The debut album from Sunderland group Ryder is packed full of anthems from start to finish. Combining the influences of Oasis and Kasabian together leads to an album brimming with heart.
Opening with Forgotten Dream, these influences are immediately evident, with a definite hint of Liam Gallagher in the vocals. The track as a whole reminded me of some of Johnny Marr’s solo work, with the bass breakdown towards the end skilfully executed, adding to the track’s massive overall sound.
Lone Soldier has a nice synth opening which gives it a slightly different feel. This combined with a chorus of voices and heavy guitar work reminded me a lot of Kasabian, especially with its passionate delivery.
Northern Lights continues the trend of massive choruses and soaring anthems, with a very Noel Gallagher-esque solo thrown in for good measure. Whilst Inner City Violence brings some social commentary to record, with some excellent drum work going on on the track.
The bass work on the album is also exquisite, and is particularly showcased on Men in Suits, where the bassline reminded me of Paul McCartney’s work on Taxman.
The beginning of Ziggy echoes of Oasis’ Talk Tonight before the whole band kicks in for the second verse. The song has an anthemic vibe, with some touching tributes to David Bowie baked within the lyrics. It feels tailor-made for a live setting, with a soaring chorus you can easily imagine going down well at a festival.
The title track, Only The Brave, again brings heavy guitars, with a touch of The Clash in the mix while lighter guitar flourishes sit atop of them to great results.
The commentary on problematic men on Hold on Tight is seamlessly woven into this biting track, creating a sharp, aggressive edge.
Heavy guitars pierce throughout Balloons, which features a great recurring guitar line reminiscent of Arctic Monkeys. Finale Faces In The Crowd is a suitably grand ending to this massive-sounding album, finishing the LP on a high.
If you love your anthems and like groups like Oasis, then you will definitely appreciate this strong debut showing.
It’s a cold Friday evening in December however the Think Tank? is packed with young music fans, awaiting them are four local bands making up a lineup packed with talent from the region.
Amongst them are Sheds, a band who already have a huge following of young fans which packed out the venue for their support slot.
Sheds – Live at Think Tank? – 06/12/19
This has really energised the band who have seen their fanbase grow from strength to strength.
“Yeah, I’m buzzing for it, practices for this have gone quite well. It’s one of the few opening gigs we’ve done and we‘ll see how it goes down because we usually just play to our own fans. We’re excited to see how it goes down with others.” said the band’s singer, Frank Cook.
“We’ve played a couple of times here. We were meant to be playing Underground but got moved up here. So we’ve ended up playing here again. We’ve had a three-hour scramble to get people to go to the right place. We’ve played more gigs here than anywhere else.”
The Crowd @ Think Tank – 06/12/19
The band certainly did go down well, with a weighty crowd of young fans filling the floor with the band smashing out a mixture of covers and original material.
Included in this was the band’s new single “Keep It Down” which is closing in on 1,000 streams on Spotify.
The reaction to the single has stunned the band:
“It’s been a bit mental and it’s coming up to 1000 streams after a month we didn’t know how people would react because we just do gigs. It was one of the older songs so it was nice to put it out and hopefully, we can do better but it’s set the tone for us it’s mental how it got received really.”
The single takes influences from Arctic Monkeys as well as various indie rock bands with a strong riff which really powers the song along.
Guitarist Tom Robson also cited the Black Keys’ ‘Turn Blue’ as another huge inspiration for him.
However, the main influence for riff writer, Tom Robson, came from a very different place.
“The biggest inspirations were Tame Impala and Arctic Monkeys I had the riff for ages I just stood in the corner at mine and he played the riff and Frank played his chords and we looked at each other and we knew it was going to be good.”
“It comes together very quickly not a lot of thought goes into it. We have good ideas and it’s just about doing it. Once in a while it just clicks and we have a song.”
The band don’t plan to stop there however with new songs constantly being worked on as well as various gigs which are planned for the new year.
They plan to get the new year started with a bang when they headline the Surf Cafe on the 3rd of January with the money raised from the gig being put back into the band in the form of recording a single or even a debut EP.
The plan is to keep gigging throughout the new year:
“We aim to play a show in April or May time.”
“There are more venues popping up all the time. I love the Surf Cafe I go down there at the weekend.” said guitarist Tom Robson.
Sheds are part of a growing music scene in North East which are currently exposing the North East as a hotbed for fresh, new music.
Sheds are very happy to be part of this amazing community of musicians:
“We had no idea about the music scene around here until we started. If you’d asked us a year ago, we’d be happy to just be on the circuit. There’s definitely a community of 20 odd bands. Everyone’s great and tight-knit and amazing at what they do.”
“We love Fowl, Frank loves his punk. We love Stasis, Distance are really good as well.”
Both Distance and Fowl featured alongside the lads that night in what was a high energy show from all three bands.
Sheds – Live from Think Tank? Newcastle – 06/12/19
The huge mosh pit which grew as Sheds performed showed the groups talent at getting the crowd going.
Despite this, their growing fan-base will have to wait a little longer for new music from Sheds:
“It won’t be soon for the EP, it’ll be a few months more. It’ll be more likely to have a single out first. For the EP, we want to write new songs instead of recording old ones. We want to write it properly we won’t release it until it’s as good as it could be. It could be 6 or 8 months but we’ve got new spins on things.” said guitarist Tom Robson
However, the band nearly didn’t make it this far.
The band, which had its origins in a high school music class, nearly called it quits.
“We were shit for a year and Tom nearly left because it was shocking after summer we formed but we got our shit together when we got offered to play a schools gig at the O2 and if it hadn’t gone well we wouldn’t have been a band anymore,” claimed Frank Cook.
“The response was good even though we were shit. But we learnt how to do it properly,” said drummer, Joel Bell.
Whilst the band are hungry to grow even bigger they wouldn’t want to have a huge fan-base.
“Realistically we’d like to keep gigging around. We’ve got a fan-base which is growing out from people we know. We’d like to fill a room but as long as we have an identity, we don’t really want a massive fan-base.”
The band dreams of Glastonbury whilst admitting headlining is probably highly unlikely for them.
They did, however, give their views on the 2020 lineup as well as past lineups.
“For Glastonbury, I was hoping they’d get Led Zeppelin or something like that for the 50th.”
“I’m disappointed that there’s no current band headlining it. I like The 1975 whilst they’re not my favourite band, I would have liked to see them headline this year, rather than The Killers or something,” said singer, Frank Cook.
“A modern band would be better. I’m not a fan of McCarthy headlining but the more I’ve thought about it the more I’m like that’s alright.”
The band’s high energy shows are definitely worth catching so get down to the Surf Cafe this January to catch them.
Humbug North East 