SLEAFORD MODS
It’s Mindblowers time, as gobby agitator Jason Williamson picks the platters that matter to splatter your napper.
1 CONSUMER ELECTRONICS
CONDITION OF A HOLE (from Dollhouse Songs, Harbinger Sound, 2015)
“Consumer Electronics are presently Philip Best, who was in Whitehouse, and Sarah Ruth Best. This is fucking horrible, down to the bare bones of what life actually is. The hole is life, isn’t it? ‘Get up, get up, do this, don’t fucking do that, stay in line, don’t think for y o urself’, all the subjects you hear in protest songs, but taken to its absolute core. There’s this horror soundtrack element to it, that sinister, slasher-movie thing with these synths going off and ‘duh-duhduh-duh’ beats, really minimal, and Sarah just screaming over it. It almost cleans the windows and opens doors to the perception of the unjust avenues of life. There’s is no real place to play this stuff it’s so bleak.”
3 WESTSIDE GUNN NASTY
(from Hitler Wears Hermes IV, Griselda, 2017)
“I got it from a mate in Notts, we share a passion for that knuckle-dragging Mafioso rap stuff. WestSide Gunn’s from Buffalo in NY state, and this track’s got that real sparse kick drum hip-hop beat, with his rap over the top. His voice is unusual, quite high pitched, and his raps sometimes verge on b eing quite wea k,b ut it works, what he’s saying about street life and the void of the drug trade, the disdain in his voice – he’s sick of empty syringes in the playground, yet he’s got no choice but to go out and sell it. It’s brutally honest, and still relevant, perhaps more so since Peter Stringfellow became President.”
2 CONWAY THE MACHINE AIR HOLEZ (FT WSG)
(from Reject 2 EP, Griselda, 2015)
“Conway The Machine is WestSide Gunn’s labelmate. This tune is fucking horrible. His mouth slants to one side, a result of a gunshot wound. He’s lived it. The sound is the classic hip-hop format – great beat, looped strings, it’s moody, it’s slow, it’s meaty, the real deal. I dunno wh a titi sa b out the East Coast rappers versus West Coast – there’s just something more brutal about them. The weariness, the obscurity of being that person in that environment, of just having nothing but a block of white stuff to sell to keep you going. It’s completely inspiring and it really cut me up.”
4 ANDREW WEATHERALL WE COUNT THE STARS
(from Convenanza, Rotters Golf Club, 2016)
“A man who part-chronicled the drug romance/ fallout the ’80s/’90s youth had in this country. This is kind of a comedown tune, when your eyes start feeling more normal and daylight’s coming through the curtains. I really like Andrew’s vocals on his solo stuff – clear and basic, with great melodies; Nina Walsh’s vocal complements it brilliantly. It reminds me a bit of Rock The Casbah Clash. It’s not disco exactly. I don’t know what it is, or what they’re saying. You get a tinge of sadness, like he’s this lone traveller who’s put music first. I don’t care where music’s made or what it evokes in the sense of nationality, but it’s very English, this.”
5 GORDON LIGHTFOOT SATURDAY CLOTHES
(from Sit Down Young Stranger, Reprise, 1970)
“This, I think, is a brilliant example of early ’70s acoustic music, post-Zeppelin. This is beautiful, faultless really – his vocal, the playing, how each instrument is mixed. Everything used to feel quite oaky around the early ’70s, it was very brown and there were elves and gnomes – I remember we had this lamp in the living room at home, it had a gnomey type cottage on it with little windows cut out so that the light would come out… it reminded me of that, of my childhood. Singers like Gordon Lightfoot take me back there. A nice place to go back to? God, yeah. Great. Fantastic.”