Sleaford Mods - Divide and Exit (10th Anniversary Edition)

Allying strong words and minimal electronics, Sleaford Mods’ second ‘proper’ album (or sixth if you go back through the early CD-R efforts) the self-released Divide and Exit was not only Andrew Fearn and Jason Williamson’s most effective artistic expression to that point, it also truly captured the taste of a land souring by the day.

Fully remastered and set for a reissue through Rough Trade Records to mark the record’s tenth anniversary.

This reissue offers a chance to fully appreciate a band hitting their artistic stride while acknowledging and commiserating that many of the dark forces that inspired its creation linger on. Once again though it is possible bathe in the hopeful anger that underpins Sleaford Mods’ blasts of outrage and electro.

“Where our previous album Austerity Dogs barked a directionless yet solid form of anger, Divide and Exit then carried this basic form of class consciousness,” says Williamson of the vision behind the record, both musically and lyrically. 

“After the release of Austerity Dogs we realised we had seemingly created a formula,” he adds. “Andrew just took the formula and ran with it and his music started to sound much more compact and urgent.” 

“Listening to it now, Divide and Exit is perhaps the most punk record we have done,” says Williamson, reflecting on how Sleaford Mods felt out ahead, covering fresh ground alone at the time, before going on to inspire a raft of post-punk-infused artists to follow their lead in the album’s aftermath. “Each song falls out of the last like an extension or whatever. There wasn’t anyone in the country doing what we were doing at that point, it feels like it was 30 years ago, but it’s only been 10. Mad as fuck.”