Sleaford Mods at The Drill Lincoln

Sleaford Mods at The Drill Lincoln

Sleaford Mods are my favourite Nottingham act. They’re also the best one to have ever put our city on the map, with Iggy Pop himself recently naming them as his favourite band. I’ll never forget watching their “Tied Up in Nottz” music video for the first time. Seeing them riding the NCT bus I rode every day to town while spitting angry truths and hilarious statements about life in the city I grew up in. “The smell of piss is so strong it smells like decent bacon” will forever be burned into my brain as one of my favourite opening lyrics from that moment on.

Before that video came out, I could never have believed that we would be blessed with this one-of-a-kind blend of surrealist poetry and electronic beats delivered with a total punk attitude as our county’s voice to the wider world. I quickly became obsessed with their incredibly unique and refreshing sound and attitude and eventually got to see them headline Rock City in November of 2016. This was a real life-changing moment for me that felt like how I imagine it was to see that famous Sex Pistols gig in Manchester which caused The Fall, The Smiths, Joy Division and countless other bands to form as a result. Seeing the place get blown to bits in the best way possible by Jason and Andrew was inspiring beyond words, and ever since then I’ve watched their gigs at any chance I get.

They continue to evolve their one-of-a-kind brand of ultra-modern punk rap, recently collaborating with cutting-edge artists like Amyl and the Sniffers as well as musical icons like The Prodigy. They have made sure to retain their substance and roots to the city and fans that made them by headlining smaller grassroots venues such as The Chameleon to help raise money for the Music Venue Trust, while also managing to reach the point in their career where they can headline the Nottingham Arena and sell out a world tour. As a musician myself, it gives me hope and inspiration to see these two veterans of the music scene work for over a decade on their music and then finally end up getting the huge success they always deserved, despite all the odds.

Now, in 2024, they turn their focus on celebrating the 10-year anniversary of their classic breakthrough album Divide and Exit with a sold-out tour of selected smaller independent venues across the UK. Divide and Exit is my favourite Sleaford Mods album, and tonight I was lucky enough to be able to watch them play it in full at The Drill in Lincoln.

I have only visited Lincoln once before, but remembered its beautiful medieval-looking buildings, cobbled streets, and cosy pubs with real fireplaces roaring— the perfect place to visit for this chilly time of year. I was immediately struck by how cool The Drill Hall looked from the outside, with its huge sculpture of a face staring out of its wall that completely stands out from the traditional old English surroundings. I grabbed a can of Hooch and made my way to see the support band, Cooper T.

Cooper T

With their balaclavas on and hype-men duo backing them up, you could immediately see the obvious influence of both Kneecap and Sleaford Mods for this act, but it would be wrong to count them out as pure imitators, blasting out their sunny dub-style tunes to maximum strength from the minute they ran onstage. Even in this freezing November weather, their music brought the heat into The Drill Hall. It seemed like the perfect music for summer and really warmed me up—even if it was just a placebo effect. This masked duo kept the energy high, even managing to smooth over an accidental fall with no issue, showing great stagecraft and confidence. Standout song “Driving So Dangerous” was incredibly catchy and well-written. I’m interested to see how Cooper T will evolve their sound and performance over time.

Then came Sleaford Mods to rapturous applause, starting off the night with “Liveable Shit,” a brilliant album track that encapsulates frontman Jason Williamson’s satirical humour, which runs through the DNA of the Mods, with its catchy and cathartic singalong chorus of “Liveable shit, you put up with it” and lyrics that veer wildly from describing in detail how “I got in this morning, and I went to the loo, and he walked out the cubicle, and it fucking stunk” to effortlessly tying this into the bubbling political anger that seems inescapable in modern Britain, telling us how “nobody likes a fucking Tory reign, The Prime Minister's face hanging in the clouds like Gary Oldman's Dracula.”

Mixing up the original order of the Divide and Exit songs was a great way to keep the crowd on their toes and bring new energy to the original album’s flow, with the second song “Middle Men” increasing the volume and anger by 1000, showcasing Jason’s John Lydon-esque spite and fury in full flow. This track seemed particularly relevant to the modern-day UK, with its repeated reference to “New Labour, The metropolis of discontent and lost dreams” being even more relevant than when it was first released in 2014.

Third song “You’re Brave” has to be one of their most underrated songs, with its honest imagery of a pretentious elitist with delusions of grandeur. Iggy Pop recently chose to read out the lyrics to this particular track to celebrate Divide and Exit’s 10th birthday, saying, “I related to this lyric very well, because in my life, I was once basically a poor, angry musician from the sticks, and you had to go to the big city and meet powerful people.”

Sat around the bloke's house
He liked me because I made some informed comment
About the early history of his fuckin' country
Big mirror
Lumps of drugs
His own private lift
Shit pieces of art
Matter-of-fact statements
About how he's pickin' his kids up in two hours
Twat, as if
You're brave

The combination of Jason’s biting humour and incendiary anger in tracks like “Fizzy” and “Jolly Fucker” fuse together like yin and yang, hooking you deep into the surreal and insightful lyrics, with beat maker Andrew Fearn’s newfound dance moves onstage being especially refreshing to see. The duo’s stage presence has only built in power and professionalism over the years I’ve seen them, with newer tracks “Mork and Mindy” and “Nudge It” placed seamlessly next to rarer Divide and Exit classics like “Strike Force” and “Under the Plastic and NCT,” highlighting the continuing strength of their creative force.

The show ended with a triple threat of classics “Tiswas,” “Jobseeker,” and “Tweet Tweet Tweet,” sending the crowd wild with a growing mosh pit and crowd surfers spinning their drenched t-shirts as they sang every word. Their fans are dedicated for a reason, and tonight the Sleaford Mods proved this, giving them everything they wanted and more. You could really tell how much Jason and Andrew truly enjoy what they do, standing together as one to create some of the best and most unique-sounding punk that continues to inspire and amaze me as well as their army of fans across the globe. I felt truly lucky to experience one of my favourite albums being performed so passionately at such an amazing venue too. I can’t wait to see them again, and I hope they choose to keep some of these deeper cuts from Divide and Exit in their future sets.
Long live Sleaford Mods!

Sleaford Mods bring their Divide and Exit UK tour to Nottingham on Saturday 30th November, headlining a sold-out show at The Bodega as part of their 25th Birthday celebrations.