Interview: The Rattlebacks (Written)
Unstoppable UK hard rockers, The Rattlebacks, just keep on rising. The fast-emerging rock ‘n’ rollers have now dropped their killer new single and video, ‘Please Me’. The track is lifted from the band’s greatly anticipated debut album, which is set to land later this year. We find out a bit more about The Rattlebacks here via rhythm guitarist, Coxy.
1. Hello! Thank you for taking the time to chat to us. First things first, tell us a little bit about yourself and how you got started.
No no thank you for having us! Well, it all started as that curly haired shredder of a lead guitarist, my friend since a month old, Max Horn got a guitar for his birthday. This meant I, of course, had to have one too. We were 11 at that point so together we began our adventure into understanding the world of rock and roll. For a brief spell we traded licks and wanted to improve our shredding but at some point, it became very apparent that Max had that amazing talent for lead and I have always been more fascinated with the groove and bounce of a riff. So quite naturally I would come up with a riff and Max would tear it’s face off. Without too much thought we became a real old school guitar pairing. Then Max went off to uni, I went and raced motorbikes and soon after we stopped fucking about and decided we were going to take on the world. So that is how it started, Max or I can’t really talk about our origin story without talking about each other, it’s poetic really.
2. Someone comes to you and asks you to sum up what kind of music you play – what do you tell them?
This will probably come back to bite us at some point but with a wink and a nudge at rehearsals one of us coined the phrase Grunge n’ Roses. I think when you start as a band you wear those influences with pride and out of that you develop your own sound, but on this debut album we have certainly found our own thing. We like to think we are the band that should of happened post grunge.
3. What’s currently going on in your camp? New releases? Tours? Etc.
We have our debut album out in the last quarter of the year and with that there will be singles, the first of which “Please Me” is out now. There will also be a massive tour to announce but we will remain tight lipped on that for now. What I will say is that we are currently on tour with the MIGHTY Tailgunner who are absolutely killing it right now, I think it is the best upcoming band tour in the UK right now. Be sure to check us out on the dates below.
THE RATTLEBACKS live:– KK’s Steel Mill – Wolverhampton (with Tailgunner); 17/10/24 – Rebellion – Manchester (with Tailgunner); 21/11/24 – Face bar – Reading (with Tailgunner); 22/11/24 – Komedia – Brighton (with Tailgunner); 23/11/24- Cobblestones – Bridgewater (with Tailgunner).
4. What has been the most positive experience of making music to date for you?
I love nearly everything about this industry, it is my Mount Everest, so no matter how tough some days are it is always positive. But for me personally I think the highlight to date is making this album. We have a song on it called “Behind You” that is very personal to me. I came to understand very clearly the lengths my band mates and brothers will go to support me, I will forever be touched by their kindness on a human level. This album has been a dream of mine since I first picked up a guitar so it is going to be amazing to get this thing out and see what it does. I can’t talk about how amazing this album was to make without mentioning Dave Holmes of Lightship 95. A beautiful and talented man that created the perfect environment to overdeliver on even our expectations. I think the conclusion is the positive experiences and the best parts of this industry are the people who you meet and get to work with along the way.
5. Likewise, what has been some of the more challenging aspects and how have you overcome them?
It is all about funding. We take this band very seriously; we aren’t here to take part we want to dominate this industry and bring back an excitement to hard rock. BUT to do that you need to operate to the highest standard possible across the board to be able to compete and that of course is only possible with cold hard cash. You hear people in the industry complain about it should all be about the music, and it should, but it is not how it is. So, you can either complain about it for find solutions to keep your dream alive. We have been very very very lucky to have such amazing fans who raised £5k on GofundMe to help kick this album process off but you get through that quite quickly! We have all had to get a bit good at our day jobs to bring in extra money and sell our worldly possessions to try and give us the best start possible. Really, the music is the easy bit it is all the other shit you have to worry about that makes it tough. If you want it enough you will always find a way and we have a motto in The Rattlebacks, “no problems, only solutions”.
6. How do you handle the modern expectations of being in a band? Always online, having to put out content constantly, your success measured in likes and follows?
Ha! Whatever do you mean? As I say it is sink or swim out here so you just have to do what you can, but it is becoming more and more vital to basically do everything but focus on the music. You hit a point that your ambition requires you to take these things more seriously and it becomes a business, so you have to start wearing a lot of hats. For me the key to it all is to surround yourself with highly talented, passionate individuals that share your bands vision. You have to accept you can’t do it all and we are very grateful to our growing team, they are the ones that really help push the band in this regard. So to everyone behind the scenes, a million times, thank you!
7. What’s something that really ‘grinds your gears’ about the industry/business these days and what would you propose is done to combat it?
The lack of money going round. Even petrol money is a luxury. I mean I could give up on myself, start a wedding band, and earn two grand a night, but where is the challenge in that? I am not sure at what point it gets easier either, the bigger you get the more everyone wants a piece. For example, if a venue wants to take merch money then we will take their beer money, fair is fair right? These venues need to remember who is putting footfall in their venue, what makes them deserving of a share of the very little profit bands get? The answer is they don’t, I don’t know how they sleep at night. They can go fuck themselves.
8. Speaking directly to listeners – what would you ask they do to help support your music?
Follow us on everything, like everything and put us in your playlists. We read all the comments and your support is so so motivating. We love you, thank you and we will continue to work towards being the band that hard rock deserves.
9. Outside of the music, what’s do you do to relax?
Sit very quietly in a dark room, just waiting until I am next summoned by fellow brothers in The Rattlebacks to go again.
10. Where can people find you?
Anywhere you want to find us you will, whatever platform. Here is our website, have a mooch about and see what you think. Links to all our socials are on there if you scroll down on the home page.
