Benefits are back with ‘Land Of The Tyrants’ – their first new music since their breakthrough debut album. Check it out below.
Shared today (September 17), the new track is the first new music the band have released this year, and comes after the huge wave of success from their debut album ‘Nails’ which saw them land a huge slot at Glastonbury, as well as a tour across the UK and Europe.
Now, after going through a succession of drummers, Benefits have now settled as a two-piece made up of frontman Kingsley Hall and electronic virtuoso Robbie Major. Sharing their first new material as a duo, they say they want to retain the charm that they captured in their first record, but also push their sound into new musical territory.
The end result is the new single ‘Land Of The Tyrants’, which sees Hall vent his frustrations over modern life and the manipulation of identity, alongside a ‘90s dance-inspired rhythm that rings reminiscent of Underworld.
“Our songs are still angry, WE are still angry,” Hall said, “but we are approaching it all in a different way. This is a punk move from us, this IS punk, but not as you might know it.”
The single features production work from electronic musician James Welsh, who helped inspire the new direction, as well as a feature from Arch Femmesis’ Zera Tønin, who provides guest vocals.
Explaining how the collaboration arose, the frontman said it came after he couldn’t stop thinking about the time Arch Femmesis supported them on tour. “In the first song their singer, Zera Tønin, came out masked in a wedding veil and did the most intense, horrifying and strangely musical scream I’ve ever heard,” Hall recalled.
“It stuck with me for months and the more we wrote and recorded ‘Land of the Tyrants’ the more it became obvious that the entire song should revolve around that amazing vocal hook.”
Check out the song, alongside the ‘80s-inspired, John Kirkbride-directed music video above.
Currently, Benefits are on the road as part of their ongoing UK and European tour dates. The shows will follow an Arab Strap support date at Glasgow’s Barrowlands Ballroom later this week and come ahead of festival appearances at Left Of The Dial and more.
Find all upcoming dates below, and visit here for tickets.
Upcoming Benefits live shows are:
SEPTEMBER
21– Glasgow, Barrowland Ballroom
OCTOBER
5 – Huddersfield, The Parish
6 – Lancaster, Kanteena
7 – Glasgow, The Hug and Pint
8 – Edinburgh, The Wee Red Bar
9 – Aberdeen, Tunnels
10, Stirling, Tolbooth
11 – Middlesbrough, Play Brew
12 – Liverpool, Shipping Forecast
13 – Preston, The Ferret
17 – Rotterdam, Left of the Dial
18 – Utrecht, ACU
19 – Rotterdam, Left of the Dial
20 – Ostend, Cafe de Zwerver
22 – Southampton, Joiners
23 – Brighton, Hope and Ruin
24 – Margate, Where Else
25 – London, The George Tavern
26 – Newport, Le Pub
NOVEMBER
9 – Iceland Airwaves
TBC – Transmusicales (FR)
Last year, NME caught up with Benefits before they performed at Glastonbury’s Left Field stage on the invitation of Billy Bragg, with frontman Kingsley Hall touching on the progress of their second album.
“We want to get stuff out as soon as possible,” he said. “The point of the band originally was to react to current urgencies: political, social or whatever. It could be 750 people drowning in the Med or five millionaires drowning in a submarine, that could be child poverty going through the roof in my constituency. We’ve been promoting ‘Nails’, but now we need to knuckle down and get things sorted.”
In a four-star review of the 2023 album, NME wrote: “The beauty of ‘Nails’ is in its raw and primal urgency; it had to be made and heard now, like government-approved sewage being pumped into a river. However, there’s a sense that the band are yet to assume their ultimate form – their power is still brewing. Hell, they’ll get their chance.”
Before then, the band appeared in NME’s First On series, and explained what they were looking to do with their music.
“We don’t have anyone editing us or telling us what to do,” Hall said. “We’re not writing to get on radio, we’re not writing to be populist or to be liked. When all that’s off the table, we become more honest, and that’s what seems to be clicking with people. We don’t give a fuck and that’s fine.”
