Sweat touch on toxic masculinity issues on 'What Men Want'

Words: Ellie Ward 

Written back in 2017 but only recently arranged and recorded, 'What Men Want', the new single from South East London outfit SWEAT, comes with beat heavy electronics and an irresistible chorus.

“'What Men Want' aims to expose some of the ridiculousness of masculinity and patriarchal hierarchies, and shows a dystopia driven by corrupt men pleasing each other to get to the top," states frontman and lyricist Dante Traynor.

"It came from a nightmare I had on NYE 2017, but I don’t want it to be all doom and gloom – ridicule seems to be a good strategy to start to neutralize the deep-rooted male archetype that causes such harm to everything it comes into contact with.

"All men are complicit in perpetuating harmful masculine mythology to an extent, and it takes a lot of time, maturity and constant vigilance to condition ourselves out of it, if we even manage to…”

The track’s video runs with these themes of toxic masculinity and finds Dante and his brother Gamaliel re-enacting the biblical story of Cain and Abel in wheat fields, whilst the band play in the hyper-masculine setting of a car garage.

Sweat play a single launch show at Peckham Audio on November 20, followed by a support date with Fat White Family at EartH Hackney on December 3.