Chain of Flowers
I can remember the first COF practice, in late 2011, we had absolutely no clue how to achieve the sounds we wanted or how to blend ideas together in an interesting way. I can remember the song we played and the phone demo that I probably listened to 100 times in the following weeks. Mainly, I remember how after the practice myself, Josh and Rich were absolutely buzzing. We were terrible but we were so happy to be actually trying something new and exciting. We went out drinking telling everyone about how good our new band was going to be.
We played our first gig in April 2012 alongside Milk Music and Eagulls. Since then we've been lucky to play alongside great bands old and new such as The Fall, The Jesus & Mary Chain, The Chameleons, Boy Harsher, Merchandise, Iceage, Nothing, Hank Wood & The Hammerheads, Psychic TV and a ton more.
12 years later, after a little break, we've just released a new LP.
Never Ending Space [2023]
Personally I don't think 8 years is that big of a gap lol.
No, it is, but considering it was never going to happen it's fine.
Despite the plethora of shit that surrounded the making of this record, recording it was incredibly fun and rewarding. We went in to the studio with very primitive, undeveloped demos of every song and brought them all to life in different styles. Focussing on what suited each song individually rather than a set sound of the whole album.
Say what you will but an honest listener couldn't throw the "unoriginal" tag on us when it comes to this record.
We worked with Jonah Falco and to be honest having him there as a collaborator was perfect for us. Pushing us to think big and wind us in when we were maybe getting a bit too ridiculous.
Big shoutout to Luke Younger who more or less forced us to get our heads back together at a time when I personally thought it would never happen.
Cadwyn o Flodau [2015]
After a few years worth of demos, cassingles, 7" singles and so on we got together enough songs to warrant an LP.
Recorded at the famous Monnow Valley Studio by an absolute clown who held the masters hostage in exchange for a royalties contract, which he did not get. Mixed by Ben Greenberg who did a great job.
I can't help but feel that the production is a little over the top, but i'm super proud of it and remember the sense of accomplishment when it was finished.
After a certain label fucked us around Luke of Alter saw us in Leeds when we played a show together and I think offered to put it out the very next week, which I was super excited about, already being a fan of the label.
Let Your Light In / Flesh Blood and Bone [2017]
I swear we were gearing up to record a full EP around this time and for some reason went with these two brand new songs instead out of the blue that me and Matt had written.
I had just bought an old Epiphone hollow body bass and used it for this session which to be honest did not garner the best results.
Mixed by Arthur Rizk.
Amphetamine Luck [2021]
After a little break we decided that maybe new music was worth pursuing and started practicing again, with Sam now back in the fold. We played two gigs in February 2020 in Paris and Antwerp. Things were exciting again and we made a plan to finish off the abandoned 2017/2018 LP. Obviously everyone knows what happened the following month.
We managed to get together at some point early 2021 and recorded this song to show some intent. It was our first time working with Jonah Falco, who we have since recorded the new LP with.
Flowers Everywhere Vol 1 [2012 - 2017]
A collection of everything we had recorded before Cadwyn o Flodau and some select recordings from radio sessions and live sets. Includes a song that we recorded for CoF that just didn't sit well with the other songs, our cover of Spectrum's How You Satisfy Me and a really bad recording of when we covered Total Recall by The Sound in 2012 at what must've been one of our first gigs.
THE DOGS
Feels mad to have a new band to write about... Basically when I moved to Sheffield, myself and Matt wanted to start something new. After about 5 or 6 months of going back and forth about what style it could be we just got together over a weekend at his house and what came out of it was the first Dogs demo DOG SHIT. As soon as we started jamming it was obvious what it was going to be and all the previous conversations were instantly forgotten.
We got Ross involved and voilà.
Dog Shit [2024]
The first four songs that we wrote, all done in the first weekend we started jamming, and a cover of The Velvet Underground.
Recorded the vocals in Cardiff a week or two later and released digitally instantly.
Still Dog Shit [2024]
Run it back.
Three more hits recorded in the same fashion, at Matt's house.
Dog Shit & Still Dog Shit were both released online before we'd played a gig.
Earring
This is a project that I share with my long time confidant Matthew Clements. We played our shitty guitars through our practice amps together as kids but had never done an actual group together until Earring. We were both back at our respective parents houses, which are opposite each other, the summer after we both finished university and decided to fuck around with some drum machines and synths as well as our shitty guitars this time.
It's either not a real group or one that will release music again in the future. You decide.
Normalcy [2014]
Fond memories of recording this at my parents old house. Everything that I like about this essentially came about as fluke. We'd never written together and we'd never attempted our own recordings before.
Distorting the fuck out of the drum machine, taking song sections in turn to play guitar/bass, finding vocal patterns by just counting from 1 to 10 along with the music. Chrome was by far my favourite band at the time and somehow the setup we stumbled upon kind of sounds like them in my opinion.
Stand out memory has got to be recording a vocal take and my little sister poking her head around the corner and making fun of a particular lyric and me really not being able to take it. Matt found it funny though.
These songs were partly the reason Matt ended up joining Chain of Flowers.
We actually played a gig around the time that this came out with Ross helping out on guitar.
Neo Syndrome / Session [2015]
This never had a real release name due to the fact that we didn't really put it out.
Basically, we decided to try our next batch of songs as a full band as opposed to just the two of us. For whatever reason we weren't 100% sure of the outcome.
It grew on us over the course of a years worth of after parties and eventually "released" them.
Listening back now I actually really like the way it sounds and think we probably should have kept at it.
Cruel Blue [2019]
I think this is still maybe my favourite song that i've ever (co)written.
Initially intended to go on a Chain of Flowers album that didn't come to pass, me and Matt (and Rich, who revoked his credit) went to John Anthony Thomas' home/barn studio and recorded this as well as another song that wasn't finished/released.
Matt jumped on the mic for this session.
Midnight Marauder
Final Fantasy [2022]
Two songs and two instrumentals that I recorded by myself at home in 2021.
Having played in traditional band setups throughout my life, I wanted to do something different and more importantly something totally by myself. Maybe just to prove to myself that I would/could.
Writing lyrics definitely doesn't come naturally to me and not something i'm sure that I'll ever enjoy but I do like what was done with these songs.
Asid
First foray back in to making hard music since maybe 2011. I feel like we practiced for about two years before getting a demo together. We also went through about 4 singers, who never sang with us, before linking up with Tin and finally pulling the trigger.
Very proud of the LP and had a great time playing shows with this band.
Video from what became our final show, at Static Shock 2020.
Asid Tracks [2017]
Self-recorded and released on cassette. I don't hear much good but there is a charm to how ham-fisted these songs are.
Asid Tracks II [2018]
This is where we started to form our actual sound. First thing we put out with La Vida Es Un Mus, which was cool having been an admirer of the label for so long.
Pathetic Flesh [2019]
The pièce de résistance of the Asid catalogue. Recorded this with John Anthony Thomas at his home/barn studio and had a fun time doing so.
Hard af record that really nailed what we were trying to do.