Tag: Sleaford Mods

Video by William Ruben Helms

New Video: Dead Pioneers Team Up with Sleaford Mods’ Jason Williamson on Brooding, Post Punk-Inspired “The Worst Among Us”

Denver-based punk outfit Dead Pioneers — Josh Rivera (guitar), Abe Brennan (guitar), Shane Zweygardt (drums), Algiers’ Lee Tesche (bass) and acclaimed indigenous visual and performance artist and activist Gregg Deal (vocals) — will be releasing their third album Wagon Burner on June 26, 2026 through Hassle Records.

Wagon Burner as the band’s Gregg Deal says is “more collaborative,” while being heavier, harder and much more accessible with a focus on mosh pit friendly hooks and choruses. The album features guest spots Cheap Perfume, The Interrupters  and Sleaford Mods.  The album’s material acknowledges that things are bleak but the band rises up to our miserable occasion, casting an empowering light deep into the gloom.

The Denver-based outfit’s third album will include, the previously released “No Kings” and the album’s latest single “The Worst Among Us,” which features a guest spot from Sleaford Mods’ Jason Williamson. Arguably one of the most post-punk leaning songs of the album so far, “The Worst Among Us” is anchored around a brooding and shimmering krautrock pulse as Deal and Williamson trade spoken word-like vocal turns detailing the rot, brutality, theft, exploitation and evil of colonialism, racism, classism and more, rooted in bitter, lived-in personal experience. Resembling The Jim Carroll Band’s classic 1980 self-titled album, “The Worse Among Us” is a bold step in a new sonic direction while retaining elements of the Denver-based outfit’s sound and creative approach.

“While it’s easy for me to say I’m proud of every song on Wagon Burner, I’d be remiss by not admitting this one is one of my favorites,” admits frontman Gregg Deal. “The way it came together with (bassist) Lee at the helm of this one. This song feels like a level up for us, a piece that brings together elements that are 100% Dead Pioneers with some other elements that are new. I’ve said this before, and I’ll say it again, but we really are about the art of this work. ‘The Worst Among Us’ is in this camp, recognizing that we sometimes will find lightening in a bottle more than once while on the Dead Pioneers path.”

“I wish I could express how excited I am to have Jason on this track with us,” Deal continues. “Lee introduced me to Sleaford Mods in 2021 when we met and pulled together ‘Bad Indian.’ In the space of the original idea of Dead Pioneers being ‘spoken word with punk riffs,’ Lee pointed me to Sleaford Mods and their then new album Spare Rib. I’d be lying if I didn’t admit that I’ve been proper obsessed with Sleaford Mods since. This feels like another full circle moment for Wagon Burner, and I am sincerely humbled to share space with the likes of Jason Williamson.

“Colonialism, imperialism, theft, murdering, oppressing and death? All the things a song needs, capped off by the unmistakable cadence and voice of Jason Williamson. This song was an important one lyrically, in presenting some personal experiences while acknowledging the more general grievances of colonialism and imperialism. This moment in the world’s history is more poignant than most for a song like this. Saying the things that need to be said on a political, social and cultural level is wildly important right now,” Deal says.

“’Nabbing lands, traditions or symbols with cunning chicanery or beady eyed brute force.’ How could I not be on a tune with lyrics like these?” Sleaford Mods’ John Williamson says. ” ‘The Worst Among Us’ is the kind of song that revitalises the idea of Punk within the listener. Wrapped up in some weird Cure/Sisters Of Mercy vibe to boot. Very honoured to be included.”

Directed by Lee Tesche, the accompanying video for “The Worst Among Us” is a remarkably cinematic visual that features Nouveau Vague-styled split screens, brooding silhouettes, and footage of Dead Pioneers’ Deal in his art studio and with some indigenous friends and family, as well as Sleaford Mods’ Williamson in abandoned, damp tunnels and abandoned train tracks.

Single Review by William Ruben Helms

New Audio: Sleaford Mods Give RVG’s “Nothing Really Changes” a Dance Floor Friendly Remix Treatment

Acclaimed and rising Aussie outfit and JOVM mainstays  RVG — currently Romy Vager (vocals, guitar), Gregor’s and Hearing’s Reuben Bloxham (guitar), Rayon Moon‘s Marc Nolte (drums), and Isabelle Wallace (bass) — have released three critically applauded albums:

  • 2017’s A Quality of Mercy, which was recorded live off the floor at Melbourne’s iconic rock ‘n’ roll pub, The Tote Hotel. Initially released to little fanfare, the album, much to their surprise received critical acclaim both nationally and internationally, landing on a number of end-of-year Best of Lists. 

  • 2020’s Victor Van Vugt-produced Feral was released by Fire Records globally, excluding Australia and New Zealand, where it was released by Our Golden Friend. The album received breathless praise nationally and internationally, with Rolling Stone Australia calling the album “the record of a lifetime.”

  • Their third album Brain Worms, which was released earlier this year through Fire Records globally and Our Golden Friend in Australia and New Zealand.

In the lead up to the album’s release, I wrote about four of the album’s released singles:

  • “Nothing Really Changes,” an angular, 80s New Wave-inspired track rooted in enormous arena rock friendly riffage, paired with the Aussie outfit’s long-held penchant for anthemic hooks and choruses and Vager’s lived-in, heart-worn-on-sleeve lyricism: The song features a narrator desperately missing someone while confronting the lingering ghosts of their relationship — with frustration, despair, anger and a begrudging acceptance. As the band’s Vager explains, the song “started off as a songwriting experiment to write something catchy with an obnoxious riff, a cross between Divinyls and ‘Smoke on the Water.‘ It’s a song about missing someone but protecting yourself from being hurt.”

  • “Squid,” a rousing arena rock friendly anthem that brings Heaven Up Here-era Echo and the Bunnymen and Starfish-era The Church to mind: Swirling and shimmering guitar textures are paired with angular guitar attack, thunderous drumming, shout-along worthy hooks and choruses. But while rooted in an absurd, Kafkaesque-like nightmare in which the song’s narrator imagines what might happen if they were to go back in time, step on something and become a squid, Vager’s delivery is so desperately earnest and urgent that it feels very real.

  • “Midnight Sun,” an urgent, hurtling ripper built around Vager’s defiant, furious delivery, jangling guitars, and a thunderous and propulsive rhythms action paired with the band’s unerring knack for rousingly anthemic hooks and choruses Fittingly, the song deals with matters of disbelief, and what it feels like to live in a culture — and a world — that often prefers to argue about semantics rather than save the world from burning. If it hits close to home, it fucking should. It’s our current hellscape, where we constantly deal with a seemingly unending and pervasive, cynical, self-serving stupidity and myopia. 

  • “Common Ground,” a shimmering and anthemic ballad rooted in heart-worn-proudly-on-sleeve earnestness and lived-in personal experience. And at the center, Vager’s commanding presence, delivering the song’s lyrics with a mix of heartache, weariness, resignation, yearning, acceptance that can only come with the recognition of a relationship being irrevocably and irreparably over. “Common Ground” is in many ways about heartache and those moments of begrudging acceptance in our lives; but it’s also about the resolve to defiantly and proudly dust yourself off and figure out what’s next. If you’ve been there — and I have been many times in my life — the song speaks of the experience with a profound wisdom, unvarnished honesty and deep sense of hope.

As the acclaimed Aussie JOVM mainstays are in the middle of a headlining national tour, rising British duo Sleaford Mods give “Nothing Really Changes” the remix treatment. But before, I talk about the single, some much-needed background on the band. The British duo have become one of the UK’s cult bands of the moment, known for being unapologetic champions of working-class anger in a post-Brexit, austerity-era landscape. They’ve had three UK Top 10 albums in the last four years. And building upon a growing profile, they’ve collaborated with Leftfield and The Prodigy, while making Iggy Pop one of their highest profile fans.

With their remix, Sleaford Mods slow the tempo down a bit and turn the song into a funky dance floor friendly bop that transforms the original’s heartbreak and despair into something a bit more hopeful, upbeat — and dare I say, blissful. “This is a brilliant song. From a brilliant album. It’s been more than an honour to be associated with it in some way,” Sleaford Mods say.

The rising British outfit’s remix is the first single from the Nothing Really Changes (Remixes) EP slated for an October 20, 2023 release through Ivy League Records.