Not only will you see Surrey-based rock band Ransom playing classic covers in your local boozer or club venue, you can also find them playing original material at gigs and festivals across the country, supporting the likes of Skid Row, The Darkness, Girlschool, Massive Wagons, Ugly Kid Joe and the Gypsy Pistoleros to name but a few. ‘Bringing the stadium rock experience to a local venue near you’ was always the strapline for this hardworking 4-piece classic rock band, armed with a wealth of new, exciting covers and original material. With a killer, tight live set (honed from doing the hard yards week in week out around London and the home counties pub and club circuit) this band are always hungry and ready to ‘Raise some hell at any level!’ This year Ransom celebrate their 10 year anniversary. And what a decade it has been, aptly described as ‘Blood Sweat and Beers!’ by the formidable four-piece! Read our exclusive interview with the hardest working band in rock here.
Great to catch you guys again, how have you been?
We’ve been busy! Still playing gigs almost every Friday and Saturday for most of this year.
Can you tell us briefly about your background and what’s all this 10 years of “Blood Sweat and Beers” about then?
Ransom started 10 years ago, in 2015, as I wanted to have a busy and successful covers band in our area (SW London/Surrey borders). It was formed by myself and my then 16-year-old son Zach, with Will on drums and Bun Davis (who now sings with the Chris Slade timeline) on vocals. Bun sang with us for a couple of years, we then had a replacement vocalist – Alez (who now plays guitar for Doomsday Outlaw and Marrissa and the Moths) for another year or so before our current vocalist Matt joined us in 2018. Between 2018 and 2020 Ransom played cover gigs almost every weekend. Then lockdown hit and we couldn’t play… so we decided we would keep ourselves from going insane (as we couldn’t play anywhere) by writing our own material. We started a Crowdfunder to raise enough money for the equipment we needed and to print some CDs, and first recorded ‘Locked Down in London’ and then our EP ‘Halfway to Hell’ – a spin off on AC/DCs song and us feeling like we were halfway to hell trapped at home! (It also had the tracks ‘Vindication’, ‘Colour Blind’ and ‘No Gender Offender’ on it.)
And in December 2020 we released our Christmas single ‘Hold you to Ransom’ filmed at Matt’s house. This track actually got us signed to a record label but unfortunately, they never did anything with it or us, shame that.
Will, our original drummer left at this time (as he didn’t want to write or play his own material) and we did most of the recording in a small studio we built at home. Our bassist Zach had done a production degree at ACM and so with his talent we were able to do all of it ourselves including drum programming. At the start of 2021 we found another drummer, Zippy (Lee), who on hearing the EP was instantly a part of the band.
In March 2022 we played our first originals set at CC7- Reading, followed CC8 in October 2022. After that every few months we had originals gigs at Hard Rock Hell, Call of the Wild, Firevolt – The Bootleg Ball and Rockmantic. As well as supporting Massive Wagons for their Patreon gig, and probably some others I can’t recall at the moment!
Later in 2022 we released our album ‘Back to the Boozer’ with a song written and titled especially for a mainstream radio presenter who told us our music was that of a pub band, and he wouldn’t be playing it on his radio show. This became our strapline for that year’s tour, which had over 80 gigs in pubs. We still play that song at every gig now and every person in every pub we play knows and loves it. Let’s face it most of the best UK bands I know started in pubs (some DJ’s know nothing!)
“Blood Sweat and Beers!” seemed appropriate for the bands 10 year anniversary, there has been a lot of blood and sweat but, thankfully, more beers than tears. We have come a long way as a band, every year we have a new T-shirt design with about 90 gig listings on the back, so every year we think of a new strapline and T-shirt design, works well for merch, keeps things fresh.
Our current line-up is as follows:
Matt Fielder: Vocals
Dave Barlow: Guitar
Zach Barlow: Bass Guitar
Zippy Lee: Drums
You seem to be playing a hell of a lot of festivals this year, what do you prefer, the more intimate pub gig or playing in front of a festival crowd?
DAVE: I think we do around 5-7 festivals a year, or thereabouts.
Both can have their own benefits but at the end of the day a gig is a gig to us and it doesn’t matter if it’s the Dog n Duck or Download we will give you the same full on, no holes barred show like our life depended on it, we work hard to put on a show and make sure that every person goes home with a big fat smile on their face.
I was so pleased to catch you at Planet Rockstock, not once, but twice. How did that come about?
DAVE: Matt does a great job talking to the festival organisers and promoting the band, I think he badgered Jon who organises Planet Rockstock but Jon was soon on board. Also we always submit every song to Planet Rock for airplay but after 13 songs nothing. BUT… we can’t complain we have played there twice in a row.
How do you book your gigs, do you work with any promoters that you can recommend?
DAVE: In short … I book all the pub gigs and the ticket venues and deal with bookings from the venues that contact us (around 90 per year), sometimes from people recommending us (thank you if you’ve ever given a venue our business card or a recommendation). Matt contacts the festivals and their promoters to book them. There are fans that have also helped us get gigs, there are many so big thanks to them, they know who they are!
Apart from the festivals mentioned above, what other gigs have you got in the pipeline?
DAVE: We still have 63 gigs planned for the rest of this year… mostly cover gigs with some originals in and around our home area of SW London/ Surrey, but we also have ticketed originals gigs in venues in Leicester, Swindon and Hastings that we are really excited about. (please go online and book them if in your area – the links are on both Facebook and lemonrock) See www.ransom.rocks/gigs too!
What is the proudest moment in your music career so far?
DAVE: As a band, every gig we do is our proudest moment, we are sharing our music with the world.
Are you working on any new music, any plans for a new release at all?
DAVE: Yes, we have 4 songs ready to work on now. We have a method where myself and Zach come up with a basic musical template (which can be from a riff or idea from anyone in the band), the band then put in their input including Matt adding vocals, then Zach arranges and formats it. When we have a rough idea we practice playing it, to see what works, then record that version roughly before recording properly with the individual instruments. We often do a couple of songs at a time, where we set up and record the drums at Zippy’s, then Zach records his bassline, me the guitar (both done at home) and then finally adding the vocals. This method works for us and helps us play the songs live so that they sound like our recordings.
What song do you wish you’d written and why?
DAVE: Tough question, there are so many it would be impossible to choose and I cant speak for the rest of the band but there’s something about ‘Kathy Wilson’ by Wolfsbane, WHY? Because that really tickles me! LOL!!
Is there anything you don’t like about the music industry, which you would change if you could?
DAVE: There are many paths you can go down in the music industry and the cogs of this industry turn on multiple levels. If you don’t do your due diligence, you can get squeezed for every penny with little to show for it. Ransom have a way of working which benefits the band as a whole and also gives us the monetary breathing room to do things that might be a loss financially (but rewarding in other ways) but on the whole NOBODY in the band has to fork out any cash, the band funds itself.
Where can we learn more about you and buy your music/merch online, have you any Social Media links that you can share?
DAVE: The best way to learn about us and our music is to come to a gig and the best way to find our merch is to come to a gig. Our Tour T-shirt’s are one-off designs each year and we only sell them at gigs. Failing that our music is available on CD or all streaming platforms and you can also get other merch T-shirt designs, hats etc online, details below.
Our website www.ransom.rocks has our details, a ‘hot list’ where you can get up to date email info https://www.ransom.rocks/hotlist and where you can buy our CDs, hats and some T-shirt designs… but we have our tour T-shirts ONLY available at gigs (as well as hats and CDs)
Facebook – www.facebook.com/TheRansomUK/
Instagram – www.instagram.com/ransom.rocks
You Tube – www.youtube.com/@ransomrocks9389
Lemonrock gig guide – https://www.lemonrock.com/ransom
We are all looking forward to your return to Crazy Cowboy Events at CC10 at The Facebar in Reading, what can the crowd expect from the mighty Ransom this time?
DAVE: Rock, Metal, Infectious Conviction and a Cracking Singalong. But after we’ve played, if anyone wants to buy merch to support us we will have it on sale along with free photos that we are only too happy to sign. We also love just hearing your feedback, so do come and say Hello!
