Bar Stool Preachers | Bite Me Bambi

This wasn’t meant to be the actual record. In fact, the twelve songs that make up ’ stunning third full-length, Above The Static, were only supposed to be ideas, a guide to what the actual album would and could later become. And so, in April 2021, together with producer Ben Hannah, the Brighton-based band set up camp at The Waterloo, a three-story pub/venue in the Northern seaside town of Blackpool, to begin the process of making an album. Or, more accurately, the process that would lead to the process of making an album. But when they listened to “Flatlined”, the first song they committed to tape there, it dawned on them that it actually sounded like the finished product.

“It’s not a real studio,” says frontman Tom McFaull. “We just went in there with the idea of getting demos—we took a mobile recording desk and everything we needed because we wanted to dial in the sound. But as soon as we recorded that song, Ben and I just looked at each other and went ‘This sounds massive enough to be the real thing.’ We were there for about two-and-a-half weeks in total. The pub was closed because of Covid, so it was just us and Fletch (the owner). We’d go to bed for a few hours, wake up, the first person up would put the coffee on and press play on whatever we’d recorded the night before. We just lived it fully. We couldn’t re-record this album if we tried.”

That’s because Above The Static truly does captures the moment which inspired it, as well as it captures the complex, ever-evolving essence of the band that made it. Formed by McFaull and bassist Karl ‘Bungle’ Jeffery in 2014, these days The Bar Stool Preachers are completed by guitarists Tom Gibbs and Karl Smith, keyboardist Alex Hay, drummer Alex ‘Whibbs’ Whibley-Conway and most recently Ray Waters on guitars and many other instruments, all of whom are on a constant search to evolve, something equaled only by their desire to stay true to themselves. It’s that unique combination that’s at the heart of this record, one that sees the band riffing off their ska-punk roots (and the ideologies which inform them), but which also ensures they break the boundaries sonically of the punk genre. With thisalbum, The Bar Stool Preachers want to both push through any preconceptions about the music they make, and ensure that what they do make doesn’t just fall on deaf ears.

Hailing fron Soutern California, bring sounds reminiscent of British 2 Tone and 3rd wave ska into the 21st century. With energetic songs and pedigree musicianship, BMB gets the crowd on their feet and dancing. Comprised of memnbers from some of your favorie ska bands (My Superhero, Save Ferris, Starpool). This new group breathes fresh life to a genre that may have originated in Jamaica, and honed in Britain, but perfected in the haze, blight, glamour and beauty of the Southland.

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