Sam Fender is familiar with deadbeat towns where broken couches are left out on lawns, families are living paycheck to paycheck and local bars swell with yelling from drunken fights.
His music often reflects what it was like growing up in the small town of North Shields, U.K.
Sam Fender, an indie-rock artist from England, has been releasing singles since 2017.
In his 2019 debut album, “Hypersonic Missiles,” he sings about the “poor souls sleeping on shop front doors” and the “mass of filth and rubbish outside the houses” in “Leave Fast.”
He focused his album on helpless people around him who are trying their best to survive, and it was a devastating reflection of his hometown.
If Hypersonic Missiles was his reflection on running away from his hometown, his latest album “Seventeen Going Under” which released Oct. 8, is about him going back to confront those very reasons and making amends with his childhood.
In contrast to speaking about the desperation that surrounded him, he turns inward and tells us his experience escaping the grip of a small town where people rarely manage to leave.
Fender returns home after realizing his past isn’t easy to escape. Seventeen Going Under narrates him confronting generational trauma, the mistakes he made as a young man and finding a way to come out of all that feeling OK.
On the title track, he sings “I was far too scared to hit him but I would hit him in a heartbeat now” as he discovers that the anger he so desperately wanted to let go of is still present and is perhaps stronger than ever. The person he once was is still part of who he is now, despite his efforts to run away from his past.
With a catchy guitar melody, the title track hooks listeners as he tells us the story of his teenage years. Unflinchingly honest and vulnerable, Fender tells us how he would wear a grin to hide the sadness brewing within him.
The narrative continues on the song “Getting Started” as he sings about witnessing his mother struggling to make ends meet and the responsibilities he had to take on at a young age to make money for his family.
As he repeats “I’m only getting started,” a gentle saxophone plays in the background of addictive guitars. The saxophone adds a touch of hope and Fender holds on to the belief they’ll be okay.
With such powerful lyrics about his lower-class childhood, it’s hard to stay away from the polarizing topic of wealth inequality but Fender is no stranger to criticizing the current political climate.
The Hypersonic Missiles title track includes Fender sarcastically singing “God bless America and all of its allies. I'm not the first to live with wool over my eyes.”
It’s a slap in the face to the listener as he continues to sing about the U.S. and other powerful countries deciding to drop hypersonic missiles on the rest of the world.
Similarly in “Aye” off of his latest album, he sings “They watched Jackie pick up Kennedy's head. They watched kids go to Epstein's bed. They watched Hollywood whitewash remake movies.” It’s an even more brutal contemplation of the current state of our society.
Fender is fearless in his political commentary. He doesn’t give a shit about the controversy that might arise because of the lyrics.
It’s refreshing to hear an artist be this brutal in their lyrics.
Fender dissipates any indication he might follow the steps of U.K. singer and songwriters George Ezra or Ed Sheeran. Instead of writing generic pop melodies, Fender stands apart because of his fearless lyricism.
Fender makes blunt proclamations to a simple clap beat on “Aye.” Instead of following the normal structure of a song, Fender changes it up by having two different choruses.
The first chorus repeats “hate the poor'' over and over again, hitting harder every time the phrase is repeated. The next chorus blatantly exposes the wealthy elite’s ignorance as he sings “they have never had time for me and you.”
The decision to have different choruses works to his advantage because the lyrics reflect the different ways poverty is viewed around the world. Either you have a disdain for the poor or you ignore them.
It perfectly encapsulates the dilemma of the working class. Is it better to be ignored or hated?
Fender continues this dissection of the working class as the song concludes. He yells “I'm not a fucking patriot anymore, I'm not a fucking singer anymore, I'm not a fucking liberal anymore.”
Fender indicates the working class is too tired to be anything else but poor. They don’t have the time or the energy to be political.
He feels alienated and tired of the labels. He ends the song with one word, “Aye,” which is slang for “yes.” That is all the working class has energy for: to say yes. They find it easier to agree with the policies of the political candidates speaking to their base than seeing through their lies.
Despite how deeply his political songs cut, Fender is most potent when he sings about himself.
On “Leveller,” he heartbreakingly sings “We are the scum who overstayed their welcome. Scribed on the walls in the back lane by my flat. Teenage premonitions of Armageddon.”
These are the kids who are ignored and neglected, even by their own parents.
Fender’s songwriting is most powerful when he’s painting a picture of his life. He is brave in his vulnerability in a time when it is seen as acceptable for men to get in touch with their emotions.
Fender has been this way all along. Hypersonic Missiles saw him singing about grief but with a mix of political anthems and hopeful tunes for the working class.
In Seventeen Going Under, Fender paints a compelling, complete narrative of his life that builds on every single track. It’s political at times but even more personal.
We get under his skin and in his head to understand what it is that makes us human. It’s being vulnerable, brave and going under to confront what makes you uncomfortable.
Fender went under to discover who he was at seventeen. Seventeen Going Under begs the question: are you brave enough to go under?
