Estuary
Blacks are a new band from Swansea, South Wales. Made up of members
of Bomb The Sun and Tabularasa, Estuary Blacks play a more
Psychedelic Stoner Rock sound with elements of Post-Rock being woven
into the background.
The
band have just released their superb debut album and it's a fantastic
sounding record that will appeal to fans of Elephant Tree and the
members previous bands that I mentioned before.
I
wanted to find out more about Estuary Blacks and how they recorded
their epic sounding new album. Tom Young (Drums) from the band was
more than happy to do this interview.
Hi
Tom. Thanks for doing this interview. How are things with you today.
Yup,
all good here....excited to release the album.
Before
we discuss your new album. Can you give a brief overview of how the
band formed and where it is today.
We
grew up together, went to school together and Dan and Al were doing a
band called Bomb The Sun who unfortunately disbanded a good few years
ago, I've played in other bands and always loved their style
together so we decided to give it a shot!
Why
did you choose Estuary Blacks as the name for your band.
Me
(Tom) and Dan grew up on the North side of the Gower Peninsula and
it's all Marshland with a large Estuary. There are horses that live
on the marsh and when the tide cones right up, the horses get to the
higher parts of the marsh and get semi-submerged in the tide. They
have to wait there until the tide goes back out again until they can
move for fear of falling into one of the groynes and drowning!! In
the evening you can see their black silhouettes standing
motionless....these are Estuary Blacks!!
How
would you describe your overall sound.
That's
always hard......big...!!
You’re
about to release your superb debut album. What can people expect from
the album.
It's
quite a diverse album, from big heavy climaxes like Puris Prass to
the delicate spacey interlude, Hank Carmarvin......
I
like to think that it offers a lot...it's not just a
stoner/doom/post-rock album......whatever people wanna label it as.
What
is the main theme of the album.
The
Sea and the seasons/weather........we get all the weather!
Who
is releasing the album and what formats is the album being released
upon.
Kozmik
Artifactz are releasing the album on vinyl and CD but it will also be
available through BandCamp as of February 16th.....then later on
Spotify.
How
did you hook-up with Kozmik Artifactz records to release your album
on vinyl.
Bomb
The Sun released their self titled (masterpiece in my opinion)
through them which ,they loved. So when we formed Estuary Blacks we
started sending them stuff and they liked it....
Here
we are.
Did
you have any other offers from labels to release the album on vinyl.
We
haven't sent off any music to other labels yet.....Kozmik always
seemed really keen to have us and they did a great job on the Bomb
The Sun record we feel we don't need to go any place else.
What
influenced you when writing and recording the album.
Where
we grew up, the Gower......we have some characers .....musically we
were listening to a lot of Goatsnake, Super Furry Animals, Ween and
Mogwai while recording this.....Don't know if we have taken any of
that!
Was
recording the album an easy or hard experience.
Some
came easy like Fat Jason and Caswell Brat......Puris Prass has been
rolling around in our jams for around 2 years now! We didn't finish
writing it till a week before we tracked it
What
is the song-writing method in the band. Is it a group collective or
down to one individual.
Dan's
got a weird way of playing the bass.....
He
plays it like a guitar and comes up with some great lines, me and Al
are in charge of hacking him up and putting it back together again.
You’re
from Wales and the Welsh scene has provided the Doom and Stoner
Rock/Metal world with some amazing bands over the years. What is the
scene currently like in Wales. Do you have an active scene to
participate in. Do you get the opportunity to perform regular gigs.
South
Wales had and still had an amazing array of bands.....what we don't
seem to have (in Swansea) is a bunch of people who go out and see
bands.....
We
may play a gig to 5 people one night, play the same venue a week
later and you got 50 people there.....you just never know........
Swansea
is a fickle beast. But yeah, when we grew up we got to see band like
Taint, Bomb The Sun, Black Eye Riot and The Death Of Her Money on a
regular basis.....it was the shit!!
Will
you be promoting and touring this album heavily within the UK. Or
will you just be focusing on gigs closer to home.
We
would love to play gigs about the country - hit us up!!
Words
by Steve Howe and Tom Young
Their debut album is available to buy digitally now. CD/Vinyl will be released later this year via Kozmik Artifactz.
