Slaves: meet the young Kent punks putting the party in the political

http://www.theguardian.com/music/2015/may/23/slaves-the-hunter-feed-the-mantaray

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It’s just gone 8pm and Slaves’ dressing room at the Wedgewood Rooms in Portsmouth is a picture of domestic bliss. Guitarist Laurie Vincent, 22, is darning turn-ups on to the orange jumpsuit he’ll wear onstage. Isaac Holman, 23, Slaves’ singer and almost certainly the only stand-up drummer currently with a major-label record deal, is ironing a pair of business slacks with meticulous care.

Vincent takes a break from sewing to ask me to rub argan oil into a fresh tattoo of a 1940s deep-sea diver that covers half his back. The harmony of the scene is spoiled only by the smell: the rich notes of the oil mingle in the air with the strange pancake aroma that’s emanating from Holman’s sweat-soaked trousers and the fetid stench of a blocked toilet next door. Ah, so this is that glamorous rock’n’roll we’ve heard so much about.

“I haven’t even pooed,” laments Vincent. “I wish I could poo.”

If things go to plan, Slaves won’t have to put up with backed-up toilets for much longer. This is the first night of the band’s first full headline UK tour, which is almost entirely sold-out across the country. After signing to Virgin/EMI last March, they were named on the BBC’s Sound Of 2015 list in January, and recent singles Hey and The Hunter both became fixtures on primetime Radio 1. They’ve used this exposure to build a rabid fanbase that, in Portsmouth tonight, will include not only screaming 18-year-old girls but also their fathers, nodding and declaring Slaves “a proper old-school punk band”.

We’ll never play on a stage, because this is never going to go anywhere

They’re fun for all the family, yet it’s not just Holman’s stand-up drumkit that marks Slaves out as a unique proposition in 2015. It’s the fact that on radio playlists dominated by sanitised singer-songwriters and slick pop ballads, Slaves turn up with primal songs that throw together punk existentialism, sketches of suburban life and absurd narratives about manta rays and sasquatches in noisy three-minute bursts. They’re never quite calls-to-arms protests, but their songs do act as broadsides against ignorance, apathy and the monotony of the nine-to-five. Nobody’s more surprised to find them courting mainstream success than the band themselves.

“The fact that we’re being played to the masses is just weird,” says Holman. “You almost forget that it’s your own band, and just think: ‘Thank fuck Radio 1 are playing something like this, something that isn’t a love song.’”

Both members of the band grew up in Kent: Holman in Tunbridge Wells, Vincent in Maidstone. They were casual acquaintances as teenagers but got to know each other properly when Vincent joined Holman’s band Bareface. Soon, the pair split off to work on their own music.

“I can really vividly remember a conversation where we said: ‘We’ll never play on a stage, because this is never going to go anywhere, so let’s just make something that we really fucking enjoy doing,’” says Vincent. “It’s actually paid off.”

To gauge just how well it’s paying off, I’ve been senton the road with them for the next five days. I plan on taking notes and drinking their riders. The band have other ideas…

TUESDAY, PORTSMOUTH

10:21PM

After tearing through opener White Knuckle Ride at the Wedgewood Rooms, it isn’t long before Holman has his top off. Holman appears to expend more energy during one song than most band members manage in their entire careers. It’s the kind of dedication that explains why he limits himself to just a few Smirnoff Ices before a show. “You wouldn’t get wasted before you work out,” he explains.

10:39PM

“Where’s Kevin EG Perry?” demands Vincent from the stage. “Kevin! Kevin!” he continues, sounding like the mum from Home Alone. He turns to the audience: “Kevin’s a journalist and what journalists usually do is stand at the back and write about us. We want you to crowdsurf him for the whole of the next song. If you drop him, we’ll stop playing.”

I’ve never crowdsurfed before, but it’s amazing how compliant you can be when a man has a microphone. As I loom over the crowd I remember why I’ve avoided it. My body is impractically long, and I wear size 13 clown boots. Against my expectations, the mass of teenagers take my weight just as Holman screams “Cheer Up London!” and launches into Slaves’ latest anthem, a slice of Fight Club-style existentialism that mocks the capital and its grumpy inhabitants.

As the song reaches its frantic climax I’m being unsteadily tossed about like a fallen tree. I peer towards the stage and catch sight of one of my canoe feet connecting sharply with the back of an unsuspecting teenager’s head. I’m washed up onstage and, in a blind stagger, I hug Vincent and then Holman. Hugging Holman is a mistake. His naked torso is slicked with so much sweat I worry that if I squeeze too hard he’ll fire across the stage like a bar of soap in the shower.

10:55PM

In homage to their gloriously foolish single Feed The Mantaray, someone has come to the gig wearing a bedsheet decorated with silver Gaffer tape. The band already have a professional manta ray, their merch guy Olly, who has a proper costume left over from a video shoot. Vincent hauls them both onstage to initiate a manta ray battle. It is very silly.

11:40PM

After the gig, Vincent is straight back on his phone. “One of the good things about playing shows,” he says, “is that it’s one time I can’t look at our Facebook or Twitter.” He’s particularly glued to it now because yesterday the band decided to post a statement, responding to criticisms about their name. Some voices have been arguing that a band consisting of two white men don’t have any right to call themselves Slaves, that the term is racially loaded. Holman and Vincent contend, however, that the name is a metaphor for life in contemporary capitalism. The conclusion of their statement reads: “We are all slaves in this modern age, whether it be to our jobs, corporations, social media or society in general. We are all in this together.”

The band are frustrated by the suggestion they’re racist. The image of slavery is used in a variety of contexts in their lyrics, from government spies on Sugar Coated Bitter Truth (“Now you’re a slave to their every command”) to the social pressure to be “Beach Body Ready” on Beauty Quest. “It feels like the people criticising our name are so stubborn about their views, they don’t even want to align with people who are treading a similar path,” sighs Vincent.

WEDNESDAY, LONDON

8:45PM

It’s election day tomorrow, but the only political statement they’ve made so far is to tweet “bellend” at Nigel Farage. The seat the Ukip leader is contesting, Thanet South, is about an hour further south into Kent from Maidstone and Tunbridge Wells, and Vincent, who recently tattooed the word “Kent” on his hand, argues that the party is benefiting from the area’s hidden poverty. “Because those towns are in the south everyone assumes they’re rich,” he says. “They’re forgotten, and Ukip are capitalising on that.”

Holman nods in agreement: “They’re preying on the weak.”

9:45PM

Slaves make me crowdsurf again. I manage to kick three teenagers in the head this time. I think I’m getting the hang of it.

THURSDAY, LONDON

9:15PM

It’s the second day of a two-night stint at London’s Scala, and the band are champing at the bit after spending the day at Radio 1, where they recorded an incendiary version of Skepta’s Shutdown. Vincent likens grime to the punk scene in 1977, and is made up at the reaction their cover has received. He’s even had a private message from Skepta himself. “It’s, like, going viral,” he says, in disbelief.

Thank fuck Radio 1 are playing something like this

10:32PM

“They’re not going anywhere, are they?” Holman is backstage with a towel over his shoulders, looking as if he’s just knocked out Floyd Mayweather. They’d decided not to play encores on this tour, but the crowd are demanding one. By way of compromise, Vincent and Holman go back onstage, but only to play their ultra-short early single Girl Fight. They debate whether the fact the audience will have waited 15 minutes for a 15-second encore will earn them some sort of record.

10:37PM

Back in the dressing room, Miles Kane has turned up. He’s wearing an ostentatious blazer and is with a model who looks Photoshopped into the scene. A moment later, Alex from the support band Wonk Unit also arrives. He’s been in DIY bands since the early 90s, is missing teeth as well as most of his hair, and is wearing a T-shirt that says Dinosaurs Are Wankers. As Alex and Miles reach out to shake hands from across a musical and aesthetic chasm, it’s a neat sketch of the two worlds Slaves straddle: the oddball punk band mingling with the indie A-list.

1:01AM

Slaves take over the top bar at the Scala for their afterparty, but the plug is pulled promptly at 1am. Holman, who’s been DJing everything from Roots Manuva to Norwegian synth-pop, is still relatively sober. Vincent, taking advantage of tomorrow’s day off, is completely smashed. “A mate is driving me back to Tunbridge Wells,” he explains. “There’s nothing worse than getting fucked and then having to sit in the back of a car.”

SATURDAY, MANCHESTER

9:35PM

There’s no barrier in front of the stage at Gorilla tonight, so the front row claw at Vincent and Holman’s legs like zombies. It’s two days after the election, and there’s an early chant of “We all hate Tories”. Holman isn’t keen. “Let’s leave politics out of this,” he says, “I’m fed up of hearing about it.” They don’t want to be firebrands; their music is what Holman calls “social documentation” in the lineage of the Streets, rather than Rage Against The Machine. Slaves’ only enemy is indifference.

10:14PM

There’s a moment of relative calm. Holman sits near the lip of the stage and a fan pulls him till they’re eye to eye, and says: “Thank you. Seriously, thank you.”

10:47PM

I part from the band as they head off for 10 more days of touring. Before they go, I ask Holman what he’d made of the fan and he immediately knows what I’m talking about. “That was intense, really intense,” he nods, his eyes widening. “But that’s what it’s all about.”

Are You Satisfied? is out on 1 June via Virgin/EMI