It’s been ten years since the South West’s Southern Rockers Sons of Liberty started out on a journey that has seen them play almost every major UK festival, support Grand Slam, FM and Molly Hatchet, and release three excellent albums, including 2024’s The Detail is in the Devil. With a UK tour about to start, MetalTalk’s Paul Hutchings caught up with the band over Zoom. Founder members Fred Hale and Andy’ Moose’ Muse were joined by drummer Steve Byrne, vocalist Russ Grimmett and bassist Mark Thomas.
Words: Paul Hutchings
Ten years to cover in the allotted Zoom time allowance isn’t easy, but we start by dropping back to the band’s early days. Moose starts the conversation. “We did a little trip up the motorway. I bought a guitar and we played some music. We chatted on the way up and then played some music on the way back. There was quite a bit of Southern rock in a random playlist from my iPod, so that inspired us to put some Southern rock-related music together. We did that for a few years, and then here we are now, 10 years later. We’ve got three albums, two EPs, and all manner of stuff that’s happened. It has been totally amazing, really.”
Those early days of any band were full of hopes and ambitions. Whilst the hope of every band is to make a living from music, I wonder if the band had less lofty ambitions in the beginning. “It was just like Moose said,” explains Fred. “You know, all this great Southern rock came on, and we both said, no one’s doing this stuff. It was a covers band, you know, we were doing local stuff, the kind of pub circuit, and things, and we didn’t have a plan to do any more than that. And I think that solidified a bit”.
Moose takes over. “Let’s go back a bit further. We were all in original bands, and that ship had sailed. There was a change in the sort of people that went to see music, and classic rock-type bands weren’t popular. And it came round again. So, when your Blackstone Cherry’s and Cadillac Three’s started coming over here, it kicked off, and there was a new wave of classic rock. And you know, there was suddenly an audience for original rock music again. But we’d all written before, and most of us released stuff in younger bands when we were younger. So, we had that in us, and it was just, let’s have a bit of fun and see if we can write together. And that was like 40-odd songs ago.”
Fred continues. “As soon as we started getting back into writing and, you know, slipping a few of the originals in the set, they went down just as well as the covers. You get the bug. Then you just go, this is much better doing our own stuff.”
When did the band realise that this could be something a little bit more than just a pub band? Steve adds, “I guess kind of 2018; we banged out a couple of EPs, Shinola and Aged in Oak. We had 11 original songs, so we had a set at that point. We got invited to play at a couple of cool festivals, and it’s like, well, this thing’s got some real legs now, you know? So, that inspired us to the kind of reaction to the songs. And then the opportunities that opened for us inspired us too.”
Mark joins in at this point. “We could then lift our heads up a bit and perhaps look for things that were a bit bigger and a bit better. Now we’re doing things that are even bigger and better than we could have possibly imagined.”
Two gigs the boys felt opened their eyes were unplugged shows supporting the Quireboys. Steve continues, “the reaction we got when we played all our own stuff blew us away. And then, I think it was only a couple of weeks or a month or so later, we were doing the introducing stage at Giants of Rock. People still talk about that set to this day, saying they’ve never seen a crazy reaction like it. So, I mean, at that point, we looked at it and thought, we can do this.”
I jokingly laugh that this was the time when the band stopped being asked to play Freebird. “We had played it”, laughs Moose. “That’s the thing: many people have grown up with us from the beginning. We’re still used to doing the crazy solo thing at the end of the set, you know? I mean, that’s quite a traditional thing to shout anyway. Particularly in America. I think I’ve seen that in quite a few places, not so much in the UK.” Fred adds, “It’s been a while since we’ve been asked to play it for sure.”
Having released two EPs, Sons of Liberty released its debut album, Animism, in 2019, and then suddenly, the world went to shit. Did they feel that all the momentum had been pulled? “Yeah,” says Moose, “And we just released Animism as well. So, we’re just on our first album, and we couldn’t tour it. It was devastating. That’s kind of why we went back in so quick (to record the second album Aces & Eight), but yeah, it was dire.”
“It hasn’t really reset completely to how it was before; I think people’s attitudes changed,” adds Fred. Russ, who wasn’t in the band at the time, was also affected. “I had a Bon Jovi tribute on the side. And then I’d started Life of a Hero, which was original melodic modern rock which did get some legs”. He continues, “When you’ve got a band that you’re the only one that’s interested in pushing it, it makes it difficult. So, it was just lucky that I ended up being given this opportunity to join this rabble.”
Mark expands on the pandemic time. “We had a window of opportunity. I think it was August or September when the pandemic restrictions had just been eased where, you know, Bristol and the surrounding areas were in Tier 4, and the studio where we were going to record it was in Tier 2, so we were still able to go down and record. You know most of the album.” (“And got very drunk as well,” adds Steve.)
“That was why we went into quick and did Aces of Eights. We’d done Animism and couldn’t follow it up on the road. But we used lockdown to write the next album, so we came out of the gates really quickly. We could still zoom and do stuff like this and then the little gaps we got together. We did as much as you could do. We hit the ground running. Because we came out straight out with a new album and a lot of the shows that we had postponed, we rebooked them quite early. So, we took a bit of a risk, but we got out playing live straight out the gate. Yeah, we did a couple of shows where people sat down too”.
We laugh about these shows now, but they were excruciating looking back. “We played Swindon, and they had a big sign saying no dancing or shouting and you had to put your hand up to go to the toilet and travel a long way sometimes. It was really bizarre on stage because as all these people sat down head banging.”
Having come out of the traps as soon as they could with Aces of Eights, my recollection is that the album was very well received. And what about the live shows, did that change? “I think a lot of people were still very, very nervous about coming out and going into any pub or venue,” Steve says, “And watching a band. Because, you know, obviously, there was the second wave, and I want to catch it again. And I think money was very, very tight.”
We acknowledge the impact on small venues, the lack of cash flow and the realism that several venues that Sons have played in the past no longer exist. I wonder if there is a change in approach. Moose: “They’re the same audience, but they’re more selective, you know, festival crowds are good. So, people will see a festival or two free festivals, like Stonedead, which sells out. People will say, I’ll go to the festival and see 15 bands. But I won’t go to the local grassroots venue every week. I might go once a month is something that I really fancy, but so it definitely is has changed in that way.”
Sons sit comfortably within the New Wave of Classic Rock, a label they acknowledge has been created by the media. How do they view where they sit? Fred makes it clear. “I don’t mind what people call us if they enjoy the music and come along and enjoy the show. It makes no difference to me”. Russ continues, “When I joined the band, the sound obviously changed. Certainly vocally.
“I’m not the other two, and never will be, and they’ve got their own decent sound with what they do. So, we knew it was going to change from the outset. That was inevitable. But I think it’s lent itself more to the modern scene. And there’s more of a modern, harder rock edge to what we do. But it still has the massive Southern Rock edge to it. I think it sits well with everything out there now and we will sit alongside 98% of these bands very, very comfortably.”
Fred continues the thread. “I think it’s fair to say that the new wave of Classic Rock movement, that was emerging at the same time as we transpired as a band, it actually gave us a fantastic vehicle for the actual initial launch of what the band was all about. I think at one point, there were like 18,000 people in the New Wave of Classic Rock Facebook Group. So, to hit those guys with a couple of posts about a gig or a piece of merch or a gig that’s coming up, or something new release, or a video which was bloody amazing.”
Mark recalls that one of Sons songs was included on the first compilations that the NWOCR crew published. “We’ve sort of participated with everything those guys have put together, be it podcast live events and such.” The band is playing at KK’s Steel Mill in Wolverhampton at the end of the month, the third live event. “They are important people that have worked damn hard to make some of those things work well, and the support they’ve given to bands like us on the way has been fantastic. It’s a community we were and still are proud to be part of.”
We move on once more to festivals, appropriately, given the time of year and that I’d just returned from Stonedead, a festival at which I think Sons would go down a storm. Sons of Liberty have played many festivals across the UK and Europe. Putting them on the spot, what are their favourites? “Literally, every festival we’ve done” laughs Moose. Russ confirms the view. “Yeah, literally every festival has been absolutely top draw. There isn’t a bad one we’ve done; the reception has been great, the hospitality’s been out of this world, and people know how to put on a rock festival. Steelhouse? We want to do that without question”.
Steve adds to the conversation. “The one that in mind for me is the Montolivo one, which took two days to drive down, two days to drive back, for the 45-minute gig.” Mark corrects him, “It was an hour and a half!” Moose adds, “Yeah, you’d already played 45 minutes!” Steve laughs, “I was only concentrating for 45 minutes.”
It was also Russ’s first gig with the band, and he recalls how he had a month to learn the songs for a 90-minute set. “Yeah, no pressure,” he smiles, “90-minutes original material, ‘learn that mate’, only 10,000 people in the audience … and we absolutely smashed it out of the park”. Mark explains, “The reaction that we got to that was insane. They’re the ones that I think are memorable. Shows like that are ones that you didn’t think you’d get to do.”It’s evident that the band will happily play to any audience and never give less than 100%. Although the bigger shows do become an achievement, they say that it doesn’t feel any different.
A new show with a new band must have been daunting for Russ. Given his tendency to dive into the crowd, was he a bit more reserved on show number one? “I couldn’t get to the crowd on that one,” he recalls. “That was the first kick I’d had to get my place on stage with the band, so we’d never played together. I didn’t know who was going to do what, who was going to be where, and I think three to four songs in it was just like I felt a click and felt the gel and thought I knew exactly what everyone was doing, where they were, and it just worked. So yeah, not in the crowd at that point, although we had a good runway out there.”
Russ then volunteers a bit more about his style. “It was good, and then we did Maid of Stone main stage last year, and I was watching Kris Barras and the way he’s great with the crowd, and I thought, this is what I want. That’s what I wanna do. It just came over probably a couple of shows where I just started getting the crowd involved more. We’ve always done the sing-back-to-us thing. But yeah, getting out to the crowd was a bit more. They’re here to see us. So, let’s bloody involve them in the set.”
If you’ve seen Sons live, you’ll know that there are a lot of near misses on stage with instruments swinging wildly, and at Swindon recently, Fred nearly caught Russ. Thankfully, the closest he’s come to an injury is falling through a drum kit, but he thanks me for the inevitable fall that is coming.
With time running out we move onto the tour that starts shortly. It’s a tenth-anniversary tour, and The Detail is in the Devil is still selling well, with plenty to look forward to. Fred outlines the tour and the way it’s spread out. “It’s the three weekends of the month. We play the NWOCR 3 at KK’s at the end of this month, and then we’re off on the tour with the lovely Kitt Trigg. We start in Swindon and finish as far away from home as possible in Kinross, but we have got a little surprise coming. We will be releasing another little EP. It’s part of the 10-year celebrations. We thought we’d do something a little bit memorable, so we’re doing that, and we got some really nice new merchandise. It is it’s going to be quite a party, I think”.
With the band always writing, new music is always on the horizon, and they tease me with the promise of new music soon. There is plenty of life left in Sons of Liberty yet. “Russ has only relatively recently joined, and we have a lot we want to do with Russ. We have lots of exciting ideas. I’m personally looking forward to writing from the get-go with Russ, and you know, he’s very good at it. It would be nice to write as a whole band as the band is now.”
With the future music covered, we finish with a wish list, and the band are asked to give me their ambitions. Their answers include another ten years together – which we can all hope is the same – appearances at Steelhouse and Stonedead festivals (hopefully they will get the call before too long), big tour support which would expose them to larger audiences, such as Black Stone Cherry arena tour, and main stage at Download. That, plus some exposure on Planet Rock.
Sons of Liberty are a great bunch, friendly, engaging, but most importantly, good musicians who play a phenomenal live show. If you can, get along to one of their celebratory shows and see what I’m on about. Here’s to the next ten years!
For more information about tour dates and tickets, head to their website.
