As Plague Vendor vocalist Brandon Blaine sits in the graffiti sprawled greenroom at London’s Old Blue Last, his glance blocked by a slightly tipped baseball cap, he talks of the stories in his head. Influences are listed at a scattergun pace, from The Stooges and dabbling in hallucinogenic substances, to falling asleep to the director’s commentary on Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas. Everything is effortlessly cool and notably dark.

It’s all led Blaine and his bandmates to ‘Bloodsweat’, a sparse desert-rock opus disguised as a short and punchy rock album. But he’s already speaking of the record’s follow-up, in the making, admitting his love of the dark not only in theme. “I want to do all my vocals at night,” he says, an excitable tinge in his otherwise calm voice. “We all love the night-time.”

It’s another step further into the abyss created on their sophomore album, the follow-up to 2014’s more overtly punk debut ‘Free To Eat’. Plague Vendor have crafted their own bleak musical expanse, an outlet for the tales forming in his active imagination. After a mere fifteen minutes of conversation, it’s clear that ‘Bloodsweat’ is the disconnected thoughts in his head trying to make sense.

“Somewhere in my subconscious there’s a story,” Blaine says. “I’m still writing it.”

Much like how Blaine verbalise these thoughts, their journey to the record is just as erratic. Guided by his bandmates’ instrumentation, each track is a mere snapshot of Blaine’s mind. The story is fluid, the idea of a concept album met with a slight hint of distain. “It’s a spur of the moment thing,” he offers as the explanation for tracks like ‘No Bounty’, “it’s just where my subconscious is at the time.”

“It’s a bit all over the place, in a really good way,” he adds, explaining how some songs form part of his internal story and not others, dismissing ‘Giving In, Given Out’. “The story is important for each individual song. I think I’d put way too much pressure on myself if I thought it had to be about something.”

‘Bloodsweat’, the title itself, provides an example of this often complex process. A reflection of what Blaine has witnessed; it’s also evidence of how the everyday is twisted in his mind. “I saw a car in flames on the highway and then saw a Gatorade advert with people sweating Gatorade. I was like, we’re going to call it ‘Bloodsweat’,” he explains, merging these experiences with his inner story.

Once recorded, these stories still have a life of their own. “Mentally the stories change,” he notes, speaking of the consistent pressure to publically analyse his songs. “‘Jezebel’ was about a couple searching to trip out, to go on a camping trip and expand their minds. But it turns into this Easy Rider type of debauchery, sadness and chaos.” He pauses. “It’s not really about any particular person though, it’s about the drug itself.” His own reflection of the track seemingly morphs as he explains it even now.

When it comes to playing the tracks live, these stories develop futher. “It’s a whole other animal,” he notes when asked whether his themes affect his performance. “That all depends on the sound of the place. You’re either going to have a night where everyone is in sync and you can lose yourself, or one when it’s completely mellow. People probably expect that it’s going to be insane, but it’s so much more than that. It’s almost spiritual. We know there’s a script, but how we act it out is going to different every night.”

He returns to his creative process. “I’ve been writing lyrics since I was 16 years old. I know where I want to take the audience and myself, and want to write songs I’m not going to get bored of singing. Once I figure out the puzzle, it all takes shape.”

‘Bloodsweat’ isn’t a complete picture, nor would Blaine want it to be. It’s part of his story, one that is likely to remain unfinished no matter how much material Plague Vendor produce. The plot is free-flowing. The art is experimental and therapeutic. ‘Bloodsweat’ is the product of Blaine’s contorted observations and influences, heavily supported by his bandmates. “It’s all just in my head,” he concludes, “so once I’m provided with the right canvas, it’s easy to write about it. The guys provide the canvas. I’m just always thinking about stuff and tripping myself out.”