With their sparkling new EP Black Dogs And Sad Men set for release on 10 October 2025, Revenant have today shared the premiere of the title track with MetalTalk, along with a moody and atmospheric monochrome video.
The band, who played the Firestarter stage at the year’s Maid Of Stone Festival, formed in 2023 and have been turning heads with tours supporting Brave Rival and Black Eyed Sons. This year also saw them make their London debut with The Dirty Denims at the world-famous Cart & Horses.
Sam Lay (vocals, guitar), Matt Hudson (guitar), Robin Nutley (bass) and Carl Donoghue (drums) sat down with MetalTalk and, displaying all the boisterous charms of being boys in a band, we quickly cut to the chase.
The seeds of Revenant were sown in 2023. “Matt had the idea to put the band together in February 2023,” Sam told us. “Then we got Robin and Carl involved really quickly. We made a conscious effort not to go out and gig until we had written some songs and we had a decent set together. We recorded in May 2023 what became the debut EP, What A Time To Be Alive, and we didn’t do our first gig till September 2023. The rest, as they say, is history. Here we are rocking and rolling.”
What A Time To Be Alive was a solid foundation that very soon got the band noticed. “From the beginning, it’s gone well,” Carl says. “We started out and just did a couple of songs and played our first gig in a pub for 10 people. That went well, and we just moved on incrementally from there. It’s been awesome.”
Matt says the band were quite surprised. “What makes it hard now is actually a lot of people really like the music that we’ve written,” he says. “We’re like, oh God, how do we keep writing good music. It’s not easy. it was quite a nice surprise. We were like, oh, OK, cool. Let’s actually go out and be a proper band then. So that was good.”
The first Revenant EP could be seen as a litmus test. If that went down well, then the push would be there to do more. “I think we probably stuck to our roots,” Matt says. “When we write a song, if the songs are good, it doesn’t matter which part of the Venn diagram of rock that they sit in.
“I think that’s one thing we learnt from that EP was let’s not try and horseshoe everything into one kind of sound. Just write good rock songs basically. I think that’s done us well. I think the guys would probably agree with that. We write stuff from all over the spectrum, really.”
There is much agreement from the rest of the band. “I would do this even if nobody was listening,” Carl says. “Something that I have to do is just play music. But I’m very grateful that people are listening.”
The next Revenant EP, Best Medicine, would follow in April 2025. “It was kind of a discussion of, do we just do an album, or is the album what people want right now? Carl said I think we should just release singles effectively or short runs. I think if you’re an established band and you’ve got a good fan base behind you and you’re doing well, I think an album is something that you can legitimately look to do.
“But I think when we were starting, it was just OK, we’ve got these songs, they’re really good, let’s record them. Then the same sort of process, really. I have to admit I was very much like, no, we should probably we should get an album together to start with. So these guys have proved me wrong with that. [laughs]”
It is an interesting perspective. “There probably isn’t any wrong or right way,” Matt says, “but I think especially when you’re a small band like us and you’re starting out, I think you need to build momentum. It’s alright if you’re Those Damn Crows and you get to Number 1 and then you go and tour all around Europe and play with some massive acts. Because you’ve got longevity and you’ve got a big fan base. So it doesn’t matter if they take a year off.
“But for us, if we were to put an album out and then go away for a year, everyone would just forget about us. So it’s put out a few EPs, and then I guess we’ll probably look to maybe do an album. We don’t know really.
“I think you’ve just got to be consistently releasing music, either way. If we go and put out an album in 12 months’ time, that’s great. But then what are we doing 3-4 months after that? We probably still need to have some more music up our sleeve.
“Also, I think these days, people just want music there and then. I think even if you look at Those Damn Crows and they went to Number 1, there’s probably still a lot of people sitting there going, OK, cool, what’s next then? When’s the next music coming out?
“Cos that’s just the world that we live in now. Music is accessible and almost feels like it’s free to people these days, even though it’s not. People pay £10 a month for a Spotify subscription. A lot of people support you and buy a CD or vinyl, and that’s fantastic. But I think there’s just an expectation upon the world now that music is essentially free, and once you drop one song, cool, when’s the next one coming? When’s the next one? When’s the next one?
“Because it’s an oversaturated market. I think Lars Ulrich was doing a good job trying to stop this whole Napster thing. I think he was right when you go back to it. ‘Cos look at the music industry now.
“But for a small band like us, I think it’s just consistency and momentum. You just gotta keep putting music out and keep people talking about you.”
There are also the pressures of social media, accessibility and the perceived need to work the algorithms to get results and be seen. “You’ve gotta be constantly working at it,” Carl says. “Which, luckily, we are. Week in, week out, we’re doing something. So, hopefully, we can keep up with it.”
In the true spirit of being a band, each member has a team role. Matt Hudson is the “social media guru,” Carl Donoghue has a good eye for video, and Robin Nutley has the sound engineering background.
And Sam Lay? “I’m left-handed,” he laughs. “So make of that what you will.”
Some discussion follows of Matt’s OnlyFans page (Carl: “Too expensive for me and my passports out of date”), but there is a serious side to this.
“I think if you look at the way that social media is part of a band these days, it’s ludicrous,” Matt says. “I think I probably spend most of my time. We will spend most of our time in this band, organising, preparing content, artwork, whatever it is, merch. There’s more time spent on the actual business than there is on playing our instruments.
“I guess that’s fine. You have to do that as a band. You have to know your business and know your product because essentially it’s ours, and we don’t want anyone else to come in and take it away from us and ruin it.
“But you would just think that you would like to be spending a lot more time playing your instruments than kind of going, oh right, well we’ve got to post that tonight. Has anyone sorted that order? There’s so much that goes into it.
“Certainly, we’ll document what we do and post out on social media, but we’re not gonna try and absolutely hammer social media. I don’t wanna be stuck with a phone recording myself all the time. We always say when we go to the rehearsal room, let’s get a quick vid of this tonight, even if it’s just a thank you to everyone who’s bought the EP.
“So again, it’s not anything fake. It’s just generally saying thanks, and it’s not just serving social media for the sake of it. We always forget, because we get so in depth with the writing, and that’s what we enjoy doing, that it gets to the end of the rehearsal, and we go, Oh, we didn’t do that. We haven’t got time now. We’re so focused on writing.”
Robin Nutley brings his sound engineering skills to Revenant. “Sam’s a big fan of his gadgets and gizmos,” Robin says, “and before they got the quad cortexes, it was just a mountain of pedals. I like to look at it almost with a producer’s hat on. Realistically, who in a pub with 40 people around them actually wants to hear all of that noise? That’s a lot to be pushing through small PAs. Maybe we can thin that out a little bit, or that effect might be taking up too many frequencies that Carl’s drums and toms might be trying to fill, or my bass might be taking up.
“We’ve done that in these three other songs on the last release. How about we just try and spin it up a little bit and keep everything fresh and balanced.”
It is good quality control. “Robin is good at that,” Matt says. “We’ll write something and go, this is great. He says, ‘But we’ve done that already.’ He is like the mother of the band, saying no, let’s not do that.”
The new Revenant EP, Black Dogs And Sad Men, has elements of the great hard rock of the ’70s and the ’80s. But it’s given a real modern edge, without being too overly fussy about things or clinical. There is a real warmth in what these guys do.
“We do like that kind of music,” Carl says. “But I also listen to a lot of electronic music. I like that sort of clinical, click side of it. I think it is a good blend, but I think it came together quite naturally.”
For Sam, there were two things that stuck out on this Revenant EP. “When we did Best Medicine, we said that was really good for what it is. Best Medicine is a cracking classic rock song. But how can we make these songs different?
“Things like the breakdown in the middle of the title track, Black Dogs And Sad Men, we hadn’t done anything like that before. I came up with that, and I could already hear Matt playing over the top. But what is hilarious about that is when we went into the studio, Matt had nothing. Matt had no inclination of what to solo over the top.
“He made it up in the studio and then went, ah, I better go back and learn that now, so it sounds the same live. But I love that ‘cos you get that sort of spontaneity. We really kind of made a conscious effort, I think, to try and do things that we hadn’t done before. But also both EPs are top and tailed with an acoustic piece as well. It’s just a natural progression to what we did before, I think.”
With the three EPs, there is definitely a progression within their work. Black Dogs And Sad Men, thematically, is a very personal set of lyrics with heart behind it.
“I took a break from music in 2018,” Sam says. “I had a mental breakdown and ever since that point, I’m quite vocal about how I feel and mental health. So to write these songs was kind of cathartic in a way.
“It keeps to our theme that we only write about what we know, things that, as Matt just said, are real. Sex With No Substance was written where I live in Basingstoke, from people watching on a Saturday night and just seeing what goes on. Which is hilarious when I think about it.”
For Matt, he wanted to write about their own lives, and turn it into a message. “I think if you look at the world these days, I think the world’s a pretty scary, fragile place,” he says. “I think a lot of people don’t really know what’s going on in their own heads, and it’s quite tough for a lot of people.
“We’re never gonna write about the whole rock ‘n’ roll debauchery thing. I’m 37 with two kids, and I’m getting married next year. What rock ‘n’ roll debauchery happens in my life? We’re not rock ‘n’ roll guys. We’re just musicians and we wanna write songs.
“We have friends who have struggled with addiction, so if you listen to songs like I’ll Be There, that’s what that’s about. We’ve got people in the band that have had mental health issues, that’s what Black Dogs And Sad Men’s about. Lie Or Living is about fake people that we’ve come across and dealt with. A few musicians, that we won’t name.
“Then, when you look at things like All We Need, that’s about time running out and actually, time’s such your most precious asset. It’s running out, and people don’t realise it sometimes. So it’s just very real and very honest, really. I think that’s what we’re always gonna be writing about.”
There are enough Steel Panthers and Mötley Crües in the world, and with Revenant’s music, people find that they are hearing something that resonates with them.
“We’ve had people come up to us about all sorts of different songs,” Matt says, “out of the blue, that go, thanks for writing that. That really helped me and made me really think about this, and I really like that song. I mean, that’s what we’re doing it for.”
“It still blows my mind to this day,” Sams says, “when we go out and gig and people are singing those songs back to us because it means something to them. I think Dave Grohl said something like it’s mad when you play in front of 85,000 people and 85,000 people are singing your song back for 85,000 different reasons. It’s that kind of thing.”
There are plenty of shows coming up, including Steel Paws Festival in Sheffield on October 11th and their own headline slot at The Giffard Arms in Wolverhampton on October 10th.
“Something that we’re starting to do now is we’re starting to leave our comfort zone and go and branch out to new places and not sell very many tickets,” Matt says. “That’s pushing to the next level. I think it’s difficult for everyone these days anyway, with ticket prices and events.
“But that’s something new that we’re starting to do now. So there are a few patches around the country that we’re starting to go out and play to small groups of people. But we’re gonna build it over time.”
Black Dogs And Sad Men is a really great EP. Revenant have set a really high water mark for themselves, a great benchmark for future things, and there is a genuine excitement for what they do next.
It has been busy, and it will get busier. Revenant have a plan to do lots more gigs, but in blocks of time, rather than “it being three or four weekends out of the month,” Matt says. “You need to put your time in, but I guess ideally if we can do that so we don’t burn out, that’s the thing.
“We’ve all got day jobs and lives and stuff like that, and we’ve got to try and write some new music at the same time.”
The new Revenant EP, Black Dogs And Sad Men, is set for release on 10 October 2025. Pre-orders and bundles can be found at revenantsongs.co.uk/shop.
