IDLES: Brutal, Honest Truth

“What I think we’ve done and what I’ve tried to instill in the other guys is not to worry about what every other cunt is doing,” he continues. “Don’t worry about people going ‘Come on man, it’s time to get a job.’ Get your fucking boots ready and get tight as fuck for the next gig and when that’s done write another song instead of worrying about the big picture. Build up momentum. That patience and that passion to go song-by-song means we haven’t been distracted and I think that’s one of the reasons why we’ve done it for so long without any gratification. It comes down to our reception live. That’s not a lie. People love our live shows.”

Recently, all efforts have been focused on making their live sets as tight as possible. Having had material ready for a debut LP for two years, they’ve ensured that it’s still brimming with intensity in preparation for the long-awaited release of their aptly titled album Brutalism. The album was recorded live, with only a maximum of three takes allowed for each track to encourage rawness and urgency. Both in his lyricism and tone, Talbot has developed a distinctive sense of sardonic punk humour, confronting the topic of class on Well Done and Stendhal Syndrome. ‘Why don’t you win a medal?/ Even Tarquin’s wins a medal/ Mary Berry’s got a medal/So why don’t you get a medal?’ he growls on the former, screaming: ‘Have you seen that painting what Rothko did?/ Looks like it was painted by a two year old kid’ on the latter.

The band’s lead guitarist Mark Bowen joins us at the table. He’s driven six hours from London for their rehearsal, and he’ll be returning later tonight. As he explains in his soft Irish accent, “Everything about [the album], from the songwriting process to the way we recorded the songs, are straight down the line brutalism. Basically it’s Joe’s interpretation of brutalism versus our interpretation, as we write all the music first.”

The concept of brutalism – beyond its overbearing architectural type – has formed the conceptual blueprint for the music, and it’s been illustrated in other ways by Talbot’s delivery. His frustration and aggression has re-imagined brutalism with powerful effect on the record, most of all on the track Mother. Having lived in Newport while caring for his ill mother for five years, until her death in 2015, the song condenses the emotion of these years into a bruising, soul-baring barrage. Accompanied by a video in which Talbot smashes a table of china while overlooked by a monochrome picture of his young mother, the track and video tell a thousand unknown stories of uncountable emotions. The image also forms part of the album’s cover art.

“My parents broke up when I was a kid and the album is to do with the roles of women in my life,” Talbot tells me. “It’s also to do with the role my mum played pre and postmortem and also about progression and grief as a theme and eventual rebuilding. The sculpture for the cover was built with my dad in his studio to resemble a brutalist structure and also a headstone. I love that photo of my mum as my dad took it. It is like catharsis to go back to the only other person I could rely on in that situation, which was my dad, as he was the only other person who knew my mum as well as I did. We built something together and it’s the cover. That’s it. It’s very powerful stuff.”