THE POP GROUP
“When the Pop Group close with the tremendous We Are Time, it’s with the sense of a band that could and still ought to light a fire under guitar music’s conservatives.” • 5* Guardian (Celtic Connections – January 2014)
The Pop Group, the most wildly innovative and barrier-shattering band to emerge from the late 70s post-punk era, have announced their first ever UK tour in October to coincide with the first run of re-issues on the new Freaks Are Us label.
Since reforming in 2010 the band have played a handful of key festivals around the world including a rapturously received show in Glasgow earlier this year. The Guardian exclaimed in their 5 star review that “the years have divested this band’s music of none of its urgent potency” while The Times stated “Cited as a key influence by Nick Cave and Primal Scream these wilfully discordant Bristolians unleash an exhilarating mash up of polemical lyrics, funk rhythms, free jazz and dub reggae with a tightness and ferocity that would challenge bands half their age” in their 4 star review.
Spearheading the first wave of reissues the band will release two albums, a re-issue of their 1980 post-punk classic ‘We Are Time’ remastered from original tapes and ‘Cabinet of Curiosities’, a nine-track compilation including the single ‘Where There Is A Will’ as well as rarities and previously unreleased material. Both albums are set for release on 20th October.
The seven date UK tour is in support of Campaign Against Arms Trade.
“In this age of hidden agendas / proxies and false flag attacks, now more than ever we must campaign against the arms trade THE MOST BRUTAL TRADE” • Mark Stewart
plus special guest:
SLEAFORD MODS
Sleaford Mods started out sometime during 2006 whilst Jason Williamson was living in Nottingham. Born out of part frustration and part accident, it quickly found its feet as an aggressive verbal onslaught on all that is contrived and connected to the day-to-day hammer of low paid employment and domestic siutations arising from that trap. After a year of working ideas out in both the studio and in live performances, Williamson moved south and took the cause to London for a couple of years and trod the boards there for a couple of years, before returning to Nottingham in 2009.
Soon after that return he met Andrew Fearn and the Sleaford Mods became a duo. Fearn’s first work was on the production of “Wank” – the Mods’ fifth CDr album. Soon after that started stalking the stage and studio with Williamson. Andrew’s involvement meant that Jason was now able to stop creating the samples and loops that littered the early recordings and concentrate on the lyrics, whilst Andrew created numerous tunes for Jason to vent his spleen over.
austerity_dogsJust after the release of “Wank” the duo were invited to play a three day festival curated by Nottingham’s Rammel Club. During that weekend a working relationship with Nottingham’s abstract-punk Harbinger Sound label was formed. A relationship which – a year later – resulted in the release of the “Austerity Dogs” vinyl album. This release would be followed by numerous shows around the UK and Europe, including further festival appearances. As word- of-mouth praise for the album slowly spread out and onto the record-buying publics’ radar, “Austerity Dogs” soon sold out of its intial run of 300 copies and has gone one to, as of today, a fourth pressing of the vinyl edition and a CD version was also released. Rave reviews would start to appear in magazines as diverse as The Wire and Uncut, along with interviews being published both on paper and on-line, both here and abroad. The album featured, and topped, many writers polls for the best records of 2013.
Divide and ExitWith more dates being lined up throughout 2014 the interest in the Mods will continue to spread. Helped by a reputation as a great live band backed with a solid set of releases – including four 7″s released by the likes of Matador and X-Mist amongst others over the last few months – behind them. Not only is the new album “Divide and Exit” due to arrive in April 2014 – in both a vinyl and CD version, but a retrospective 2LP set will be released in Germany during the coming months too. “Divide and Exit” has already won extensive critical praise in the run up to its release date. 
