Interview With Suns Of Thunder By Matt Bladen
MoM: Introduce yourselves/remind everyone who you guys are. Band name, members, style etc?
Suns Of Thunder: We are The Suns of Thunder and we hail from Swansea in South Wales. We’ve been releasing music for 20 odd years, not all of it available anymore and we’ve gigged and toured with the cream of the classic/stoner/doom rock scene in the U.K. We’ve been deafening audiences around the U.K. since the millennium and celebrate our 22nd year together this year, generally just having a massive blast for two decades really.
So we have longest serving member, big Greg on vocals and guitars left, Matt ‘pipes’ Williams of Sigiriya/HWDU/Bad Electric fame on vocals and guitars right, Chris on the low end and Sam on the tubs. I suppose our style has changed over the years with our line up but our influences are a massive melting pot and we peddle something we like to call ‘beer boogie’ It’s heavy, it’s energetic, it’s riff after riff, hook after hook with a twin vocal attack. Think ZZ top jamming with the beastie boys whilst using COC’s equipment after a massive sabbath binge and you’re getting close.
MoM: How have the last year(s) been for the band? What have you been up too?
Suns Of Thunder: As with all artists/performers/human beings we’ve had some absolutely crazy times over the last 2 years. It’s been tough times for everyone and us personally. As always with life comes obstacles, issues, personal journeys and shit to deal with and we’ve tried to keep the band as much as an escape from it all as it is a Labour of love, a sheer need to play live and entertain people because ultimately that’s what we live for, music is our church.
MoM: How have the last year(s) been for the band? What have you been up too?
Suns Of Thunder: As with all artists/performers/human beings we’ve had some absolutely crazy times over the last 2 years. It’s been tough times for everyone and us personally. As always with life comes obstacles, issues, personal journeys and shit to deal with and we’ve tried to keep the band as much as an escape from it all as it is a Labour of love, a sheer need to play live and entertain people because ultimately that’s what we live for, music is our church.
We’ve managed to stay on the radar since our a last album release in 2016 with killer shows supporting the likes of Karma to Burn, Atomic Bitchwax, Greenleaf, Elephant Tree, Raging Speedhorn, Son of Man and Greenlung as well as regularly filling rooms and releasing split records with our good friends Desert storm, playing festivals like Riffolution and regularly contributing to complications, Splits and most recently adding 2 cover tracks for 2 killer Pale wizard record compilations you should all check out!
We released our last album in 2016 called Start As You Mean To Get Down which we are very proud of. Between 2016 and 2020 in between contributing to said complications/splits we had hoped to also release some new music with our old friends Grifter but they unfortunately split up and we decided to tune the EP into an album during lock down and it’s killer, ready to hit the studio and it’s ABSOLUTELY EGWE.
MoM: What experience have you had with Bloodstock/M2TM in the past?
Suns Of Thunder: So, Bloodstock is an a killer festival anyway with some of us attending in previous years. We’ve always taken an interest in the M2TM heats in the years before as most of the time it’s friends bands have been competing and well, it’s a cool concept that seeks to promote what brings the best out of us all. It’s such a cool way to get bands to step up a bit, have some fun together and most importantly get that coveted opening slot at Bloodstock!
MoM: What experience have you had with Bloodstock/M2TM in the past?
Suns Of Thunder: So, Bloodstock is an a killer festival anyway with some of us attending in previous years. We’ve always taken an interest in the M2TM heats in the years before as most of the time it’s friends bands have been competing and well, it’s a cool concept that seeks to promote what brings the best out of us all. It’s such a cool way to get bands to step up a bit, have some fun together and most importantly get that coveted opening slot at Bloodstock!
So last year with Covid and restrictions making it near on impossible for anyone to play live we submitted a live performance video as requested but our good friends in Pearler blew us all out of the water with worldly of a live video and that was that but this time the gloves are off and we intended to do what we do best which is bring the noise, rile the crowd up and blow their heads off
MoM: How are you feeling entering the M2TM format back as it should be? Playing in front of a crowd again?
Suns Of Thunder: We welcome it back with open arms. We love fuel, love Cardiff as its our second home and it’ll be great to be part of something that so many quality bands are getting involved in. We wouldn’t have got 22 years in without learning how to have a laugh with all this, and taking part and having a blast with other bands after all we’ve all been through is a big part of this, just not as important as eventually blowing them off the stage afterwards.
MoM: How are you feeling entering the M2TM format back as it should be? Playing in front of a crowd again?
Suns Of Thunder: We welcome it back with open arms. We love fuel, love Cardiff as its our second home and it’ll be great to be part of something that so many quality bands are getting involved in. We wouldn’t have got 22 years in without learning how to have a laugh with all this, and taking part and having a blast with other bands after all we’ve all been through is a big part of this, just not as important as eventually blowing them off the stage afterwards.
We cannot wait to tbh. This is what we literally live for, live fuckin music, and entertaining people who respond to that and people are hungrier than ever for love music. We’ve managed to get back in the saddle after lockdown and have had some pretty sweet shows recently and feel we are at ramming speed but seriously, we just want everyone to enjoy, push each other’s performances to be better and have fun.
MoM: What would it mean to you to play Bloodstock?
Suns Of Thunder: It would mean so much. We’re probably too old for this shit but that’s part of our problem, we’ve never given up on playing bigger, better gigs and using all that energy to write better music. Big crowds and festival set ups were made for us and we play our hearts out for every second we are on that stage but ultimately, to have the chance open up such a groundbreaking and iconic festival, to get our music to fresh ears and know that we were killing it underneath so, so many big name legends on the day would be a serious career high. Who we wouldn’t want that
MoM: Tell us two truths and a lie about the band?
MoM: What would it mean to you to play Bloodstock?
Suns Of Thunder: It would mean so much. We’re probably too old for this shit but that’s part of our problem, we’ve never given up on playing bigger, better gigs and using all that energy to write better music. Big crowds and festival set ups were made for us and we play our hearts out for every second we are on that stage but ultimately, to have the chance open up such a groundbreaking and iconic festival, to get our music to fresh ears and know that we were killing it underneath so, so many big name legends on the day would be a serious career high. Who we wouldn’t want that
MoM: Tell us two truths and a lie about the band?
Suns Of Thunder:
1. Suns were once threatened with a lawsuit from American Christian Association over the ‘biblical connotations’ of our band name
2. Suns were once threatened by American Christian rock band Sons of Thunder of ‘Airheads’ fame over our name being essentially the same aside from one letter.
3. A former band member liberated a mistreated goat from it’s captors, called him Maynard and lived with him for 6 months before finally putting him in the front seat of his car, driving for 2 hours into the countryside and freeing him to an animal sanctuary in west wales.
MoM: Finally give us a four word rundown of what to expect?
Suns Of Thunder: Tonnes of fucking FUN-DER
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