SLAVES - TAKE CONTROL (ALBUM REVIEW)

Well…… what a month it’s been. Life looks to have taken an unplanned deviation from its cyclical humdrum nature. That’s right, things are potentially looking up. Maybe not in terms of career or lifestyle but our sanity and wellbeing for sure. Those glum days dwelling in an office chair glaring at a screen full of excel spreadsheets with numbers and data that generally mean jack shit to anyone have been given a lifeline. A little something to break up the monotony of everyday life and reawaken that firey dragon burning inside. Not all heroes wear capes and this one comes disguised as a vigorous hip thrust of meticulously crafted and enviously original punk rock. Yes, that’s right; Slaves are back with their angsty new album ‘Take Control’, released Friday 30th September. So, where do we start?

Many dared to question the lifespan of such a band after the release of ‘Are You Satisfied?’. Where could they possibly go from here? Will the new album just be more of the same? It’s difficult to grow, adapt and change when your limited to a half assembled drumkit and electric guitar. They received similar critique to Royal Blood, another two piece allegedly constrained by their primitive setup. Both bands blew up in astronomic fashion after the release of their debut albums, securing peak slots at major festivals and selling out tours. Overwhelming expectation comes adjacent to this level of success and many bands fall victim to its pressures. Take Royal Blood as a shining example. Their self-titled debut album was released back in 2013, receiving global recognition and many well regarded awards. This left thousands of fans poised unnervingly on the edge of their seats, wondering when a follow up would be announced. It’s been 3 years and still no sign of life in camp RB! Have they got the jitters? Struggling to adapt and develop their sound? Who knows! The point is Slaves could have easily fallen victim to this fatality, but they haven’t. They got straight back on the horse and used the incredible momentum of their debut album to carry them over the line. Actually ‘carry them over the line’ douses the fire somewhat. It paints underwhelming imagery of them only just about managing to put together a second album, which is by large not the case. Disregard that derogatory phrase please. They came smashing through the line, rubbing it out and creating their own fucking line wherever the hell they wanted. That’s right, fuck the critics, fuck the haters and piss on the doubters cos Slaves are back and it’s fucking glorious.

Are You Satisfied was the epitome of snarly punk. Venomous overdriven guitar, pounding rhythmic drumming and cleverly bound lyrics delivered with no subtlety. Take Control has maintained the bands core affluence but developed on the traditional punk motive significantly. Dropping just a year after their debut release they seem to have embraced momentum and attuned their writing style to integrate other aspects of their personal musical interests. A wider spectrum of instruments have been incorporated into the new record with Isaac using drum machines and bass guitars whilst Laurie has tried his hand on the keyboards. This exploration has opened their sound pallet up considerably moving them away from the use of just ‘primary colours’ and into a world of abstract and illusive shades. These explorative sounds can be heard primarily towards the back end of the album on tracks such as ‘Steer Clear’, ‘Angelica’ and ‘STD’s/ PHD’s’. Possibly the most gossiped about feature of the album is their collaboration with the Beastie Boys founder Mike D. The former rapper contacted Laurie after becoming aware of their rapid rise to music industry fame in the UK. His wealth of knowledge and distinctive style can be felt throughout the record and looks to have helped take Slaves up a gear into the next stage of their careers.

We dive head first into business with ‘Spit It Out’ probably the most comparable track to their former album. This single was released months before the record dropped and served as our first indication of what to expect. Written in a countryside studio called Dog House just outside of Reading this was their principal starting point for the album. During this period the boys met an old boy called Barry in the local pub. He insisted on getting them tanked up every night which Isaac claims played a big part in the writing of the music at the time. They spent their evenings getting smashed in the pub when they were meant to be hard at work and this mischievous aura can definitely be felt on ‘Spit It Out’. The spirit of Barry lives in the punk!

Hypnotized isn’t a track drenched in poetic illusions, its approach is black and white. A song highlighting the idiocy of shit reality TV shows that possess the minds of our generation. Being consumed with other peoples lives, sitting in front of the TV so intently fixated that you’re ‘dribbling’. The track is chuggy punk rock at its most audacious. Next up is ‘Consume or Be Consumed’. Despite being, in our opinion, one of the best on the album this track was originally meant to be a B-Side and wasn’t included on the tracklisting until the very last minute. The nature of the song, to us, illuminates the presence Mike D had on producing the album. However in an interview with NME, Slaves stated that the former Beastie Boy infact didn’t like the song to start with and voted to leave it off the record. Having taken the album away to reflect, the song was later revisited thanks to Mike D’s children who allegedly loved it. We are eternally grateful to the Beastie Boy offspring! The boys were desperate to get Mike D rapping on a Slaves song and with a big instrumental section towards the end of Consume or Be Consumed they had the perfect opportunity. The lads plucked up enough liquid courage and eventually asked him to rap a verse. They’ve hit the nail square on the fucking head with this track it has a perfect niche blend of fuzzy punk and 90’s hip-hop. This paired with Isaac’s Jamie T like rapping is a recipe for sensual eargasm’s.

Take Control, the album title track, was written in conjunction with others similar in style like ‘Spit It Out’ and ‘Hypnotised’. Lyrically it originated from Isaac’s harsh self-judgement, he wasn’t at all satisfied with the quality of his writing and decided to jot down lots of ‘shit lyrics’ as a way of taking his mind off the process. Laurie saw the outcome in a complete different light to his musical compadre and spent ages convincing him otherwise. Take Control is a ruthless guitar driven track that hurtles you into a state of euphoria. Blood will pump around your body at 100mph surfacing the rebellion tendencies you strived so hard to subdue. Despite this rather intense series of events by the end of the song you’ll be as de-stressed and chilled as a stoned sloth.

This album see’s the introduction of skits, a convention often used on rap albums. Their inclusion arose from the bands love for hip-hop/ rap and Eminem in particular. In the past Slaves have often had skit-like sections incorporated into their tracks, usually at the beginning or end of songs. It’s argued that people get annoyed with skits, they’re not really songs just brief segments of intermittent randomness. Funny they may be, but in reality how many times do you need to hear a 30 second loop of someone chatting shit? Having them as standalone entities gives listeners the option to skip through these tracks and get onto the ‘good stuff’. Take Control has two skits ‘Mr Industry’ and ‘Gary’. Mr Industry is a voicemail recording from their mate Ollie who many will recognise as the Mantaray/ Merch Guy. Isaac had arranged to meet up with him in a pub after the Mercury Awards show last year but, to the anger of his pal, was a no-show, hence the aggy voicemail. Gary Skit is, again, another voicemail from Isaac’s phone but this time of a happier nature. Their brummy mate Gary left them a message after a gig in Birmingham asking to meet up for a few drinks…….. not much too it really!

Up next is ‘Rich Man’ which is, hands down, our favourite track. The song itself is inspired by the current state of our country. Rich Man isn’t a real person but a character of fiction, one used to epitomise the notion of socialist, wealth and elite hierarchy that is becoming evermore apparent in our nation. The rich stay rich and the poor/ working class suffer. This particular character is one filled with pig ignorance and complete lack of disregard for those around him. This man may seem to have everything BUT his self-indulgent arrogance has dragged him down a path of moral seclusion and loneliness. In reality he has nothing but wealth and what is wealth if you have nobody to share it with? The track is homage to Blur’s ‘Country House’ which depicts a similar message of wealth distribution. Lyrically it’s ferocious, the direct intent and meaningful prose paint a clear picture and the riff itself is an absolute world beater, something to sink your teeth into.

Our generation is relentlessly connected through Social Media. In reality we are left powerless to its importance in modern life. Everyone and everything is connected in some way shape or form. This addiction is picking up some warranted attention in the form of studies and researches. We don’t fully understand its effects on the health and wellbeing of society. As the first generation of Social Media users it is important to comprehend the benefit it really holds and whether extensive use can have any underlying side effects. Some studies argued that use of Social Media tools have led to an increase in depression and anxiety. The notion that we are always connected, accountable for our, supposedly, private actions and subject to extreme scrutiny at every corner. Our personal lives are no longer personal, actions are instead closely examined under a scorching spotlight. It’s an interesting topic and clearly one that Isaac is moderately invested in. Play Dead is, put simply, a BANGER. It stems from a jam session where the two verses ‘too connected’ ‘disconnected’ formed a structural theme. The concept of being so connected that really we disconnect ourselves from life itself. Isaac mentions in an interview with NME that sleep disorders are on the increase, most people will sleep at night with their phones next to their heads and subconsciously we are aware of this, not allowing our body to shut off from the world. The song was tackled intensely over a day of recording and the original muse was built on to create more lyrical depth. Play Dead eventually came about, the idea of a dog rolling over and ‘playing dead’, we have become so reliant on being connected that we, ourselves, are playing dead. It’s an aggressive sounding track with viciously sharp distortion akin to pouring lemon juice on an open wound. You can feel the guitar growling its way through the song, not direct but unnervingly toying with its prey. Tempo may have taken a brief stint on the sidelines but ‘Play Dead’ still manages to be one of the albums heaviest. There’s no tranquiliser man enough to take down this beast!

‘Lies’ creeps up like an unexpected rebate from the tax office, you had no idea it was coming, damn was it needed and shit does it feel sweet. It’s a track that, instrumentally, we probably wouldn’t be able to match up to Slaves on a Never Mind the Buzzcocks quiz round. The guitar is explorative, you get the feel of two guitars playing at once with bassline notes and lead drives. If you close your eyes and ignore the vocals and certain aspects of the drumline you can almost hear a ‘Silent Alarm’ Bloc Party era essence. It’s a powerful topic, one of war, corruption, greed and national arrogance. Written stateside around the time that the UK decided to bomb Syria and deny the entry of thousands of helpless refugees. Isaac and Laurie witnessed what was going on back home whilst in LA and were, put frankly, shocked and disgusted. The lyrics branch from these worldwide topics creating a track that has an emotive feel through to its core. FUCK THE HI-HAT! This is a short whirlwind of guitar and drums, derived from one of their many jam sessions. It’s simple in structure and meaning. In the early stages of Slaves the band relentlessly toured the live circuit coming across many hecklers along the way. One common jeer from the crowd was ‘Where’s your Hi-Hat?’, this short track is a tribute to these early days and even a slightly smug middle finger, if you like. Issac shouts ‘I don’t need it’ as the track comes to an end, he’s definitely proved his point over the past two years

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yZg2qNAhSwE

As we come to the latter end of the album the tone, tempo and style of the album turns on its head slightly. People That You Meet is plain and simply a song about some of the people Slaves met during the making of Take Control. It has an old cockney drinking song vibe about it, you know that rhyming flow you could bellow out with one arm round a mate and the other spilling your half full pint all over the floor. It wouldn’t go a miss being thrown on after knee’s up mother brown or my old man’s a dustman at one of them classic Gavin and Stacey-esque family frontroom piss-ups. Get the broom from the understairs cupboard take centre stage get your knees up and bellow your heart out. Whether this style was intentional or not they’ve done a great job with it adding the punk twist. They slot a clever verse at the end of the song in tribute to Mike D that adds a great final touch to the track. ‘I feel like shit’ is the phrase that introduces the song, spoken by Isaac who had been out on the piss with Joel from Wolf Alice the night before recording. We’ve tried not to overkill this review by taking a look at each and every track on the record BUT it’s filled with so many bangers it’s been near impossible to cherry pick just a few. So to spare your capacity and will to continue living we’ll skim over the next few briefly. ‘Steer Clear’, ‘Cold Hard Floor’, ‘STD’s/ PHD’s’ and ‘Angelica’ are probably the most experimental tracks on the album. With the use of drum machines, bass guitar, synth and keyboards they’ve looked to explore the use of several instruments and let their characteristic tempo take a backseat. It’s interesting to see the spectrum of variation this album actually has to offer, I don’t think anyone could have expected this in the lead up to its release. We’re hoping to hear a few of these live on their upcoming tour, they’ll provide an interesting change of tempo and atmosphere mid-gig. The final song ‘Same Again’ heads back in the direction of the Side A with guitar and drums being prominent drive to round off the album. It’s a song about small town mentality; you know those kinds of people that won’t lift their head from its downward tilt to look up at the possibility and opportunity of anything outside their dismal hometowns. Night’s out in the same old shitty nightclub, seeing the same likeminded faces and reliving identical experiences ‘week in week out’. These types of nights were top notch at the age of 18/19 but tend to go off the boil about the same time your disillusionment fades and maturity becomes a mandatory fixture on your lifestyle agenda.

For us this album will go down as a classic, one I’m certain we will be pulling off the shelf and onto the turntable until we’re grey and old. Won’t that be a sight, false teeth on soak, slippers securely fastened, hanky no further than an arm’s reach at all times and Slaves blasting out of the speakers to inject us with enough adrenaline to test out that dodgy hip replacement. It’s an album that see’s Slaves breeze through what is notoriously a bumpy period for bands. The second album jitters, where fans expect more of the same but not exactly the same, scrutiny and judgement is always at its most ferocious but Slaves have pretty much we-written the myth. Take Control will elevate them to new heights cementing their name with industrial glue into the punk rock history books. We’re off to Hamburg next weekend to catch them in action at Indra and in London for their gig at Shepherds Bush Empire at the end of the month. If you’re at any of these drop us a tweet @therockwolf1 and say hello! Finally this goes without saying but………. BUY TAKE CONTROL NOW.