POLITICALLY charged, thought provoking and downright noisy, Nottingham’s Sleaford Mods could be the perfect band for these divisive days as the clock runs down on Brexit.

Releasing their fifth studio album entitled Eton Alive this month, the LP’s 12 tracks deal with what frontman Jason Williamson calls the “elitist plan being digested slowly as we wait to be turned into faeces once more” with the 48-year-old Williamson laying the blame for our EU withdrawal squarely with the likes of Cameron, Gove and Johnson and anyone else educated at the Berkshire public school which gives the album its punning title.

“I was interviewed recently by someone from the Financial Times who went there,” says Williamson. “He was really thorough and knew everything about us and he was quite an interesting person to talk to.

“Eton is so present in our society - they have created for the most part this destructive umbrella which hangs over everybody and

I thought it was quite an apt title really.”

Formed in 2007 by Williamson and musician Andrew Fearn, Sleaford Mods are known for their abrasive, minimalist musical style and embittered explorations of austerity-era Britain, culture, and working-class life, delivered in Williamson’s thick East Midlands accent.

It’s by no means easy listening but 2015’s Key Markets and 2017’s English Tapas were both top 20 hits and Williamson’s lyrics are being increasingly heralded as a successor the kind of street poetry made famous by John Cooper Clarke and Shaun Ryder.

“The last album had a hint of the mainstream and I think this one will be the same but we’ll never be fully allowed to join the mainstream,” he says. “We’re not Brit nominees, which is when you’re in the thick of it.

“I don’t think we’d like it. I wouldn’t like it and Andrew certainly wouldn’t like it. If we can exist on the fringes then that’s fine with me.”

The band’s minimalist combination of lo-fi drum machine beats mixed with pounding bass guitar and Williamson’s ranting wordplay set the tone that would define the band’s sound, but it remains the frontman’s extraordinary vocals and lyrics full of images of an austerity-ridden small town Britain which remain the duo’s chief calling card.

“I just don’t like a lot of things,” he admits. “I approach songs with that energy because everything is so bland.

“There are pockets of interesting creativity and I would dare say the referendum result will mean in two or three years along the line there will be some really interesting things coming out. Especially if it gets even worse.

“There are currently a lot of people trying to be something they’re not and it’s like a pool of mediocrity. When we write stuff we attack it with an energy that’s built out of negativity.”

A 33-date tour will see the band get a taste of the current state of the nation with a trip to Chester on the agenda on April 4.

“This is what is interesting about these tours,” Williamson enthuses. “We did one about four years ago and we got to see England. You get an idea of how things are. I never purposely think that will get in a tune but it can worm its way in in some way. I definitely feed off that kind of thing.”

So how does a typical day pan out on tour in Sleaford Mods land?

“I’ll find the local gym and go there for an hour,” laughs Williamson. “Then I’ll go and find somewhere to eat and then go back to the hotel and wait for stage time and trot on down to the venue. That’s what it’s like everyday and any kind of diary is kept upstairs in my head.

“But any gig is good: you get to refine your act and it spreads the word. It’ll just be interesting to see how you can push two 50-year-old blokes and a laptop forward in what is a landscape based around youth and is extremely fickle. It’s a challenge to navigate an industry like that.”

The duo’s latest single Kebab Spider keeps up a long Sleaford Mods obsession with take aways and food in general. Williamson has even admitted he was once in a band called Meat Pie.

“Kebab Spider was something me and Andy were laughing about,” he adds. “I was talking about coconut spiders and it kind of moved on to kebab spiders which I thought was funny and worked into a song.

“We’ve managed to move the sound on a little bit with Eton Alive like we do with every album.

“It moves along subtlety and this one definitely has a few more poppy things on there which are quite a departure from the signature sound. I’ve been listening to things like Luther Vandross, Alexander O’Neal, Cherrelle and Chaka Khan.

“It’s a challenge to stretch it out and if we get to a point where we can’t do it anymore who knows what’ll happen. We’ll split up I guess.”

Sleaford Mods play Chester Live Rooms on Thursday, April 4, 2019. Tickets: www.seetickets.com