Squid - The Blades

What this video is

Released May 25, 2023 as the third single from Squid's sophomore album O Monolith (Warp Records, June 9 2023), 'The Blades' arrives at a moment of critical peak for UK experimental post-punk. The song references police brutality and the Bristol 'Kill the Bill' protests of 2021, grounding surrealist imagery in specific political trauma. Produced by long-time collaborator Dan Carey and mixed by John McEntire of…

Why it matters

A key document of the 2020s UK post-punk art-rock convergence, 'The Blades' fuses krautrock rhythmic propulsion, art-punk instrumentation, sprawling electronics, and blistering horns in a structure that critics likened to Hail to the Thief-era Radiohead. Its multi-stage compositional architecture…

The director

Kasper Häggstrøm is a director credited on IMDb and industry databases with music video and short film work spanning Radiohead, Kelly Lee Owens, Lindstrøm, and Squid. His short film Cows (2025) and music video Radiohead: If You Say the Word (2021) are among…