Vexed: Culling The Toxic Waste
The UK is flooding with some of the most exciting new talent within metal as of late. From LOATHE to LEECHED, bands are breaking down the genre boundaries and paving the way forward for a music generation like no other. Joining the ranks as one of the most vicious upcoming bands in the scene is VEXED. The Hertfordshire-based band have been dominating the scene since their start and turning the heads of anyone that crosses their path. We managed to catch up with the band’s vocalist Megan Targett about their quick success and their upcoming debut album; Culling Culture.
The band are only just gearing up to release their debut album, Culling Culture, but already they’ve grabbed the attention of the masses. From a feature appearing from CJ McMahon [THY ART IS MURDER] on standalone single, Elite, to being signed by Napalm Records, there’s no wonder there’s an exciting buzz fluttering around the scene.
“Because of the power of social media, when we released our first song it did better than what we ever anticipated it to do, we just didn’t think people would care that much. When we did disappear for a bit because of the ‘world’, we didn’t think people would care, but when we said we were coming back and people did care, we were just really shocked and surprised. It’s been really nice to see that people actually do give a crap about us and really weird at the same time. It’s really strange to comprehend that people actually like us.”
As Targett mentions, there’s a strange air around the success that comes with being such a young band. There’s the uncertainty about whether people actually do like you or not, and when you do disappear off the grid for a certain amount of time, are people who initially paid an interest going to forget about you and move on? It’s an understandable worry that would come from an upcoming band, but one that doesn’t get touched on enough is the aspect that rising to success so quickly isn’t all as exciting as it sounds, in fact, it can be pretty daunting.
“It’s really weird because we feel so proud of ourselves and so excited for the things that we’ve achieved, but at the same time there’s a little bit of imposter syndrome there. It’s like, do we really deserve it because no one really knows how hard we’ve actually worked? People don’t know how hard we’ve worked and haven’t heard the album so maybe we don’t deserve it kind of thing. I think there is that little bit of imposter syndrome there but I think that will quieten down a bit, in my mind at least, when the album is out and people can hear what we were working on and what CJ heard, so we don’t feel as like we’ve been really lucky or bought our way, we have actually worked really hard to do it.”
It’s understandable in this situation why an upcoming band may feel like this. We’re in an age now, especially with the COVID-19 pandemic, where everything is online. There’s no seeing a band tour and witnessing the energy they put into their music, it’s emailing and being vocal on social media as much as you can, you are your own word of mouth. Whilst that aspect hasn’t been the most ideal for most bands, the relationship between people and social media is actually what inspired some of the album concept and the title.
Culling Culture is an album that weighs heavy on subjects such as hate, betrayal, anger and toxic relationships, but it also reflects our society in a brutally honest way around the online ‘cancel culture’. “We were struggling for a long time to think of the album title, all of the songs were done and we just wanted something that summed it up,” Targett says. “At the time when we had written the songs there was the whole cancel culture kicking off and it’s crazy! In some ways it’s fantastic but in others it’s mental. We were discussing how that had similar themes to the songs because each track is about an individual or group of people that we’ve personally cut out of our lives because for so long we’ve tried to remain positive and keep people in our lives who bring nothing but toxicity or negativity.”
She continues, “we decided that Culling Culture was our way of cancelling or killing off, so culling, people from our own lives that do nothing but be harmful. It was to get rid of all the toxic shit and start afresh, so that’s the kind of the message behind it. Instead of focusing on the outward world and cancelling everybody who doesn’t have an input on your life, focus on the negative people who are around you in your direct space. Instead of worrying about who they are or what they bring, if they don’t bring anything positive, just cull them off, get rid of them because it’s the most powerful and cleansing and healthy thing you can do for your mental health. That’s where the inspiration came from.”
Their humble attitude towards their success, their poignant message about looking after your own wellbeing and culling out toxicity and their fierce refusal to be pigeon-holed into a box shows why they are achieving great heights so early on in their career. What they’ve done hasn’t been done in such a brutal and honest fashion before, and that only comes with blood, sweat and tears. VEXED are here to spit the truth, destroy the stages and deliver strength in moments of weakness.
Culling Culture is out now via Napalm Records.
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