Volk Soup announce debut album, 10p Jazz, due 3rd October
Debut album from new Leeds post-punk/free jazz six-piece, FFO The Birthday Party, Fat White Family
Volk Soup
Announce debut album, 10p Jazz
Due 3rd October via Dipterid Records / Cruel Nature
Share "Reptilian Brain" Single - Listen here
Live Dates in December
Threading wiry post-punk, dissonant noise and bursts of free-jazz intensity, new Leeds' six-piece Volk Soup announce debut album, 10p Jazz, due 3rd October via Dipterid Records (digital and vinyl) and Cruel Nature (cassette).
Today they also release new single "Reptilian Brain". Vocalist/guitarist Harry Jones shares:
"We brought this song to fruition in a lovely practice space in a mostly abandoned warehouse in Manchester a couple of hours before playing a show. The bass line and lyric was hand delivered and the rest fell into place. I don’t know what it is about this song that brings out the Liam Gallagher drawl in me. Perhaps my mind was too firmly in Manchester at the time of its birth. Definitely the newest song on the record.
I wrote the lyrics almost immediately after watching Alain Resnais’ Mon oncle d’Amérique which makes some reference to the basal ganglia. I don’t remember much of the details of the inspiration but I was probably quite horny at the time."
Volk Soup - "Reptilian Brain"
Official Video: https://youtu.be/RysZfa9bQQg
Streaming Services: https://orcd.co/9odne5q
Album Preorder:
https://volksoup.bandcamp.com/album/10p-jazz
Live Dates
4th December - Soup, Manchester
5th December - Kazimier Gardens, Liverpool
6th December - Hyde Park Book Club, Leeds
All dates with Gaol Bird
Volk Soup formed in early 2020 in Leeds, founded by Harry Jones (vocals, guitar, lyrics) and Ryan Walker (bass). The project was quickly paused by the pandemic, delaying their first live performance until October 2021. By that point, they had added drummer Luc Gibbons and recorded their earliest material as a raw, angular three-piece. As they gained momentum on the Leeds underground circuit, the band expanded to a six-piece in 2022—bringing in Ryan Geach (saxophone), Luca Vitale (trumpet), and George Orton (guitar)—and along with the new members came a broader, brassier, more unpredictable sound.
Their style threads together wiry post-punk, dissonant noise, and bursts of free-jazz intensity, stitched with a low-end swagger and a chaotic sense of precision. The music leans into abrasion and absurdity, full of sudden turns and structure-bending arrangements—equal parts menace, muscle, and meticulous collapse.
In 2023, they released Incompetent Hits, a compilation of early singles via French label Swish Swash, and toured France in support. The release found its way to Kevin Curty, founder of Dipterid Records, who was immediately drawn to the band’s frantic energy and distinct visual identity. When Volk Soup began seeking support for their debut full-length, Dipterid signed on to release it.
That record—10p Jazz—is the band’s most complete statement to date. Produced by Oscar McKie (Westside Cowboy) it captures the raw force of their live set while pushing further into uneasy textures and untested ideas. Momentum twists, structures collapse, and nothing stays settled for long. “With 10p Jazz we wanted to bring some coherence to the chaos. We wanted to capture our live energy without forfeiting what it is we wanted to explore musically. We felt we needed to take the frenetic intensity we’re known for and to add depth”, shares vocalist Harry Jones.
As usual with Volk Soup the band explore a wide and varied range of themes, touching upon some of their most personal ideas to date, from self betterment to professional digressions. But as usual, these ideas are abstracted somewhat, never straightforwardly biographical. On songs like Mass Village Angst and Nothing in Tomorrow they tackle increasing social tensions, picking up on the subtle resentments of a small town England “No pitchforks sharpened/ Only tongues” sings Harry Jones. But where Mass Village Angst talks of the quieter hatred being harboured in corners of the country, Nothing in Tomorrow broaches what it might look like if this division reaches fever pitch “Blood will spill from corners of the city/ Gushing forth by decree of the committee”.
If this is Volk Soup at their most polemical then there’s plenty more of the irreverence they’re typically known for. Spellbound by the Phallus is a homoerotic proto-disco track that takes inspiration from songs of film star Divine. Holy Building Tourist is a gentle ode to popping into a church wherever you go, if not in piety then in appreciation. It’s the bands most considered arrangement, more Leonard Cohen than The Birthday Party.
It’s a diverse piece of work that takes a lot of unpacking. 10p Jazz is the picture of a band stretching themselves further than they have before. Sonically, lyrically and thematically their most complex work yet.
Tracklisting
1. Bastard
2. Reptilian Brain
3. Professionalism Debunked
4. Friends
5. Holy Building Tourist
6. Mass Village Angst
7. Nothing in Tomorrow
8. Spellbound by the Phallus
9. Meet Me by the Willow
