It has been a hot minute since we heard anything from Million Dead, so you would be forgiven for being unfamiliar with their work. There will be many young attendees of 2000trees who will have been born, completed school and college, and started university since the punk rock outfit last took to a stage.
Until very recently, had you asked any member of this relic of noughties Hardcore whether they had any hope of a reunion, the outlook would have seemed bleak.
A lifetime has passed since their exuberant youthful project, but sometimes all it takes is a Vampire Slayer, a couple of beers and a well-timed festival promoter to change everything.
As Frank Turner was whisked off the Forest stage, reuniting with his Million Dead collaborators ahead of their triumphant return, I was fortunate enough to grab them for a quick chat and get the lowdown on how this all came about. 
For anyone new to the Million Dead bandwagon, guitarist Tom Fowler very neatly summed their identity up in his own words. “Million Dead is a rock band influenced by many different areas of that genre of music,” he told MetalTalk. “We were just talking about Fugazi and many other bands that spring to mind… Hot Snakes…
“We did two albums, you know 20 years ago, had a great time making them and doing tours at the time and played with some great bands. We’re really excited to do this again now.”
One of the first thoughts on many minds would be how this seemingly impossible Million Dead reunion came about. As Turner said, “Shall I tell the story?” you just knew this was going to be a fun one.
“Our old guitar tech is a fan of Buffy The Vampire Slayer,” the exuberant frontman recanted. “There was an offshoot of a bunch of e-books called Spike. I don’t really know what that is, but there was a bit in one of them where the character Spike has to go to London to catch the Million Dead reunion show.
“The guitar tech [took a] screenshot and sent it to us all on an email thread saying ‘lol’. It was the first time we had all been in communication in 20 years. So we all started being like, how are you? Where are you? He’d [Cameron Dean] just moved back to England, and we all realised we were quite near each other.
“So we met up for a pint and it was alright, which was surprising, I think, for all of us. It was a pleasant surprise. It was just a nice hang. And pretty soon, it was just like, do you wanna get in a room and see what happens?
“Then James [Scarlett] from 2000trees got wind of this. It’s my fault, I told him, and then he is a big fan and immediately just went, ‘I will pay you money to play my festival,’ and I think that’s kind of the moment when this really sort of became real.”
“I think all the other plans we’ve got now are built around that, really,” added Tom
Turner continued. “Yeah, well, it was just it was a very vague conversation until the point when there was an actual concrete offer on the table, and then it was like, oh yeah, actually, we could do that. Then we said yes, and then we were like, shit, we need to practice.”
Julia Ruzicka, Million Dead bassist, expanded. “I totally agree with that,” she said. “I think James is a big part of this because, like you said, it felt real then, like someone’s taking us seriously, and we were like, oh, we better do something about it. I think, as you said, that’s when it kind of felt like, okay, you know, this is something of interest to people.”
Turner returned to the crux of the whole reunion when he said, “I suppose it’s that thing of how many people care? It’s quite hard to judge. And it seems that some people care. We played a sold-out show last night, and everyone went mad. So, happy days.”
The melting pot of talent united at a time when their musical tastes were very much divided. While Turner and Ben Dawson, the band’s drummer, were heavily invested in the Harcore scene, Cameron’s taste veered more in the direction grunge, Death and Thrash metal, and Julia was more fond of alternative and indie rock.
When asked if their interests had converged over time, Fowler said, “I don’t think a lot’s changed really.”
“There was a bit of sharing of influence and stuff,” Frank Turner said, “but broadly speaking, we’re all quite independent-minded people, and I think we probably do still listen to quite different stuff now. I think it’s one of our strengths as a band, actually.”
Potentially letting the band’s future plans slip, Ruzicka went on to say, “It’s just evolved over time, and I think if we did try and write again together, I think it would be quite different. I’m not saying we are, but it would be interesting again to see what would happen.”
Then Cameron Dean insisted the microphone should be taken away from her.
It is not often an artist leaves an entire back catalogue of music in a storage container for 20 years before revisiting and relearning it. I was curious how difficult it would be to unlearn so much of the musical progression they have made since their disbanding.
Ruzicka, who had now been regranted microphone privileges, said, “Personally when I was relearning the songs, it was just days of going ‘what the fuck was I playing there and how did I come up with that’. Because when we started I was really naive when it came to playing music and I suppose that’s part of the charm of it.
“I really didn’t know what I was doing not that it’s just like going on feel and what sounds right. I’ve been playing in another band since then for the last five years, and it’s changed. So again, going back to it was fascinating because I was like, I would never write that now. But I’m really glad I did it back then. But it’s been really interesting revisiting that.”
“That is actually interesting you said that,” Fowler said, “because we were saying, and I think, the writing choices a lot of the time we made then, I mean, they sound, they’re great. It’s great to relearn, but you maybe would do it differently now. That doesn’t take anything away from the way they were done. It’s great to relearn them like that, but it is interesting going back to things you wrote that long ago.” 
For Frank Turner, he is relearning a lot of the lyrics. “When we were going to the first practice, I was like, they’ll come back,” he said, “and then they absolutely didn’t. I was listening to the record on this tube on the way there, and I was like, ‘fuck, this is hard’. I was quite absurdist in a lot of my lyrics back then. There’s a couple of bits where I’m a bit like, ah. But mostly, I’m quite proud of it, actually. I think they’re quite good.”
I was curious to delve into the band’s feelings of where this truly unique project might feel they belong in the music scene by asking who they considered their sonic peers.
I posed the simple hypothetical question of who would Million Dead share a split record with. After a brief minute of indecision, Turner said, “One of the things I think that we were all quite proud of at the time is we were associated with a certain scene back in 2003/4/5, which was nice. It was fine, and there were some cool bands with nice people and everything.
“But we never really felt like we fitted into the pigeonhole that the music press tried to put us into. And listening back to all the material for the purpose of re-learning it, I was pleased to discover that it isn’t just youthful bravado.
“We’re a fucking weird band, and we don’t really sound like anybody else that we were around with at the time. Not saying we don’t sound like anybody else full-stop, but it’s just like we were often compared with a few more from a friend who are friends of ours who we talk with and who are an amazing band, but we don’t fucking sound anything like them.”
Dawson developed this. “I think this is the thing with a lot of music, and a lot of the way people approach being in bands is sort of self-adulation and trying to behave and write in the way that other bands do because you’re trying to mimic what other people do. Because you want to be that, and you want to sort of, be rock stars or whatever it is.
“This band was a collection of people with different music tastes, not writing for external people, but writing for ourselves, and writing what is, you know, not avant-garde, but pretty odd music.
“It is a reason we weren’t very successful because most people don’t like our music. We were never going to be a pop breakthrough. So I think that not to push back on you, but the question is, who would you split 7 inches with?
“And another question we had on another interview was, who would you support? And for me, that all talks to the idea of this ‘who do you want to be like’ question. It’s not to say we haven’t been through that journey. Of course, when we were younger, I think we were much more into that.
“I’ve grown up, and that just does not matter at all. The only thing that matters to me, and the best part of being in a band for me, is being in the rehearsal room slamming out songs. All of this, some of its really good fun and an added bonus. Some of it’s a pain in the A, you know. As an introverted person, that’s what I love doing.
“So I don’t care who we do a split seven-inch with or who we’re gonna support. We wrote some music, and if people like it, amazing. I love that they like it. And if people don’t like it, I couldn’t give the slightest care in the world. That’s music. It’s a subjective art form, and we created art. Whether it’s good or bad, it’s for people to decide, that’s it.”
Million Dead denied the opportunity of the very first show back by fitting in a quick trip to the place where it all ended the first time, The Joiners in Southampton on 10 July 2025. A fitting location to breathe new life into this band and to get a quick warmup in before their massive show at 2000trees.
“It was great,” Fowler reflected. “It wasn’t quite up there in temperature as it was in 2005 in the same room. That’s where we played our last gig back then. So it was kind of like a symbolic return, in terms of, let’s do that. The first gig in that same room.
“But it was up there. It was a hot one, but it was great! It’s a very strange feeling getting up there and doing it again. But speaking for myself, I really enjoyed myself, it was great. I think we all did.”
“It was a great reaction from the crowd, which was nice,” Dean said.
Their Axiom headline set was every bit as popular as we would have expected. The perfect timeslot between our two main stage headliners saw hordes of fans both new to Million Dead and older ones who proudly brandished their 20-year-old merchandise, hardly believing what they have the opportunity to witness again.
All five of the members who have ever been in Million Dead entered the stage, Turner with his arms abreast, sporting a bullish arrogance that was unfamiliar from his solo persona.
The band whipped into their discography with little stage rust. They may have had a warmup last night, but their performance seemed as though they were a regularly touring machine.
Turner explained that he had three questions when deciding whether he wanted to pursue the reunion: Would he enjoy it? Would the band enjoy it? And would the fans enjoy it?
With the answer to all these questions a resounding yes, their return at 2000trees was an absolute no-brainer. Turner attributes a significant portion of the credit for the band’s return to festival promoter James Scarlett, who invested a huge amount of faith in the popularity of a band who have been gone for so long.
It turns out, as often seems to be the case around these parts, that Scarlett was absolutely right. Each timeless track was reflected back in voice by the passionate crowd who had amassed to witness a huge moment in the history of the five-piece. 
On the note of five pieces, it’s worth highlighting that this, after their Southampton show last night, is only the second time Million Dead have appeared with five members on stage.
Fowler joined the band following Dean’s departure, so the two had never previously overlapped, meaning Dean had to write a whole new guitar part for their classic songs.
This was not the only adjustment that needed to be made to the original format of the songs. Turner joked that as many things have changed with age. Dawson can no longer provide the screams that he once did with ease, explaining he now sounded like a gerbil being murdered.
Because of this, the crowd had to take over the responsibility, for which they obliged proudly. Turner joked that he had hoped the band would show his ageing voice a similar grace, only for them to make it even harder for him.
Million Dead wrapped up their set with a rendition of arguably their most recognisable track, Smiling At Strangers On Trains, which was greeted by an even louder singalong, possibly due to Turner touring the song as part of his solo project for the last 20 years.
The show could hardly have gone better as the legends took their bows and captured photos for their memories.
Whatever happens next, this moment will live long in the memory and remain a special reception for a much-loved band.
2000trees Festival is being held from 9–12 July 2025 at Upcote Farm, near Cheltenham, Gloucestershire. You can read all of MetalTalk’s 2025 coverage here.
