SLEAFORD MODS / Y PENCADLYS / GINDRINKER | LIVE REVIEW
CF10, Cardiff University Students’ Union, Tues 10 Mar
Cardiff duo Gindrinker are used to being the curiosity on largely alt-rock bills, but in Sleaford Mods have found such a well-suited kinship, they should be installed as permanent support for the entire tour. Like Sleafords’ Jason Williamson, DC Gates’ witty and acerbic street poetry is delivered with such singular vehemence, you get the feeling he’d be doing it regardless of musical accompaniment. So while DC rants about cyclists and dog Valhalla, Gareth Middleton arm-wrestles a drum machine and two guitars into submission with moves learnt from Slayer, Tad, Big Black and My Bloody Valentine, and shit-eating grins spread across faces in response.
Whether it’s a wilful compromise to this largely English-speaking crowd, or a more permanent new direction, electronic wünderkind WH Hughes, aka Y Pencadlys, has his vocals running through so many effects tonight that even Welsh speakers would be hard pressed to tell what he’s saying. Always an animated performer, what his mouth is doing is so unrelated to the sounds coming through the speakers, it’s like watching a mute screaming in an echo chamber. It’s not unsuccessful, and trippy as fuck, sitting somewhere between Drums Of Death and Aphex Twin, but a similar effect could be achieved at home watching Chris Morris’ Jam after too much Lemsip.
CF10 is now impressively full and quite the culture collision, with a mix of aging punks, mods, clubbers, hipsters, students and football supporters illustrating just how divisive (or unifying) Sleaford Mods are. There’s no denying the Notts duo hold an exposing, albeit wry, mirror up to modern Britain, and as much as Andrew Fearn’s blips and beats conjur The Streets when Mike Skinner still had something to say, Jason Williamson’s heart is pure rip-it-up-and-start-again punk.
You do have to wonder just how many people their moniker misleads: after opener Bunch Of Cunts, one mod in his late 40s announces “what a load of fucking shit” before marching out. Yet particularly caustic renditions of Mr Jolly Fucker and Jobseeker soon have the Cardiff crowd pogoing with the best of them. Williamson’s ire seems so universal you wonder who he doesn’t hate, but as tonight’s gig-goers chant along to rapturously hooky closer Tweet Tweet Tweet, it’s clear that behind a subterfuge of chaos, Sleaford Mods are very calculatingly borrowing pop structure from the very thing they’re seeking to destroy. Clever bastards.
words GARETH PIERCE photos SIMON AYRE