Unemployment. Mental illness. Rising suicide numbers. A general feeling of isolation. Despite the high politics of their southern brethren, there’s a lot the north of both Ireland and England have in common. Perhaps that’s what drew me to the unapologetically named ‘Dead Boys’ in the first place - There's an affinity to be found in it’s mournful, questioning chorus that transcends borders. “Nobody ever could explain all the Dead Boys in my hometown.” It's an abrasive, prickly topic that is as likely to create new wounds as it is the close old ones. But it’s hard not to become enthralled by the fearlessness with which Sam Fender attacks such dilemmas. And on his debut, ‘Hypersonic Missile’, Fender announces himself to the world, not with an exclamation, but a question: “Why?”
Indeed, it is hard to imagine he’s not asking the same question of himself. After all, good luck isn’t a staple in his home town of North Shields. Yet when the management of Ben Howard walked into the bar in which Fender played in-between shifts as a bartender, he seemed to have happened upon the biggest oil reserve of the year. Now, years later, Fender emerges on his inaugural album as one of the most arresting and fearsome voices in indie rock. Using piercing, raw vocals to sing about suicide, substance abuse, political turmoil and the impending apocalypse, all while looking like the type of character who could grace the cover of Vogue if he’d been born in Kensington, Fender has established himself as one of Britains top songwriters on his first attempt by relying on one particular fuel - authenticity.
This is what lies at the core of the album, a stinging and slightly frightening commitment to the genuine article. Never one to claim to possess answers, Fender instead lobs questions at the powers that be - How could you do this to us? How could you let things get so bad? Why did we trust you? Less a leader and more an Inquisitor, there has been a lack of such working-class anger in the mainstream since the days of John Osborne. And whether or not he has intended it to do so, Fender’s music has resonated with the public. Enough has been written about his breakthrough single ‘Dead Boys’, but the fraught, anxious energy of the eponymous track or the intense urgency of ‘You’re Not The Only One’ speaks to a corner of England that has long been passed by in both society and culture.
It is this connection between his music and blue-collar realism that as earned Fender comparisons to Bruce Springsteen, a correlation that is lazy at best (he’s not the first white guy with that guitar tone since The Boss, and his vocals sound more like fellow northerner Henry Stansall of the Ruen Brothers). In much the same way that Born To Run could only have been bathed on the New Jersey Turnpike, Hypersonic Missiles is indistinguishable from the claustrophobic alleyways and paved streets of the North East. To compare the two is to ignore the idiosyncratic issues that plague the two areas in favour of “they’re both fucked and they’ve both got a coastline and a saxophone player.” If anything, Fender bears similarities to the solitary chill of Jeff Buckley, whose intensity and sheer force of presence he matches easily. His songs ring with a low slung freedom that would border on nonchalance if it wasn’t so cool. And while brass gives it its rock, blues, Americana roots, but also its link to the legacy of Northern Soul. It’s music that you can dance to, but don’t for one second assume you can take the piss, lest you anticipate an emotional haymaker.
This is where Fender’s strength shine, in imbuing both a believable amount of emotion into a lively, arresting track-list of groovy rock tunes that vary in both cadence and composition. Indie rock is undoubtedly the most reliable path, but he has no issue going from stomping, certified head nodders that beckon to a simpler time (‘That Sound’) to gentle, purring waltzes (‘Call Me Lover’) an contemporary, electronic anthems ('Will We Talk’). These are tracks that refuse to be pretty and baulk at the idea of compromise - the realities of being working class, broke and unwell (either physically or mentally) are spread out across the table like an etherised patient in both ‘White Privilege’ and ‘The Borders’ - fuelled as they are by a critical self-and-social awareness that looks to give a voice to the silent. Nowhere is this truer in the stand-out track ‘Play God,’ an open sneering condemnation of the shameless careerism of the political class, one that seems all too happy to leave Fender and his ilk out in the cold. Scorched earth lyrics (“Am I mistaken, Or are we breaking, Underweight from the long time, That he played God?”), a barely restrained pace that teeters on the edge of a tense explosion and an urgent intonation combine on this, the most accomplished song on the album.
Far from the first to shine a light on these issues, but in a time of division and uncertainty, Fender gives a platform to an uncertain people who know one thing: They’ve been forgotten. Its protest music for a modern society and abandoned souls, an album that champions not just matters of the mind, but of the heart and spirit. On ‘Hypersonic Missiles,’ Fender has all the looks of the next great British voice.