If you are to believe the hype, Sewer Rats were discovered lurking around a disused Grimsby fish market – yes, it’s grim up North, and it doesn’t get much grimmer than that. Hailed by their label, ‘Fluffer Records‘, as “the future of British rock ‘n’ roll” we needed to find out more. So we headed over to the docks to catch them in their natural habitat…
BM: Who are you? And where are you from?
SR: We are Luke Guitar/Vocals, Iain Bass and Dean Drums.We are from Immingham
BM: Have you known each other long?
SR: We’ve known each other for like 10 years now and have been in bands throughout our childhood. Me and Iain decided finally after like years of talking about it that we’d start a band. And it kind of went from there. Dean joined around 4 months ago and its been going well since.
BM: Sewer Rats – not the most attractive of names…
SR: Immingham is a really grim place so we found the name fitting.
BM: Fluffer are saying you’re the future of rock’n’roll – how would you describe your sound?
SR: Well thats one of them errrrrr moments, we don’t really answer that question if I’m honest just tell them to listen to us online, or wait and see if its at a gig. We’ve had people say we sound like Kyuss, Queens of the Stone Age, Nirvana, Zeppelin all rolled into one. But I can honestly say we don’t set out to make music that sounds like someone, it just happens.
BM: What is it that makes you a band?
SR: Give or take a few things we all enjoy and are into the same things, like skating, were all into the same bands and generally we all like drinking copious amounts of alcohol.
BM: Any bands in particular that you would say have influenced you?
SR: Sabbath/Zeppelin definitely are the two that have had massive influence on us. Just the pure raw vibes both band give out in the own individual way.
BM: Tell us about the shed…
SR: Our first ever practice was about a year and half ago in Iain’s tin shed in his garden. We could barely fit the drum kit in there and me and Iain couldn’t stand up in there whilst playing. But we were all so happy to be jamming together it didn’t really matter. I remember once we tried to have a gig in there and some poor lad got thrown through the tin door and nearly took the whole shed with him. Good times.
BM: What was your first gig like?
SR: Our first ever gig was at a mate of ours night called “Scene Not Heard” up in Scarborough. Fuck it was a healthy crowd for a first gig. Can remember our drummer at the time (Nathan Marshall) being proper nervous. We all were to be fair. But it went pretty well for a first gig. Had like 5 Swedish blokes punching each other throughout the set, no idea what they were doing in a basement in Scarborough but we loved it.
BM: How would you describe your live set?
SR: You could say its a lot more full on then the recordings. Loads of Fuzz and tons of Wah!
BM: Talking of recorded stuff, you’ve got your first EP ready to launch…
SR: Our new record coming out, through FLUFFER RECORDS, is entitled MONEYMAKER and will be released on the 27th of July. Its a five track Ep that we have written over the past couple of months between gigs.
We recorded the record at Sound Savers Recording studio in Hackney London with the wizard Mark Jasper a couple of months ago. FLUFFER had booked us the recording studio from 9am-6pm on a Saturday morning but we Couldn’t get the van until Saturday morning at around 4 am meaning we had to drive from Grimsby to London at 4 am. we didn’t arrive until 8am. After recording till 6pm we then went on to gig that night at, I think it was, The Shacklewell Arms. It was a fun one as you can imagine.
BM: How does the writing process work for you guys?
SR: I (Luke) come up with a riff and some lyrics take it to practice and we work on it throughout the practice session. Sometimes i have to go away and tweak lyrics sometimes it just works. Which is an incredible feeling. The general rule is the music comes with exception to a few songs.
BM: With Fluffer Records you join Love Buzzard, who we really like, any other bands on there that you think we should look out for?
SR: Theres a band called Sunlight Service Group that really impress us any time they play, three piece psychedelic vibes.
BM: Debut EP launches in just over a fortnight, and you’ve got plenty of live dates coming up – what next for Sewer Rats?
SR: By the end of 2015 we aim to have played as many venues as humanly possible and hopefully have at least half of our debut album written.
BM: And finally, what’s the Sewer Rats message?
SR: I wouldn’t say we have a message, I’d say we like to give people a relief from the outside world through our music. 4 minutes of psych bliss were the world doesn’t really exist.
Catch SEWER RATS live at the following:-
12/06/15 – The Jacaranda / Liverpool
13/06/15 – The Big Busk Festival / Cleethorpes
20/06/15 – The Roadhouse / Sheffield
03/07/15 – Aces & Eights Saloon Bar / London
23/07/15 – Replay Records / Grimsby (IN STORE EP LAUNCH SHOW)
24/07/15 – Stags Head, London (EP LAUNCH SHOW)
30/07/15 – Dublin Castle / London
31/07/15 – Night & Day / Manchester
01/08/15 – Matrix / Grimsby (EP LAUNCH)
15/08/15 – The Washington / Sheffield
20/08/15 – Fiddlers Elbow / Camden London
26/08/15 – The Shed / Leicester
29/08/15 – Northern Lights Festival / Cleethorpes
25/09/15 – Waves / Cleethorpes
26/09/15 – Fantasy Island Festival / Cleethorpes
Pre-order ‘Money Maker’ here – https://flufferrecords.bandcamp.com/album/sewer-rats-money-maker-ep
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