SLEAFORD MODS | LIVE REVIEW
Y Plas, Cardiff University Students Union, Fri 27 Oct
It’s not been long since Sleaford Mods last performed in Cardiff, and even less time since they were last in Wales, headlining at the Green Man Festival over the summer. However, it’s full house here at Cardiff University, in a hall that holds hundreds; and, indeed, there are hundreds, brimming, drinking, and waiting, with faces that shine with sweat and no small anticipation. The smell of beer wafts in a cloud down onto our hair – and on those without, for the Mods, the Sleas, the ‘Fords (however you call them, I’m sure they wouldn’t give a whatsit either way) have pulled a crowd that’s full of those both young as well as middle aged, testament to the fact that their music, unusually, has wide inter-generational appeal.
Support band Nachthexen [below] are new to me. I shouldn’t have to report the fact that the band are all female, as it’s not the norm to tell when there aren’t any women present – but, being women in the world of punk, and providing a fine, feisty fulfillment of riot grrrl presence and politics, this fact makes Emma, Donna, Fiona and Olga all the more cool to a 90s child such as myself.
The Sleas enter, after, like a tornado following a hurricane; the more expansive, but still very tight, sonics of Nachthexen replaced by their taut, muscular sound. Their energy, born of anger and frustration, envelops the room, the ‘plink plonk’ (plonk rock?) of Andrew Fearn’s keyboard a translation of the terrible ennui of working class life, whilst Jason Williamson’s vocals are the literal expression of it. Their lyrics are a tenacious antidote to apathy, and appeal strongly to my poet self – for Williamson, too, is a wordsmith, a published writer, and there are many killer lines/rhymes here, which pack a powerful, and memorable, punch.
Crowd favourites such as B.H.S., Jobseeker and Tied Up In Nottz are delivered in a style reminiscent of John Lydon in his PiL years, a similar tiger-ish vibrato rendering the pair’s ranty, rap-veering lyrics. On stage, however, it is Andrew Fearn who looks Lydon-esque, whiplash thin and fizzing. Williamson is more compact, sturdy, his ape-like movements at times seeming to contain within them both the parody and potential of/for football hooliganism and prize fighting – classic working class endeavours, and typical outlets for male feeling and physicality. The ‘Fords, of course, have sublimated these possibilities into art; into their songs which explore, satirise, and sear such cliched romantics, sending visceral chords throughout the hall as well as through such lazy associative thinking.
The next day, then, when crowds are piling into the city to watch the boxing and drink themselves into stupors, and stupid behaviours, I can’t help but have “Just like we do, just like we do” reverberate round my head as I gaze on, mindful of the fact that the mob are made up of many – of me, of you, of us all. The Sleaford Mods are, quite frankly, brilliant, and their smart, emotive music continues to sing to me, to speak for us as members of the working classes, well after this particular gig has ended.
words MAB JONES photos PHIL BROOKES