Get It Out: Q&A with Joe Sherrin (a.k.a. SLONK)

Released earlier this month, Songs About Tanks is the new album from SLONK (real name Joe Sherrin) and it serves as an unflinching document of just how hard a break-up can be. Much of the record was written and recorded within just a week of the break-up, and though Sherrin's words are draped in all kinds of lovely, cosy-sounding instrumentation, you can hear that his wounds are still painfully fresh. Here, he answers some questions about Songs About Tanks and what was going on in his life during its creation.

The Album Wall: Please introduce yourself - who are you, what should we know about you, and where did the name 'SLONK' come from?

Joe Sherrin: My name's Joe Sherrin. I play in lots of Bristol-based bands, and SLONK is my solo project. 'SLONK' is just a nonsense word I used to use, e.g. "just slonk that over here please, Steve". I was pretty stuck trying to find a name for my solo stuff, so I just went with that - I like that it's silly and a bit weird. Turns out 'SLONK' has an Urban Dictionary definition though, so that pissed me off.

TAW: Your new album, Songs About Tanks, is a break-up album. What's the story behind that title? What do tanks have to do with breaking up?

JS: I put the song We're Both Going To Be Fine up online in its original demo form (just guitar and vocals) back in November, and I put in the comments to my friends who found the song upsetting, "don't worry guys - the next batch of songs will be about tanks and harlots, like usual". That was a lampoon, though; none of the songs are about tanks. They're wetties.

Our Corpse: Songs About Tanks by SLONK

Countless artists have written songs about breaking up, but few break-up albums cannonball into the deep end of that experience like Songs About Tanks, the new LP from Bristol's SLONK (real name Joe Sherrin). This record isn't funereal and sombre like The Boatman's Call; nor is it as resigned a farewell as The Walker Brothers' classic break-up song Make it Easy on Yourself. Most end-of-relationship albums, even the really angsty and depressing ones, find some sort of closure by the end, but Songs About Tanks isn't so much about finding closure as it is about painting a devastatingly detailed picture of the immediate fallout. There's no real 'journey' here, no healing process that ends with our protagonist getting over it and moving on - this album simply seeks to capture exactly what it's like to have your heart ripped in half.

And it does that very well indeed. Sherrin has a great eye for detail, and his lyrics do a superb job of documenting the tiny little pains that follow the end of a relationship: changing your passwords so that they no longer include your ex's name; realising that the little songs the two of you used to sing to each other will never be sung again; going back to their flat, the one you used to share, and noticing that all the photos of you have been taken down. Rather remarkably, the lion's share of Songs About Tanks was written and recorded within a week of the break-up that spawned it, so as a listener you feel very close - almost uncomfortably close at times - to the centre of it all. You feel like you're standing right there at ground zero, looking over Sherrin's shoulder as he surveys the debris.