When you’ve found a band that piques a wide spectrum of your musical interests, it’s incredibly difficult to not want to tell all your fellow music nerds about them. Nevertheless, today’s subject is one I’m super proud to have plenty to share about, even with how still relatively fresh their timeline is. Eat Your Own Head not only thoroughly deserve a spot as this week’s Weekly Featured Artist, but they are sincerely a band anyone who needs some fresh, sludgy, noisy, masterclass-grade rock and metal music should be paying close attention to. As such, here’s as many possible words as I can reasonably make coherent and acceptable enough for the editorial team at Everything Is Noise all about why you better follow this band ASAP! Let’s start with the video below…
The band began more or less after the ending of another band, Solko, where guitarist/vocalist brothers, Ash and Jordan Woolnough, performed much different music from what they would move onto in Eat Your Own Head. A Dub-reggae style band that would end up bonding with drummer Ben Mollett after he’d fill in for a wedding they performed, the three grouped up to jam out their own music, deciding they wanted to play something heavier and noisier. The result would be some of the earliest renditions of songs we’d eventually find on HANK, their October 26th, 2020 release! Their bassist, Tom McGeady, joined the fold shortly thereafter as well, having been apart of the conversations with the Woolnough brothers on wanting to write heavier music after his former band had performed alongside Solko plenty of times before.
‘Ben: Dub-reggae brought me into contact with Ash and Jord. I covered for the drummer of their old band, Solko, playing a very bizarre wedding (think a bunch of guys in baggy trousers turning up to David Cameron’s tory wedding). The best part was going back to some shack afterwards where we jammed and came up with some very confusing patterns until 3am. I believe one of these confusing patterns resulted in our first song called “Spit It”.
Ash: Yeah at that point, the band me and Jord were performing in was fizzling out. We were bored playing reggae chops so it was time to crank the noise.
Tom: I played in a band that used to gig with Ash and Jord’s band and we had always chatted about doing something heavy to scratch the itch that reggae doesn’t. We chatted, met up with Ben and never looked back.‘
A record that served as a strong starting point for Eat Your Own Head, HANK is no exception to that formerly unscratched itch. Plenty of odd grooves, heavy riffs, gritty, yet melodic vocal work, and traces of sludge rock, experimental, as well as prog entangle this album into something much outside of what your average ‘heavy’ band might entail, or at least what you might initially expect. “Spit It” is a track that plays out like something bluesy, rocky, and still somehow in the realm of prog and metal in its own regard. Each track presents a fine level of finesse and dynamic, with not a single track keeping you from being locked in. From heavier ends of the spectrum being heard on “You’re The Hammer I’m The Slab”, to something a bit more in the alternative vein on “South America”, this band seamlessly makes an excellent case for variety in musical compositions.
Once they released their Neck-Deep in the Blyth LP in May of 2022, the support and recognition would only pour in further. A look at the comments on the album of the band’s Bandcamp add proof to the exceptional quality of the band’s songwriting. With one commenter noting that ‘No words could do this record justice‘, while another chimed in mentioning that the record ‘sneaks up on you‘, the general consensus seems to agree that ‘every track becomes a favorite‘. A quick listen to tracks such as “Bullets”, “Poltergeist”, and “The Concrete of Moulded Men” will have you in stark agreement. The record only furthers the prowess of the band, with each track building its own unique path that ensures this band is continually just as fresh as the riffs they lay down in the studio.
When asking the band about what they believe is an important centerpiece or message behind their music, they had the following to say on the matter…
‘Ben: Play what feels right. Make shit punchy. If it sounds nasty – it’s probably the best bit. We like making songs that sound different from each other.
Ash: Yeah, I wouldn’t say there’s a particular message in our music, but for me personally, it’s just an honest release of emotion. I guess we’re just being real! Keep it real – that can be our message.‘
As of May of this year, 2024, Eat Your Own Head have given us yet another collection of songs that show no shortage of the aforementioned hype found in their prior releases. Another nice anecdote about this release, The Trawler, is that it is actually my point of entry into the band. Even with being so late to the party, I found myself listening back over all four tracks repeatedly, truly trying to fully absorb what I’d just heard. Between the heavy grooves of the opening track “Chest Pains”, all the way to the grungy, odd-timed goodness of the title track, “The Trawler” – even with there being some sort of central, signature style the band has clearly trademarked, it’s still so much unlike anything else I have heard that comparing it to anything would feel like a disservice.
Talking to the band, I wanted to know what production behind this EP was like. As much as it mirrors the Eat Your Own Head we know and love from before, something just seems to go a little bit further than before here. Not always, but much of the time, I understand that musicians will generally write to such a free and expressive, rough-around-the-edges form during their earliest works; Sometimes that can change, other times that’s what helps them continue to churn out their best work. For Eat Your Own Head, as they told me of what went into The Trawler, it appears things did get, in fact, a little different during the process of writing and recording this one.
‘Ben: It was a different writing process to our debut album Neck-Deep in the Blyth. We were fortunate to be granted funding from Help Musicians to help us make an EP – we set ourselves some rough deadlines and went for it. When we approached the EP, we had six possible tracks, two that we’d already finished (including a monstrous eight minute epic), but we actually decided to use the ones that we created in a shorter space of time on The Trawler EP. Those songs were just ‘us’ at that point in time.
Ash: Yeah, this set of songs didn’t suffer the scrutiny our debut album had from us. We just banged this one out. The track “Hardwired” was pretty much fully formed from a home demo I made. We didn’t mess with it too much and that was cool. I’d like to approach our next album with with a healthy balance of the two attitudes.
Tom: It was a different process to anything I’d worked on before. It’s the cliché thing to say that you’ve got all the time in the world to write your first album and the next one is more pressured. I didn’t enjoy that feeling at first but once we got into it, we wrote some songs that I think we can be really proud of.‘
So now that we’ve talked about how spectacular Eat Your Own Head‘s music is, let’s get into a little bit of the personality of the band and what makes them such forward-thinking people. A lot of the band’s premise seems to be built on writing the music they, themselves, adore and feel proud of. You could chalk any band’s intentions up to being something similar, but, for Eat Your Own Head, it seems that their biggest goal was always to not focus on anything less than what they feel belongs – by that I mean, writing, expressing, and performing in a manner that consistently aligns with their interests as well as their chemistry. I always like to ask bands about what they believe makes a good music scene, as such, given a music scene is typically a powerful circuit in bringing such honest musicians as them to the attention of those who seek out such an organic collective.
‘Ben: A good music scene probably encapsulates all the good stuff about the city you live in – it’s culture. In all honesty I’m not entirely sure why music scenes are so strong in some areas and weaker in others. I think diversity, cultures mixing, and being in a city of a certain size definitely helps. What’s great about the UK’s size is the ability for smaller acts to be booked across the country, something which I imagine is far less likely for small bands in the USA. I think this really helps music in the UK pollinate. Shout out to JT Soar (Nottingham), The Windmill (London) and The Exchange (Bristol) for bringing the vibes every time. These are the sorts of venues that feed music and we love to play.
Tom: For me, it’s just having lots of people that go to gigs regularly and still get that buzz from live music. It becomes a community and helps push bands to put on better shows and write better music. People will obviously continue to do it for the love, but nobody likes playing a quiet show for 20 people.‘
Furthermore, given their experience as seasoned artists navigating their way through such mixed cultures and diversity within their respective music scene as well as others, I asked of what things they might like to see more or less of within music culture. A lot has changed within and outside of the industry especially within recent years. While things such as networking, putting your music out, and other factors have all become quite easier to manage even on your own, it’s no surprise new challenges have come about with this, while echoed or pre-existing ones have been arguably heightened. While no band, country, genre, or medium of consuming music is immune to various challenges and advantages, the roles everyone plays, as well as the roles things outside of our control may play, are no less recognizable and important to consider.
Eat Your Own Head find a general ease, as they mentioned above, in being able to network within their scene in the UK, or at least to the point of booking across the country. Elsewhere, however, things may be a bit more difficult to pull together. In any case, the factors that lead to any of these challenges or advantages vary from medium, to region, to laws of the area, spaces available to host music, general interest in hosting different kinds of music, and what-have-you’s. Obviously, no one band or institution can completely change the world, at least not yet. But as said above, we all have a role we play; I believe Eat Your Own Head have quite the insightful take of good ways to play that role in a positive fashion.
‘Ben: Up and coming bands have taken on the role of being their own manager, label, booking agent, social media campaigner, merchandise on top of actually just creating the music. Everyone is now more concerned with stats, Spotify growth, social media growth. No one used to have graphs showing how you have done the last quarter. The internet has given more people a voice, but with that the field is crowded it’s challenging to get noticed. I would like to see a fairer deal for artists in terms of pay on Spotify and more financial support (I guess from the government) to stop small venues closing / struggling which are the lungs of the underground scene. Without an underground scene you have no music scene.
Tom: Like Ben, I feel there should be more support to keep smaller venues open. Whether that’s protecting long established venues from closing because of noise complaints due to gentrification/new housing in certain areas or stopping ridiculous rents being charged. Everyone is struggling and we need music to cheer everyone up and forget the struggle for a couple of hours.
Ash: There’s so much bad music out there, that should be made illegal.’
Eat Your Own Head are gearing up to play shows across Cardiff, London, and Bristol in early July, as well as shows later that month in Colchester and Leeds. Ash also offered some details of their appearance at Maui Waui Festival, as well as a Norwich show, prompting all fans to check their website for upcoming show details. While on the subject of live performances, as well as just that particular aspect of what they do, I asked the band about what they believe is the most important part of doing music to them, as well as what they hope fans may find in their music. It should come as no surprise that Eat Your Own Head are just as much about connecting their music with the fans as they are for themselves.
‘Ash: The best is playing a live gig but music is super important to me on an emotional level. It’s always been my main outlet of energy, fun and pain.
Ben: Creating music. It’s just so exciting and fun – the best thing about finishing a project is knowing you’re about to start making new stuff – and we have already started on some new material. We actually have a load of demos etc to work through. Yummy.
Tom: For me it’s playing live, there’s nothing like it. Feeling that connection with your band mates and letting the rage and stress of your working week out with like minded people is a great release.‘
…Expanding more on what music means to the band…
‘Ben: Well, I think our music is an emotional release for us – we have to connect with it and if we don’t we ditch it. I hope people relate to the tone of our music. We want people to screw up their face like they just smelled something bad… but in a good way. But yeah I hope people just vibe off it really and be compelled to come see us live. Our music is music to experience live.
Tom: Like I said before, music is a great release for me and I want people to listen to our music and feel the same. I want them to just rock out, have a good time and say, yeah, these guys fucking rock!‘
Eat Your Own Head are undoubtedly a fresh beacon of light for all those yearning for something new. On top of being exceptionally talented musicians, they are just overall super kind, genuine, honest people with something to say. A lot of my time writing Weekly Featured Artist pieces such as this tends to be geeking out not only over the band’s work, but any interesting aspects I see in what they do. This band is certainly no exception, and I implore you to follow their Facebook, Instagram, and Bandcamp pages respectfully to keep up with all new events surrounding their endeavors. You will not regret it!
I leave you now with the one ‘best wild live show story’ they decided to tell me about when I asked…
‘Ben: When technology went wrong at a packed headline gig – I kept the crowd entertained with an impromptu rendition of a ‘FUCK THE TORIES’ chant with a nice drum and bass accompaniment. Suffice to say, it went down well. We look forward to being ON STAGE at New Cross Inn, London on 4th July as the tories are voted OUT. (well…hopefully!). Come celebrate with us – perhaps a new wild story to add to the list? I can’t wait to see them demolished. Fuck the tory government – wastemen (and woman).
Tom: The best gig experience for me is getting a good reaction from a crowd in a city you’ve never played in before. Meeting people after the show and meeting new bands is a great buzz and keeps the love of music going.‘
Eat Your Own Head is…
Ash Woolnough – guitar and vocals
Jordan Woolnough – guitar and backing vocals
Tom McGeady – bass and screams
Ben Mollett – pots and pans (drums)
