Pete Hindle

Slint are a seminal alternate guitar-rock band from the 1990s. I first came across them on the soundtrack to Larry Clark’s Kids, which was one of those albums which promised that the film would be a-fucking-mazing. Instead it was a bit of a bummer, but the majesty of Slint’s “Good Morning Captain”…

Steph Swainston’s Fourlands is the setting for her novels, which are part of the New Weird, an extension to the fantasy genre that allows authors to escape the sword-and-sorcery crap that they’ve been stuck with by certain best-selling authors. Where fantasy had become reliant upon pastiche and re-invention of Tolkein-esque themes, writers operating within the New Weird allowed themselves to create truly new worlds.

Swainston’s books are set in a world ruled by immortals, who fight an endless war against giant insects. There is no orcish horde to defeat, but instead an unknowable enemy who seems to only operate by instinct – something we can all understand, especially if you’ve ever found a cockroach in your kitchen. Familiarity doesn’t end there though, as despite living in a feudal world, her characters wear jeans and t-shirts, know what serial numbers are, and are generally as badly behaved as us in the modern world.

Slint’s work came at a time when Grunge defined what rock was, but they weren’t working alone. Shellac and Helmet released albums around the same time, opening up rock music to a wider range of textures than the pop-orientated sounds that were prevalent within Grunge. The influence that these bands had opened up the sound of rock music in a post-modern sense, meaning that not only could things be heavier but that they could also sound different.

The New Weird is a similar movement in fantasy writing. Swainston’s work, and that of others who accept the genre, are swimming against the idea of fantasy as ‘epic’, or the introduction of vampire mythology into the humdrum present day (such as the Sookie Stackhouse series). It’s a reinvention that enlivens a creative discipline, and while both Slint and Swainston share a common theme of narrative and flawed characters, the best link between them is to see how revolutionary they are.