International Clash Day London Broadcast Preview: Goat Girl

In celebration of the 40th anniversary of The Clash’s landmark album London Calling, KEXP will travel to London for a 4-day live broadcast and online event, featuring live performances and exclusive interviews. Goat Girl will take the Studio 9294 stage on Thursday, February 7 alongside IDLES, Heavy Lungs, Soviet Soviet, and Queen Zee. Get familiar with the band before their performance below.

South London’s Goat Girl are scrappy and whip-smart punks, making playful tunes that are most-times pointedly aimed at politics. Holding nothing back, the band doesn’t mask their opinions or make veiled references.

“How can an entire nation be so fucking thick?” they pondered on the 2016 single “Scum,” while 2018’s “Burn the Stake” suggests to “build a bonfire, put the Tories on the top/Put the DUP in the middle and we’ll burn the fucking lot.”

While that may sound heavy, the band – whose stage names are singer Clottie Cream, guitarist LED, bassist Naima Jelly, and drummer Rosy Bone – are determined to have some fun while also burning the political parties to the ground. If there was ever a band so Clash-esque in 2019 it would be Goat Girl.

KEXP spoke to Goat Girl about the significance of The Clash in a brief interview. Read below.

KEXP: What does The Clash mean to you and have they inspired your music at all?

Goat Girl: Seeing as we are “Brixton punks” (as Jools Holland put it) we see a lot of ourselves in The Clash They weren’t afraid to make banging pop tunes in a sea of aggressive willy rock, which we appreciate and aspire to do. They were supporters of rock against racism and used their platform as artists to raise awareness of injustice. Other bands involved at that time have been very inspiring to us too, like the Slits and X-Ray Spex.

Do you find there to be parallels between the lyrical content and ethos of London Calling and the current state of England?

The Clash are inspiring for not only their music but the movements they were involved in at a time of political despair, they were a refuge for a lot of people which is something we look up to. This, in itself, inspired music to follow that had a similar anti-establishment agenda.

What can audiences expect from your performance for KEXP's International Clash Day London broadcast?

We will be playing songs from our debut album for 25-30 mins. KEXP is very good so we were very excited when asked to do this.

Goat Girl will perform at KEXP’s International Clash Day London broadcast at 6:00 AM PST / 2:00 PM GMT on Thursday, February 7. Check out the full schedule of performances here. Watch the video for “The Man,” directed by CC Wade, below.