Emerging from the depths of Cardiff’s burgeoning music scene, heirs to their country’s lineage of storytellers, are Slate. Formed by frontman Jack Shephard and drummer Raychi Bryant, the four-piece band are barely touching their twenties, but together, they have command of post-punk which rings with the gravitas of a death knell; a grasp of atmosphere and melody which touches on the ethereal.

With the addition of bassist Lauren Edwards and guitarist Elis Penri who completed the band at the end of 2021, the four bonded over the written word playing poetry games over pints. Together, they found an affinity with the surreal works of Arthur Rimbaud and the Welsh poets R. S. Thomas and Dylan Thomas, whose reverence for their country and its people bleeds into Slate’s own lyrics.

The 7″ collects Slate’s stunning 1-2 of debut singles ‘Tabernacl’ and ‘St Agatha’, which were both produced by Buzzard Buzzard Buzzard’s Tom Rees. Both songs come loaded with frontman Jack Shephard’s distinctive, poetic drawl, blistering yet gothic and ornate guitars and rollicking, road-ready drums. Together they offer a snapshot of a band born fully-formed and prove a statement of intent that’s hard to ignore.

Of the track, Shephard explains: “‘St Agatha’ is the first song we wrote about being Welsh. Though, living in in the south, we each converge at the forefront of anglicisation. At the time of writing, we were indulging in literature, landscapes as well as each another, in an attempt to re-connect with much of our disregarded national identity. So much was left unrevealed to us in school. We read about a churchyard on the border, where some people are buried with their heads in Wales and their feet in England. It was the perfect place to tell the story of a conflicted protagonist. Severed at St Agatha’s, between there and the homeland.”

Fresh from a recent string of dates opening for Buzzard Buzzard Buzzard and some much talked about shows in the dark corners of London’s live circuit, the band have performed further across the country this autumn and winter including stop-offs at Cardiff’s Sŵn Festival and Brighton’s Mutations Festival.

NME – “Slate‘s debut single ‘Tabernacl’ was a six-minute behemoth that introduced the Welsh band as a distinctive and intense new voice in British post-punk. It was defined by its swirling guitars and frontman Jack Shephard’s powerful drawl, somewhere between a Gallagher and Fontaines D.C.‘s Grian Chatten.

The track’s follow-up, ‘St Agatha’, leans a little more into lightness, though maintaining the band’s already-signature monochrome feeling. Beginning with drums right out of the playbook of Joy Division‘s Stephen Morris, Shephard tells a story of Welsh national identity with a morbid edge.

Across their first two singles, Slate have already presented a signature sound and even more definable energy. To make music this intense while not sacrificing an inch of their power in its storytelling is a real feat.”