Discover up and coming artists in 10 questions…

Please welcome from the sparkling city of Brighton…. JUNKYARD CHOIR

Carlo Woods Estevez and Tom Herbert, one half Scottish grit, the other half Caribbean spice, are JUNKYARD CHOIR. A virile tequila blues engine, with frontman/guitarist Estevez‘s voice as impressive as the cathedral of Notre-Dame-in-Paris and hoarser than Joe Cocker and Tom Waits doing a duet together and with drummer Tom Herbert hitting his gear merciless and inexorable as if he’s beating the shit out of idiotic politicians. The crushing tandem already infiltrated my ears, back in 2015, with debut LP Let Sleeping Dogs Lie, a raw Americana blues beast. This Friday, 26 January, their second longplayer TROUBLE IN MIND will be released (listen below). An overall sultry steamroller. From massive knockouts that will dare you to smash your neighbour’s furniture to melancholic ballads, you can cry your heart out to. The record sounds and feels like if wicked wall-of-sound legend Phil Spector was in the production chair. Everything reverberates MUCH bigger as if a whole army
was hired to pump up the decibels. Mammoth riffs, huge organs, titanic drums, mighty harmonies and even LOUDER vocals. Before talking to vox Mister Estevez let’s play the towering lead track from the new LP to get us all in the right mood. Turn it up…

1 / When, how and why did the band formed?
“The band started by accident. We used to be a 3-piece for many, many years going under the ‘Junkyard Choir‘ banner. One rainy night at a gig in Croydon (South London) the bass player couldn’t make it, so we rehearsed one hour and the gig as a duo went so good that we kept going like that under the pseudonym ‘Dos Hermanos Locos’ during late 2013 and early 2014, before resurrecting the ‘Junkyard Choir’ band name in the summer of 2014
and releasing our debut album ‘Let Sleeping Dogs Lie‘ in April 2015.”

2/ When did you know “this is how want we to sound, this is what we want to tell the world”?
“Our sound came when I dug deep in the fire and pulled out this old ‘Dirty rat‘ distortion pedal that someone had left me many moons before. I plugged it in and It was wild, untamed, raw. I purchased a 2nd hand octave pedal from a friend to further fill the sound without leaning on a bass player. I bring the songs in and Tom bashes them into shape and we see what sticks to the wall. Our sound has developed over the years and with the new album we’ve added some more colour and shape with some great people guesting on the album.”

3/ Why is it that Brighton is such an inspiration to form a band, as almost every week a new one is coming up on the surface?
“Tom and I both moved to coastal towns east and west of Brighton, we rehearse in Brighton, we gig there. Everybody in that town is so creative, inspiring. It’s a melting pot! Bohemia! Once we left London it was a great place to go. Great venues & neon lights!”

4/ If the band was an animal, which one would it be?
“The wolf. Howling out from the mountain. We can smell a song about 2 miles
away which makes for good tracking!”

Junkyard Choir howlin’ at the moon...

5/ If brand new album ‘TROUBLE IN MIND’ was a movie, which one would it be?
“Hell Or High Water, two brothers in conflict. The desert. A Chevrolet Camaro. Enough said.”

Junkyard Choir’s new album looks quite explosive…

6/ What’s on the van’s stereo when driving to gigs?
“The Band, The Stones, Dylan, Arctic Monkeys, Quotsa, Uncle Neil, Creedence.”

7/ Who’s your number one artist/band to go on a world tour with?
“The Dead Reds. They are our blood brothers from Brighton way. Blues soaked rock & roll baby. We would shoot pool with each other’s girlfriends and share a can of beans broken down on the roadside.”

8/ If you could go back in time on which artist’s front door would you knock and
ask to have a selfie together?
“We would go to Nellcote in Southern France. With Keith & Gram Parsons and jam it out in a sweaty basement. Avoiding the substance abuse we would get the exiled guys back on the red wine and have a damn good time.”

9/ Plans for 2018?
“More hotels & patching up broken dreams. Fix up the car & build a snowman.
Then go write another album.”

10/ The band’s ultimate dream?
“To tour Europe & the Americas, eating enchiladas and drink nothing but tequila.”

Bottoms up, Carlo, and thanks for the chat…
May the road rise with JUNKYARD CHOIR!

About time for some cracking blues bravado
Here’s the brand new LP TROUBLE IN MIND
available on Bandcamp…

.
JUNKYARD CHOIR links: : Website – Facebook –  Twitter – Debut LP on Bandcamp