First Look: The 109’s – So Long

The 109’s follow their 2017 eponymous debut with ‘Hollow Point’, a set of 11 new songs that showcases the band’s combination of ferocious rock riffage, searing lead guitar breaks, and harmony vocals. The 109’s are an English four-piece who celebrate a mutual love of the late ’60s and early ’70s rock – Sabbath, Zeppelin, AC/DC, The Who, MC5, Grand Funk Railroad. This melting pot of influences has created a blistering, dynamic fusion of all that is best in rock, and their music has garnered praise from DJs, festival promoters and gig-goers alike.

The musicians come from strong improvisational backgrounds and write their songs as a collective, jamming until they find riffs, melody lines and unusual rhythms and cadences that can be boiled down into short, punchy song structures that strut effortlessly through complex, unexpected changes. The album has been produced by Jason Wilson, at Stakeout Studios who has produced bands such as ‘Don Broco’ and ‘You Me At Six’. Jason has translated the tremendous power and passion of the band’s live performances into recorded songs that have an equal sense of aggression and grandeur.

On “So Long” Matty says:

Sometimes a song begins not with a melody or a lyric, but with a guitarist suddenly discovering a unique tone or sound. This riff appeared literally seconds after I plugged in a freshly purchased effects pedal, an Octave Multiplexer, which gives the guitar that distinctive phat fuzzy tone. We added some lyrics that pay homage to our interest in grungy, dystopian sci-fi and the rest of the song wrote itself.

Lead guitarist, Matty P, is also an author and member of the UK Crime Writers Association. He has published four novels in the UK to date – Scarecrow, Stolen Lives, Broken Arrow and Werewolf – under the name Matthew Pritchard, and was nominated for the CWA’s Gold Dagger Award.

The band’s line up is as follows:

Drums – Steve Collings
Vocals and Guitar – David Gambril
Bass – Andrew Horstead
Guitar and Vocals – Matthew Pritchard

LINKS:
https://soundcloud.com/the-109s/sets/album
https://www.facebook.com/the109s
https://itunes.apple.com/gb/album/the-109s/id1153559243
https://twitter.com/the109s
https://www.instagram.com/the109s
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCX-DfgIKTdyQmAoBtLCjFUA
http://www.the109s.com