant garde Bristol producer Grove, Laurie Vincent of Soft Play (formerly Slaves) and Enter Shikari. Still, they’re aiming higher this time. On their new album, Bobby sings: “The album went to 18 but they know I’m No 1.” Humble as the Sun represents an ambitious step up, with hip-hop-influenced production and high-profile samples, including revamping Fatboy Slim’s Right Here, Right Now on a track of the same name.
Bobby Vylan, of course, is not his real name – nor is Bobbie Vylan the real name of his drummer bandmate, who isn’t present today. The pair deliberately obfuscate their identities to resist what they see as a surveillance state. Across the interview, Bobby asks that I don’t cite his age – I’d guess he’s in his 30s – and declines to clarify specifics about where he studied or now lives. The most we might know biographically is that he was raised between Ipswich and Stepney Green, and that he has a daughter. It’s in keeping with the band’s status as music industry outsiders: they operate independently and set their own terms, allowing them to “not answer to anybody, create with no restrictions”, he says.
For Bobby, music originally came before politics. As a kid in Ipswich, he started making music on the PlayStation game Music 2000, like many grime producers of the era. He became more politically aware thanks to a woman called Del White, who ran local African-Caribbean events and, he says, opened his eyes to “the treatment of other people, no matter where they are in the world”. His conscience started to creep in to his music-making. “I don’t think I would be capable of creating art and not saying something that I deem to be important,” he says. He met Bobbie in a London bar in 2017 (both have since quit drinking). They never discussed what sort of band they were going to be. “I think our shared interests and values just naturally made the band what it became.”
Making a statement seemed to come naturally to them. Their new album advocates for repatriation (“Got a message for the thieves in the palace, we want the jewels back,” he sings on Reign), rages that there’s “nothing great” about Britain on Makes Me Violent and takes a shock approach to the housing crisis: “Landlord just raised your rent / Mate, get yourself a gun,” he sings on GYAG. The latter comes from a particularly personal place, and Bobby becomes frank and emotional when detailing some of the adversity he’s faced.
He speaks sorrowfully about his experience of a cruel landlord when he was “a baby with a baby” and found himself in dangerous housing conditions. “It was cold, it was damp, the windows were not double glazed, there was mould,” he says. “The extractor fan caught fire when we were not home and there was a fire in the flat. Came home and whole place was black; everything smelled like smoke. And the landlord couldn’t give a fuck. My partner got pneumonia during the pregnancy because of it. And he just didn’t care.” While the lyric appears violent, for Bobby it reflects the anger that can stem from systemic mistreatment. “I’m not saying it for the purpose of purely being provocative. It’s just what I feel.”
These experiences, plus growing up seeing the “violence that my bredrin were surrounded by”, took a toll on his self-esteem – and beyond politics, he also sees his music as a medium for promoting positive self-image, hope and self-worth. “You are more than your take-home pay,” he sings on Hunger Games. “Those kinds of affirmations, it’s for me,” Bobby says. “But I know if it’s for me, it’s for other people too. I’m not alone in needing to be reminded of what I’m capable of.” It’s an affirmation which keeps him alive – much of his messaging concerns avoiding alcohol, eating well and being in good health. He describes a childhood of typical oven dinners, “chicken kievs and potato waffles”, but that his mother made sure vegetables were always on the plate. Ten years ago, he converted to veganism. “I feel healthier in my body and mind,” he says. “If we’re going to use our existence to rally against injustice, we probably need to be quite healthy to do that.”
The inspiration for the title of Humble as the Sun came as the band made the album in the garden studio of Windy Ridge in north-west London. In between recording, Bobby meditated in the sun and had “conversations within that space, with that nature, with that ball of fire that keeps us alive”, he says. “The sun don’t dim its light for nobody – even if there’s clouds in front of it, you can still see your hand in front of you.” He decided to follow suit, rejecting humility to celebrate his own beauty: before he takes his daughter to school, they repeat affirmations like “My eyes are beautiful, my Black is beautiful, I am loved” in the mirror, inspired by the civil rights-era ideology of “Black is beautiful”.
“No one did that for me when I was young,” he says. If anger, then, represents the burning of the sun, selflove represents its light. It’s a balance that music helps Vylan to navigate and reconcile. “I need to talk to myself,” he says. “The album’s for me.”
• Humble as the Sun is released via Ghost Theatre on 5 April
and tweed skirt suits in acid brights accompanied by Mary Janes. While at Celine, Twiggy acted as muse for the shift dresses and miniskirts.
The mood seems to be rubbing off on younger generations – on the secondhand site Depop, a favourite with gen Z, searches for miniskirts are up 30%, baker-boy hats by 17% and leopard print by 235%. Polo necks are also trending.
On Pinterest, searches for Biba are up 65% and searches for 60s styles, 60s outfits and shift dresses have risen by 30%. The number of people looking for leopard-print outfit inspiration has increased sevenfold.
What is behind the 60s resurgence? Fashion and the wider world is in a period of upheaval and, perhaps seeking comfort, is in an increasingly nostalgic mood.
The recent deaths of 60s style leaders may also be affecting the mood. Having made miniskirts fashionable, Mary Quant, who once described the garment as representing “life and tremendous opportunity”, died at 93, catalysing a moment of remembrance and celebration of her mark on fashion.
The late model and actor Birkin has continued to set trends in death as in life. Her death last summer has triggered a boom in fashion inspired by her signature Gallic style on resale sites such as Vestiaire Collective. And the overstuffed handbag with which she is associated has been a surprisingly farreaching styling trick – on TikTok there are tutorials on how to Birk-ify your bag.
But this is about much more than the passing of style heroes. The fashion historian Tony Glenville says the decade may also be experiencing a revival because “the short clean look of much of the 60s is a great antidote to layering and volume”. He thinks that decade was “so different to now; it was optimistic and about change, rights, short skirts … It was all fun”.
In 2024, a financially strained time in the UK, when “we’re not socialising, not working and not having fun”, Glenville says the 60s may be particularly appealing. “[Looking back] through rose-tinted glasses, [people] were social, clubs [were] starting, [people were] out and about, exploring new things, [it was] possible … to have fun on little money.”