TRACK REVIEW: IDLES - Model Village

TRACK REVIEW:

IDLES

PHOTO CREDIT: Tom Ham

Model Village

9.8/10

The track, Model Village, is available from:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sjr11lGEBg4

The album, Ultra Mono, is available to pre-order here:

https://www.idlesband.com/collection/ultra-mono/

RELEASE DATE:

25th September, 2020

GENRE:

Post-Punk

ORIGIN:

Bristol/London, U.K.

LABEL:

Partisan Records

TRACKLIST:

War

Grounds

Mr. Motivator

Anxiety

Kill Them with Kindness

Model Village

Ne Touche Pas Moi

Carcinogenic

Reigns

The Lover

A Hymn

Danke

__________

BECAUSE the wonderful IDLES are one of my favourite…

PHOTO CREDIT: Lindsay Melbourne

modern bands, I felt that I needed to review them this weekend! I know I have reviewed the band before and, whilst I try not to repeat myself, it has been a while since I visited them. Before I talk about the new single and aspects of IDLES’ upcoming third album, their new track, Model Village, has an incredible video! It is directed by Michel Gondry (with his brother, I believe) and it is one that made me smile. Although there is a deeper meaning and message in the video, and it conveys something quite serious, the animation is wonderful, and one cannot help but re-watch the video, as it is a lot more engaging and interesting than most out there! IDLES have always produced wonderful music videos, and I never expected them to hook up with Michel Gondry – who is my favourite director in any realm. I love his work, and I hope he and IDLES continue to work together in the future. I do think that music videos are as important now as ever and, whilst music television does not play the same role as it did years ago, a great video is an important thing; it can bring the song to new people, and you do get artists who do not really put much into videos. IDLES have this knack of releasing brilliant videos, and they provide their songs with new angles and nuances. The video for Model Village is superb, and it means that I have listened to the track more than I normally would. I love how IDLES approach things, and they put so much care and attention into each aspect of their music. I am going to look back and quote from interviews the band - mostly their lead, Joe Talbot – conducted a little while back, but their new album, Ultra Mono, is out on 25th September. Ultra Mono is one of the most-anticipated albums of the year, and it follows the epic Joy as an Act of Resistance from 2018. The Bristol band seem to get stronger with every album, and I do feel like they are one of the most real and powerful bands around.

PHOTO CREDIT: Tom Gallo

In terms of the new record, then what are we to expect? A few months ago, DIY caught up with the band, and their lead, Joe Talbot, explained what will arrive with Ultra Mono:

“Though the forthcoming record undoubtedly still rings with the same need for connection and truth - “It’s exactly the same as the last two albums,” he notes, “hopefully it’s a window onto us and mirror onto you” - you sense that the frontman is keen to ensure IDLES are musicians first, and slightly inadvertent figureheads of a new movement second. “That’s why hopefully you’ll never see me in the tabloids, because it’s not about images of me, it’s about the art we create,” he continues, emphatically. “It’s important to keep that distance otherwise you end up becoming a celebrity and no one wants that, not really.” And so, while excitable chatter around the record might initially stem from its potential emotional impact - how it can progress the hammer blow hit of catharsis that ‘Joy…’ landed two years back - the main talking points at play here look set to be sonic ones.

Recorded at France’s La Frette Studios and written “slightly remotely”, with the singer in Bristol and guitarist and main co-songwriter Mark Bowen in London having both recently become fathers, the coming together of the album too seems born from a determination to harness and progress their own musical powers. “I think we’ve found a similar joy in what makes a good song. Bowen is a very creatively engulfing person; he wants to do everything and make it massive and play all the time, but we’re learning the economy of sound, and space and silence within songs,” explains the frontman. “It takes a lot of writing to find out what you love about music, and then you write what you love instead of trying to write the next Radiohead song. We found each others’ strengths and enjoyed each other’s skin.”

Thematically, the band have honed their sights in too, with the record’s title forming a basis for them to “set boundaries and individually flourish” within its concept... except he won’t tell us what it is yet. “Absolutely not!” guffaws Joe at the - very reasonable, let’s face it - question of letting slip the titular key to LP3. But there are, however, some breadcrumbs to help establish the trail so far”.

PHOTO CREDIT: Charlotte Patmore

It is amazing to think how far the band have come since their debut, Brutalism, was released in 2017! Prior to then, they were relatively unknown, and that debut really opened doors for them. In fact, it wasn’t really until the second album (Joy as an Act of Resistance) arrived that they gained proper respect, and their music reached a much larger audience. I think many people assume a band like IDLES sort of came from nowhere or were fully-formed when their debut came out. Like most acts, the road to realisation and success has been a gradual one for the Bristol band. It has not been easy but, over the past decade, IDLES have been able to grow, and they have reached a place where they can be themselves and don’t have the same worries and limitations as they did as a new band all those years ago. I want to bring in an interview from NME from last month, where Joe Talbot explained how IDLES grafted and gained the experience so they could get to where they are now:

“The beautiful thing about us being ignored for 10 years is that there was no one telling us what we couldn’t do, we just had to learn it ourselves,” Talbot began. “And that meant that now I think ‘Ultra Mono’ is vigorously Idles. It’s fluent in Idles language because we’ve just been able to take baby steps every moment, make mistakes, and no one’s fucking at our gigs so we can make mistakes and come back stronger.

“We just built it slowly over time,” he added. “It made us really appreciate selling 40 tickets. It made us really appreciate being able to write five decent songs in a row, because we took that time and we were given the breadth to make mistakes, and now we’re here.

“I think experience is fucking amazing but you also have to hold yourself accountable and work your ass off. It’s not an industry that carries people. They chew you up and they spit you out”.

I want to change directions slightly and pick up on an aspect of IDLES’ music that was evident in their first two albums, and one will hear on Ultra Mono. Many might assume a Post-Punk band like IDLES would be raw and unfiltered. So many of the older Punk bands were, but I think there has been a welcomed evolution from the 1970s and 1980s whereby bands can put out this physical and gutsy music, but there is sensitivity and vulnerability underneath. In fact, when it comes to opening up their hearts and discussing themes that are more sensitive, IDLES have definitely been at the forefront and inspired other bands to do likewise. In any genre, it can be difficult to be that bare and honest, and it is especially tricky if your music is Punk/Post-Punk. In the DIY interview I quoted from earlier, Talbot talked about vulnerability and, as last year was such a busy one, what impact that had on him:

“The songs are all projections of inner workings,” he continues. “I’m not preaching or telling anyone else what to do. I’m showing people what I’m doing to become a better person in the long run - no, not better, but a more productive person...” More productive than the 190 shows the band managed to plough through during 2019? “Numbers aren’t necessarily productive,” he answers, with a wry chuckle. “I probably wasn’t a very productive person by December last year, I was at my ends for sure...”

Even when IDLES are pushing their artistic limits and attempting to make a heavy, thumping record to challenge hip hop’s greats, it’s comments such as these that show the band are still determined to allow themselves to be vulnerable. And, having debuted a handful of new tracks during last year’s winter tour run, the co-existence of these ideas is already easy to hear”.

Listen to songs on Joy as an Act of Resistance, and you get these gut-wrenching moments, and so much emotion and vulnerability. June deals with the death in childbirth of Talbot's daughter, Agatha. Other songs on the album address toxic masculinity, immigration, the changing roles of men, and mental-health.

PHOTO CREDIT: Ed Norton

Not only is addressing subjects like this important and inspiring for the listener, but I also think there is something therapeutic about the music. For listeners, there is the chance to bond with this very urgent and deep music; filter some of your own fear and anger through the songs and connect with a band who mean every word they sing. I think for IDLES, and Joe Talbot especially, the past couple of years have been hard, and he has faced personal tragedy and addiction. Back in 2018, Talbot spoke with The Line of Best Fit, and he addressed how he became addicted to alcohol, and the impact that had on him and the people around him. Although music has helped a lot in terms of rehabilitation, it is obvious that Talbot has taken responsibility for his past, and he needed to change:

“The last time I'd kept in my emotions I became rampant with drugs and alcohol and I was violent towards my friends and my partner, and I was a horrible man,” he says. He stops in his tracks to clarify that he was never violent in the sense he was punching or kicking, but that he was aggressive. “I was a nasty man,” he adds, bluntly. “I never wanted to go back there.”

“I'll make a mistake a few times but you won't catch me doing it forever, and I'm pretty good at accepting fault; sometimes I just think the way to improve is completely wrong. I'd always convince myself that isn't wasn't alcohol that was the problem, but that I was just drinking too much or whatever. The big thing I thought I was doing was being honest – but it turns out I really wasn't being honest at all.”

“But that's where I am now,” Talbot says with quiet relief. “I know I have to be more open with my partner and communicate with her more, my friends and family too, and let them all know where I am emotionally”

PHOTO CREDIT: Stewart Baxter

There are a couple of subjects I want to tackle before moving on to review Model Village. Not only are they relevant to past IDLES albums, but they will also feed into Ultra Mono. One reason why I love IDLES is because they are a band that tackle toxic masculinity. Again, maybe this is not something one would expect from a band who deliver such powerful music. Part of that power derives from how they tackle stigma and harder themes that many people avoid. Again, I want to come back to Joe Talbot, as I think his past and earliest years have enforced how he approaches lyrics and what makes IDLES stand out. I want to return to the interview from The Line of Best Fit, where Talbot addressed the role of gender and toxic masculinity:

“Talbot's ideas on gender and masculinity – “there's no real anything in terms of gender... it's all fake,” – charge Joy As An Act Of Resistance to new heights. Like every strand of thought of the album, his ideas on the topic are shaped by a newfound honesty and a place of genuine, Agape-type love for the goodness in humanity. Yes, masculinity is profoundly toxic – but there's a hope for change. At least on an individual level.

“I was very excited about becoming a father – or at least a parent,” Talbot says. “I've always wanted that. To try and encourage another human that's it's okay to be different and weird.”

“I felt very lonely growing up – I had plenty of friends and my parents were wonderful, there was no neglect or anything, no financial strife. I had a wonderful upbringing, but I always felt lonely. It was during counselling, during the making of the album but after my daughter had died, that I really got to realise how little I spoke of my emotions, even though I felt like I was an open book because of my music and my lyrics – I feel like I'm quite blunt because I don't fuck around with words”

PHOTO CREDIT: Lindsay Melbourne

The last thing I want to talk about before moving on is the revival of Punk, or the growth of Post-Punk. Maybe the genres have been augmented and celebrated is because of the sort of themes IDLES are addressing, and how different their music is. They combine the spirit of Punk and its potency, but they have expanded the lyrical palette and created music that is a lot deeper and more resonant. There is a political edge, as I shall discuss at the end of this review, but they are very personal and connect with so many people. IDLES were interviewed by NME last year after they were nominated for a BRIT award, and Joe Talbot was asked about IDLES’ role in reviving the Punk scene:

“We were talking to Laurie from Slaves last week and he namechecked you guys in declaring that there’s been much more of an acceptance towards punk lately than there has been in recent years. Do you feel the same way?

“I love that guy. Yeah, of course there’s a lot of younger kids getting involved and that makes it attractive to the industry. It is absolutely more popular now. You’ve got some amazing bands coming through, and some amazing bands that are coming through. I heard a cheeky rumour that Girl Band are going to do something soon. I like a really good band called Egyptian Blue. They played at Yala at one of Felix from The Maccabees‘ nights. They were fucking sick. It’s great, and that’s what happens.

PHOTO CREDIT: Pooneh Ghana

“The other side of music is bloated, boring and awful. You’ve got loads of DJs with weird masks on and it’s all falling apart. It’s a bit Ant & Dec these days, isn’t it? People are getting bored of that shit and they want to hear people talking about what’s going on around them. People with Mickey Mouse heads on playing other people’s songs isn’t that interesting.”

Would you use the word ‘revival’?

“The last time that anything like that happened was with The Strokes, then The Libertines kicked off and what not. Then 2009-10 happened when everything got awful. It’s weird. I was clearing out my attic and reading an old NME from 2008 with all the new bands from nu-rave and all that. It was fucking great. Young Knives had a second album out, Art Brut had a new album out, We Are Scientists were on their second album. It was that second wave, then after that it all got a bit shit.

“I think Girl Band’s album was the last album that got me really excited. I thought that was going to get loads of kiddies into noise-rock and stuff, but it didn’t. What needs to happen now is for a young band to come out and make this fucking amazing album that excites everyone and changes everyone’s mind again. Well, maybe not a young band – maybe IDLES need to do it? We’re touring with Fontaines DC. They’re friends of ours. I’ve got their album on my phone and it’s fucking sick. That could be THE album. It fucking should be. There are other albums coming out that I’ve heard that are unreal too. I hope it happens, just to change the scenery”.

I do like how Model Village seems to encapsulate a particular state or area of society: those who are unevolved and discriminatory; a sort of person that one can find anywhere, but they have become more vocal and amplified given growing tensions around the world. With the Black Lives Matter movement creating greater unity, but also bringing to the surface a lot of hatred for those who oppose its values, I think a song like Model Village seems to encapsulate a lot of communities around the world!The song does have that wonderful video, and I think the fact that it is animated gives the video more width and ambition; it can be more eye-catching and vivid, and the cost is far less than if it was live action. The opening verse is not too angered or snarling: instead, Talbot delivers the words with a spring, and there is a this sort of growing menace that gets under the skin – rather than shout or deliver the words with growl, there is something more intimidating about Talbot’s delivery. “A lot of nine-fingered boys in the village/They haven't got much choice in the village/Model car, model wife, model village/Model far, model right, model village” says our hero. The idea of this model village is that the people have built something fake and ideal to them but, to be fair, it is not representative of the real world and it needs to be dismantled. The people are not too friendly in the model village, and it seems like this perverse ideal of supremacy and a ‘perfect Britain’ is one that needs abolishing – “Got my head kicked in in the village/There’s a lot of pink skin in the village/"Hardest man in the world" in the village/He says he's got with every girl in the village”.

PHOTO CREDIT: Ania Shrimpton

The chorus is the moment when Talbot lets his voice power and roar. As opposed the almost playful nature of the verses’ delivery, the chorus has this slowed, elongated and animalistic quality. It is a powerful section of the song, and one cannot help but be moved: “I beg your pardon/I don’t care about your rose garden/I've listened to the things you said/You just sound like you're scared to death”. The video provides more depth and detail, as we see these figures race around the village, and all sorts of carnage and destruction take place. After the brief switch in the chorus, the second verse returns to the sort of inhabitants who are full of hate and bile. There are “a lot of overpriced drugs in the village/A lot of half pint thugs in the village”; a lot of white skin and thugs in the village and, as you look deeper into the words, Talbot is singing about something much more alarming than there being these small communities of racists and heartless people. In the modern day, the problem is far wider, and it is the politicians who could make a change but not doing anything. “Just give them an anthem and they'll sing it/Still they don’t know the meanings in it/Just saluting flags 'cause it's British/Idiot spirits think they're kindred” reinforces this idea of there being a split in Britain, and how urgently there needs to be reform and change. Model Village is another insane cut from an album that many are predicting will be the album of the year – even if there is still competition! They seem to tap into a feeling that many of us share; that desire to eradicate the worst of society and make things better. Their way with words and the sort of power they can deliver is what sets them apart from so many other artists.

PHOTO CREDIT: Lindsay Melbourne

The composition for Model Village is brilliant: from a raging guitar line and pummelling drums, the guitars then twist and wind, whilst the bass provides this wonderful sense of tension and movement. Talbot is at the front and, as usual, he is on tip-top form! The end of the song provides some of the most striking and urgent lines: “You gotta laugh as the curtain twitches/And the villagers bury their riches/But the village doesn't know what rich is/Just snitches snitching on snitches/Only one thing to do in the village/Just say toodle-do to the village/Toodle-fucking-do”. Even though Model Village is over four minutes in length, it seems much shorter, and you will cone back to it time and time again. It is one of IDLES’ best songs to date, and one knows that Ultra Mono is going to be absolutely huge! The band have already released three other singles – Mr. Motivator, Grounds, and A Hymn -, but I think Model Village is the best of the crop so far. It is an incredible song whose lyrics are so vivid and spot-on. They perfectly illustrate scenes inside of areas of the nation that are very bullish, unyielding in their wrong attitudes, and beholden to this idea of a pure, white Britain. Sadly, I think these enclaves are not reserved to margins and in smaller villages – big cities are embedded with people who want things to return to how they were, or they want to whitewash Britain. After such a fractious and strange year, I think Model Village holds more meaning and chills than it would in other year, and one cannot help but be gripped by this incredible track. Whilst a track as incredible as Model Village would be a peak in the career of all other artists, really, it is just business as usual for the unstoppable juggernaut that is IDLES!

Let us wrap things up soon but, just before, I would urge people to pre-order Ultra Mono, as it is going to be one of this year’s biggest albums. I am going to quote from a couple of older interviews that relate to the changing political landscape. In 2020, I think things are even more tense and divided than they were back in 2018, for example. I feel this is why IDLES connect with so many people, and why their albums are so impactful. I want to return to the interview from The Line of Best Fit from 2018, where Talbot discussed the political divide, and what side of the fence he sat on:

“The ongoing political landscape is scarred on all sides, with every angle catapulting projectiles at every other. Talbot says, with a degree of surprise, that many of his “'normal', admirable left-wing friends” began leaping onto the bandwagon, hurling insults and attacks at those who disagreed with their outlook on life.

“I am left wing,” he states, dampening any ideas of otherwise. “I am very socialist minded in the sense that I truly wish I could sacrifice my wealth – when I say 'my wealth' I don't mean give up my house or anything, but I am more than willing to pay considerably more tax and all the things the government should be subsidising for children of all wage gaps, all races, all socio-economic and socio-political areas, in all areas of the country. Things like housing and diet and fucking education. The health service. Equal opportunity is my main agenda.”

“With that in mind,” Talbot tracks back, “I saw a lot of people slinging mud – left, right, and centre. Obviously from the right, but suddenly more apparently from the left. To understand things as a humanist, as someone from the left, you need to be open to everyone's opinion. I don't mean you have to sit there and listen to every individual person, but you need to understand the context of where the people who voted Brexit are coming from: they wanted change. A lot of those people were deprived of the opportunity to work for a living or have access to housing – lots of things that the government stripped them of. The government then 'intelligently' used the tabloids to blame the whole thing on all immigrants. It's what right-wing politicians do all over the world and have done forever”.

PHOTO CREDIT: Ebru Yildiz

Before wrapping up, I want to go back even further to a 2017 interview from Loud and Quiet. It shows that, even back then, IDLES were really responding to what was happening around them; providing something that not many bands were – or doing it in a much more meaningful and powerful manner. With the country so split and conflicted, Joe Talbot talked about the political scene, and his bandmate, Mark Bowen, posed an interesting question:

“It’s not like we’ve tapped into a zeitgeist, it’s more that the zeitgeist has tapped into us,” adds Talbot. “People are a lot more socially aware than they were five years ago. They’re a lot poorer than they were and politicians are getting away with a lot more than they used to. It’s creeped in slowly and now bands like us and Sleaford Mods are getting popular you have people popping up saying, ‘who are you guys? You’re just tapping into shit.’ Nah, we’ve always been here but the situation has changed. Conversations up and down the country have turned more political. It’s what people want to hear about right now.”

“Do you find you want to write more political stuff now because of what’s going on?” asks Bowen, stepping into the role of interviewer. “No. I want to be more obtuse,” answers Talbot obligingly. “It would be lame to be like Green Day singing all that American Idiot stuff; it’s, like, well done. I bet Little Mix will come out with a political song any day now. I want to be more expressive and explore myself as a man within this political climate. That’s what we’re doing with the album. I’m interested in how politics affects my psyche, my emotions and my role in society. Basically, I don’t want to keep talking about the bastards and focus more on me as a bastard”.

I have sourced a lot from IDLES’ past, but I think that it is crucial when looking at the present. The band have come a long way, and they have definitely changed the music scene. I think Ultra Mono will be their most successful album, and they are a band who are remaining true to themselves; not needlessly going more mainstream or changing their music as they are more popular and well-known. It is full steam ahead for a band who have grow personally, and I think their music has provided great help and catharsis for so many out there. They will be keen to get back onto the road as soon as possible and, with a new album beckoning, it will be fascinating to see how the tracks…