IDLES ā POP POP POP (dir. Stewart Baxter, 2024) +

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IDLES ā POP POP POP (dir. Stewart Baxter, 2024) +

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Itās raining. Of course it is.
Sirius stands under the crumbling archway outside Grimmauld Place, rain slicking down his coat, hair flattened, arms hanging loose at his sides. He didnāt bring an umbrella. He never brings an umbrella.
Remus is already at the door, his hand on the knob, his shoulders tight like heās holding himself in place by will alone.
They havenāt spoken properly in days. Not since the last meeting. Not since Remus started pulling away again, all silent glances and avoided hands. Not since Sirius caught him looking at Tonks with that soft, hesitant sort of guilt that only means one thing.
āYouāre not going to say anything, are you?ā Sirius says, voice rough from smoke and sleep he didnāt get.
Remus doesnāt turn around. āWhat do you want me to say?ā
āThat Iām wrong.ā Sirius laughs, sharp. āThat youāre not running.ā
Remus exhales through his nose. Rain plinks on the metal railing, on the stones, on the tops of their shoes.
āIām not running,ā he says finally.
āNo?ā
āIām⦠choosing.ā
The words are soft. Too soft. Like if he says them louder, theyāll become real.
Sirius flinches. āFuckās sake, Moony. Choosing what? Safety? Stability? A family you donāt have to explain?ā
Remus turns then. Just slightly. His eyes are red. Heās not crying, not anymoreāmaybe he did earlier. Maybe he never stopped.
Siriusās voice goes low, the way it does when heās barely holding it together. āIgnore my eyes, babe. Theyāre just sore.ā
Remus closes his. Takes a breath that doesnāt quite steady him. āYou always say the most beautiful things when youāre breaking.ā
āIām always breaking,ā Sirius whispers.
They stand like that, the rain still falling, the distance between them gaping wider than the front steps.
Remus opens the door.
And he walks inside.
And Sirius doesnāt follow.
āāāāāāāāāā
The Black family library is colder than it should be. The war is over, the house is mostly empty, and Remus is sorting through whatās left ā as much for the Orderās records as for himself. Dust. Old spell books. A photograph of the four of them, half-burnt. He doesnāt keep that.
He finds the letter tucked inside a book Sirius never wouldāve read on purpose: Practical Charms for Harmonious Households.
Siriusās handwriting is unmistakable. Slanted, impatient, more pressure on the downstrokes. The parchment is smudged where something wet soaked in and dried ā not recent. Not ink.
Remus sits in Siriusās old chair and reads it.
āāāāāāāāāāāā
Moony,
I wasnāt going to write this. Iāve had enough of trying to turn myself inside out for someone who doesnāt want to look anymore. But the thing is, I donāt actually know how to stop. So here you go.
I want to be angry. Merlin, I am angry. You chose her, Remus. You picked her. You call it something else ā safety, sense, a future ā but you still chose.
You told me once that your greatest fear was becoming a burden. That no one would stay if they really knew the weight of you. And I said, I would.
I meant it.
You told me you needed to do the right thing. That loving me wasnāt practical. That you were afraid of being seen. Well, newsflash, Moony ā I saw you. I see you. And I still fucking wanted you. Every version. Every scar. Every snarl and silence. You couldāve ripped me apart and Iād have thanked you.
You always said I romanticized pain. Maybe I do. Maybe I liked thinking I was tragic and star-crossed and doomed. Maybe I made it harder for you to stay. But I never asked you to save me.
I just wanted you.
And now I have nothing but ghosts. You and her and the baby and the bloody war ā and Iām still here, haunting this house like I never got out of Azkaban.
I hope youāre happy, Remus. I mean that. I want you to be.
But if you ever think about me ā and I hope you do ā donāt remember the fights, or the stupid things I said when I wanted to be touched and didnāt know how to ask. Donāt remember the mess I made of everything.
Remember this:
I wouldāve stayed. Every time. For you.
āS
āāāāāāāā
Remus folds the letter neatly. His hands are shaking.
He does not cry.
Not now.
Instead, he places the letter back in the book and puts the book on the highest shelf, where no one else will ever find it.
And he leaves the room quietly, like a man leaving a grave.
āāāāāāāāāāā
Once again loosely based on A Gospel by Idles
IDLES - POP POP POP Album TANGK (2024)
TANGK photoshoot

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the righteous gemstones needledropping grace by IDLES in 4x08 genuinely cemented it as a hall of fame show to me. by the way.
Idles: āOur old lyrics were not the words of a healthy manā
IDLES talk politicism around the time of the release of TANGK, Annabel Nugent for The Independent, 17 April 2024.
Outside the taxi window, Paris zooms past. Balconies with their baskets full of hydrangeas; a beige blur of boulangerie windows lined with flakey pastries; the Eiffel Tower. But before long weāve left this postcard vision for an industrial city of concrete and metal. Itās a fitting change of scene for Idles, who as a band, donāt exactly scream escargot and macarons.
Since releasing their debut Brutalism in 2017, Idles have been on the front line of British rock. That record combined thrumming basslines and punk licks with candid lyrics on topics like austerity, toxic masculinity, mental health, and white privilege. Its blunt force rage at the state of the nation cut through the noise of complaints that rock music is dead. Theyāve since earned a spot on the Mercury Prize shortlist, a Brit nomination, two No 1s, several top fives, packed-out Glastonbury sets, and many a sold-out tour, including this current one ā hence Paris. āPassion is always our strongest feeling,ā says Mark Bowen, the Irish guitarist and soft-spoken foil to frontman Joe Talbot. āI think thatās why weāre often confused with being angry ā weāre getting out our internal rage and any kind of masculine bulls***.ā
Weāre backstage in a wood-panelled room where Bowen and Talbot, the bandās two primary songwriters, have sequestered themselves on a sofa an hour before theyāre due on stage. The other Idles, Adam Devonshire (bass), Lee Kiernan (guitar) and Jon Beavis (drums), are downstairs cracking jokes between second servings of roast chicken and mouthfuls of rice pudding. Itās the first time Idles have had catering on tour and the excitement is palpable.
Anger in itself has never been Idlesā modus operandi ā nowhere less so than on their latest Tangk, their fifth, which nabbed the band their second No 1, and will likely earn them another Mercury nod later this year. (With any luck, itāll be their first win.) Tangk siphons that passion into something else equally worthwhile: love. Waltzing pianos and pizzicato strings percolate behind their usual prowling synths and garage rock sound. On songs unironically titled āGratitudeā and āGraceā, Talbot positively croons. The city of love, then, isnāt so incongruous a setting as one might think.
During the making of Tangk, both Talbot and Bowen became dads ā a fact that goes a long way to explain their softer sound and perhaps their moods, too ā both are on top form, easygoing and open. āFatherhood has taught me that you can have the same kind of passion in other facets of your being,ā Bowen says. āThereās passion in gratitude, passion in tender moments.ā Both he and Talbot are determined to do the dad thing āreally f***ing wellā.
Talbot, who is Welsh and born in Newport, met Devonshire at school in Exeter. It was when the pair moved to Bristol for university that they found Bowen, fresh out of Belfast, on the cityās DJ circuit. Their first EP Welcome, released in 2012, favoured a clean post-punk sound by way of Interpol and Radio 4: a portrait of a very different band to the one Iām speaking with today.
But soon came Brutalism, a breakthrough in the truest sense of the word. People sat up and took notice. It was impossible not to, the albumās humanitarian politics hammered into your skull with all the force of its punishing percussion. It was released in post-Brexit 2017 and never has a band sounded so emblematic of the times; Idles were disillusioned and fed up. Over time, this post-punk quintet have become inseparable from politics. Their music is an urgent plea for something better, or an example of empty posturing ā depending on who you ask.
For a band with such strong views, they bristle at being called a quote-unquote political band. āIf you allow people to say youāre a political band, they can throw you in the bin,ā Bowen says. āThey can write you off. Coming at things as a āpolitical bandā and smashing that into peopleās faces isnāt of interest to us because it wears people down too quickly. It makes them too defensive, especially if theyāre of a different opinion to you. Our idea is to shake that personās hand and say, letās talk and have a conversation.ā
All the same, Tangk still retains plenty of that original Idles aggression ā mostly aimed at the current government. āWhat would you like me to say about them?ā Talbot says gamely, broad grin spreading across his face. āEvil bastards. Evil, evil bastards. You wonāt print this ā but f*** the Tories.ā He throws his hands up, exasperated by it all. āI miss Gordon Brown so much, so f***ing much.ā If it was up to him, Talbot says, the headline for this piece would be: āI LOVE YOU GORDON BROWN.ā I tell him Iāll consider it.
He canāt quite believe the ācircusā weāve found ourselves in. āItās all there in front of us in black and white,ā he says, incredulous. āWe had a prime minister who was racist in black and white. The government completely ruined our country⦠in black and white. Itās all there for us to see.ā
What does he think of Keir Starmer? āItās irrelevant how I feel about him. I donāt think thatās a relevant conversation to be had in modern day politics. We need to be talking about the policies and how to fix the insane circus that has been happening for the last 13 years. Itās not about this person-centred crap. Keir Starmer is the leader. Heās the best person for the job right now.ā He scoffs. āBetter than Jeremy Corbyn.ā Quickly, itās clear any new fuzzy feelings Talbot has around love and fatherhood have not blunted his political scythe.
Talbotās candour, though, is never more striking than when it is turned inward. Written following the death of his mother, whom he had cared for during a long illness,Ā Brutalism laid bare his pain. It also disinterred 18 years of on-off substance abuse, a recurring theme in Idlesā discography. His addiction came to a head, however, when he nearly died in a car accident after rounding a corner at 60 miles per hour, getting cut off and smashing into a lamp post. He was high at the time. āIf someone else was in the car, theyād be dead 100 per cent,ā he says now, matter-of-factly. Trapped in the driverās seat, Talbot could feel the passenger door crumpled against his side, flimsy like tin foil.
The worst thing about recovery is the meritocracy that comes with it
Joe Talbot
By all accounts, the event shouldāve changed his life ā or at least got him sober. āYouād think so, wouldnāt you?ā Talbot grins. āIt wasnāt as steep a learning curve as that, Iām afraid. Not a Hollywood moment like that. Thereās a plethora of times where the average person with a weaker stomach wouldāve stopped everything that I was doing but unfortunately it took me longer to take accountability. Thatās not the only time Iāve almost died and itās definitely not the only time Iāve nearly ruined my life and other peopleās.ā
In reality, his brush with death was just one of several junctures on the way to recovery ā and not even the most important one at that. āHaving a child was way more impactful,ā Talbot says (he and his partner previously lost an earlier daughter, Agatha, who died during childbirth). āAnd the patience and the goodwill of everyone around me. Iām very f***ing grateful they stuck with me, carried me for so long.ā
Addiction, he clarifies, was only āone component of my debaucheryā. Violence, crime, drugs, alcohol ā he is very grateful to be done with all of it now. He catches my eye as it darts across the table, strewn with several green glass bottles. āThose are zero alcohol beers so stop judging me!ā he laughs. He has been sober for eight months. āOr nine months, something like that,ā he shrugs. āI stopped counting; the worst thing about recovery is the meritocracy that comes with it. Itās good for some people to count, I guess, but Iām not not going to have a glass of wine ever again.ā
Accountability is a word that crops up a lot in our conversation, and a big reason why Talbot is where he is today: steady and sober. āIāve met famous people who are mentally ill because of fame,ā Talbot says. āAnd thatās because they donāt have people around them holding them accountable.ā
He pauses, considering for a second whether to forge on. āF*** it,ā he mutters and ventures forth. āKanye West is a good example of this.ā In recent years, the rapper has regularly spouted hate speech, making a string of antisemitic remarks on his social media and in podcasts. āTo me, I see a boy trapped in a manās body who misses his mother. I see myself in him sometimes. I see that guy. I was that f***ing ill, I was that f***ing alone, and I was that scared, and I was doing s*** that was toxic ā and seemingly insane. It happens when you donāt have strong people around to hold you accountable with grace and with kindness.ā He gestures to Bowen, āYouāve done it very well with me, and so has my dad. He doesnāt let me get away with slipping; he lets me know with love.ā
Is he nervous himself about fatherhood? In particular about raising kids in the current climate, amid the raging dumpster fire that he and Bowen rail against in their music? āNo,ā says Talbot. āIām not scared of whatās to come. I mean, f*** me, my mum didnāt get it right and my dad didnāt get it right, but I always knew that I was safe and loved ā and at the end of the day, I hope I havenāt made the world a worse place so what else is there to be afraid of?ā
Lyrics mostly come easy to Talbot. As they should, he shrugs: āIām talking to you now and I know exactly what Iām going to say because I mean it.ā Most of Tangk was devised at the mic, cobbled together from whatever came to Talbot in the moment. āF*** the king,ā for example, is one such lyric that was front of mind.
There was a time, though, when that wasnāt the case. āI got to a place about two albums in where I was becoming too self-aware,ā he says of the bandās 2020 album Ultra Mono. āI became detached.ā That record cranked the Idles mentality to 11: they were accused of posturing and placard politics. Pitchfork wrote that Ultra Mono āfelt like the work of someone whoād spent a little too much time reading their own pressā. Ironically, it was also their most successful record to date.
That car crash is not the only time Iāve almost died
Joe Talbot
āYou can hear it in the words,ā says Talbot of his state of mind when writing the record. āIāve always found violence to be a beautiful thing in art ā but write those words down and you can see they are not the words of a healthy man. I was scared and lost and angry.ā At least it was honest, Bowen interjects. āThatās true,ā says Talbot. āI never lie ā well apart from āGreatā on [the 2018 album] Joy As An Act of Resistance. That song is like a bad haircut, which is why we donāt play it. Itās not me.ā
Bowen sees Idles functioning as a ātrojan horseā of sorts. āWeāre quite a macho, masculine looking band on stage,ā he says. Itās true; they are all hairy, sweaty, and inked up. āBut weāre trying to subvert concepts of modern masculinity. Itās always about subverting expectations.ā In their early song āSamaritansā, he gender-swaps Katy Perryās āI Kissed a Girlā; during live shows, this lyric is often followed by a big olā snog with Bowen on stage.
While theyāve been heralded by some ā and ridiculed by others ā for their progressive messaging, Idles see themselves as a work in progress. āWeāre just processing openly and hopefully that brings people in,ā says Bowen. āIf you are vulnerable then that often evokes vulnerability.ā Talbot adds, āI donāt think we have a āresponsibilityā other than the responsibility to ourselves.ā
He credits their platform with ākeeping us aware of thingsā. The band was recently criticised by fans for their silence about Israelās ongoing military campaign in Gaza. Tonight, during a hulking, memorable set in Paris, Talbot will scream āViva Palestinaā at the top of his lungs a dozen or so times. āAnd we should do that because we have a platform and itās a beautiful feeling to be part of the conversation on the right side,ā he says now. āDoes it mean weāre going to change the world? No, but Iāve changed my world. And Bowen has changed his.ā
You can watch the new video for āPop Pop Popā here taken from the album āTangkā which is out now
No god, no king I said love is the thing No crown, no ring I said love is the thing