The Bad Flowers Talk Starting Gun And Upcoming Stone Broken Tour



The Bad Flowers debut album Starting Gun will be one of 2018's stand out cd's and bass guitarist Dale Tonks took some time to talk us about the cd and their touring plans for 2018.

Before we talk about your debut album Starting Gun can you tell us about the early days of the band.  When did you form the band?

The band was formed just under four years ago from two other bands that had come to an end though members leaving, we put the call out for a drummer and within seconds Karl Selickis answered the call and within a week of that we played our first show.

What were your earliest influences as a band?

The earliest influences for the band were Tyler Bryant and the Shakedown, Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin, Deep Purple and Rose Hill Drive, we grew up listening to these bands and they were the ones that inspired us to start playing music.

And individually?

Individually it's very much the same thing with bands like Black Sabbath, Free, Led Zeppelin, Monster Truck, Dream Theatre, Audioslave, Tyler Bryant and the Shakedown, Tracer and Clutch, to name a few.


First The Bad Flowers gig re collections? When was it?

The first gig we played was a week after the first time we had practiced together at a local venue and we locked ourselves away and rehearsed the songs for hours in our practice room, the after the first gig had finished we knew this was the line-up for the band that was going to work hard and get to the point we are now and we are now working harder than ever.

How soon before you started writing music together?

It was only a few weeks before we started writing songs and jamming on ideas that we all had, it was really quite amazing how things fell together so quickly.

What was the first song you wrote together as a band?

We have written so many over the last few years it's hard to remember what was the first one, one of the oldest songs we have at the moment is Hurricane and it's remained one that people always ask us for along with City Lights.

Do you write together or individually?

A lot of the writing comes from ideas and riffs that get thrown round the practice room, and we jam them out and see where they can go, Tom always has lyric and melody ideas that he will throw in while we're jamming songs out and it really helps in forming them.

Do you demo the material before recording it?

We do rough recordings of them that we can take away from rehearsal and listen to, especially the next day when you listen with fresh ears you hear the parts that you know you change just to get the best out of each song.


The debut cd has 11 tracks on it. Can you tell us some song based stories and what the lyrics are about?
What influences your lyrics?

The lyrics are written by Tom and come from past experiences and things that are happening to us as a band on the road.

Did you have any pre conceived ideas of what the album would sound like before you recorded it?

I think we were all on the same wave length, we wanted it to stand out and sound huge. Being the first album it has to be your statement and we want to shout about it letting people know we are here and we're not going anywhere.

Where was it recorded and who produced it?

We recorded it Vigo Studios and it was produced by Adam Beddow who recently produced Diamond Head’s most recent album.























How long did it take to record the album? 

It took about a year in total to get everything written and recorded, we were still writing alongside recording so that made the decision a little tougher as what would make it onto the album.

Favourite song from the album?

We love playing them all but I think a band favourite might be either Let's Misbehave or Thunder Child

If you could sum the cd up in one sentence what would it be?

It's a journey of loud, hard hitting thunderous rockers with a surprise or two thrown in that you be wanting to play more than once.

What do you see as success as a band in 2017? Critically acclaimed album and ticket sales or more on a personal level?

The main success had been getting the band out there and playing to more people from playing Sold out gigs in London to getting on big tours and festivals in 2018.

How much are you looking forward to the dates with Stone Broken and Jared James Nichols?

We have toured with Jared before and the guy is a great to be on the road with, we also know the guys from stone broken as there from our neck of the woods so I can't see there being a dull moment on the tour and every night is going to be a great night for music on a whole.

How long will you be playing for?

We're going to be doing a full on 30 minute set and we're going to make sure it's one hell of a show.

If you can say to one Stone Broken fan why they should turn up early what would you say to them?

It's going to be a set of heavy riffs, fuzzy grooves and chest hitting drums with vocals that you will walk away with stuck in your head.

The Bad Flowers’ debut album “Starting Gun” is released on Friday 16th February.
They tour the UK with Stone Broken and Jared James Nichols from Thursday 22nd February. www.thebadflowers.uk



























All photos credited with thanks to Mark Varney.
With thanks to Dale Tonks for his time in answering our questions and to Peter Noble of Peter Noble PR for arranging the interview.

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