Mikey Waugh - Vox, Rhythm Guitar
Stewart McWilliams - Lead Guitar
Mark McCullagh - Bass
Matt *Haircut" Doyle - Drums
Callum Fay - Keys

“What am I to build, if my hands are broken, if I’m not the chosen one?” sings Steven McKellar of Civil Twilight on “Story of An Immigrant”, over a lush, dynamic beat that evokes the sounds of his native South Africa while steeped in the band’s everevolving present. The foursome (Steven, his brother and guitarist Andrew, drummer Richard Wouters and Kevin Dailey on keys and guitar) are living proof of what happens when you stop worrying about being the chosen one and make music built on both the roots that grew you and the love that keeps you thriving every day. Civil Twilight’s songs embrace every corner of human emotion, balancing delicate, poetic lyrics with sweeping arrangements that touch all the senses: a phrase to make you think; a rolling drumbeat you can feel in your bones; a guitar vamp as illustrative as a picture; a shimmer of keys whose light can nearly be seen and heard. Produced by Ben H. Allen (Gnarls Barkley, Bombay Bicycle Club, Cut Copy), their third record on Wind-Up is built on this vibrancy, on the permanent dust of a Cape Town youth; on the connection that unites them all as brothers beyond blood and on their new home in America where they pull from the innate, thriving musicianship of Nashville, where they live. When you listen to Civil Twilight, from their self-titled debut, to 2012’s widely lauded Holy Weather to now, it’s easy to understand why the band has topped five million YouTube views and reached historic success with film and television syncs – because it’s music you can’t shake, that translates experience into moments and creates melodies that become imbedded deep under the skin. We’re all immigrants, in some way, and Civil Twilight’s singing our national anthem.

Politically incorrect Balkan, Ska, Punk, Reggae extravaganza
New studio album, titled #fakenews, will be available at the end of January 2020.


In Sunderland everything of worth was born of adversity. This is the terrible truth for the creative freaks in this city. 

In 2008, Frankie & The Heartstrings found each other in a bar on Sunderland’s left bank. It was raining (obviously), words were exchanged and the rest is up to you to pick out of the anecdotal lucky dip. The truth is the band had been formulating itself without us knowing. Our very own hideous experiences in pit villages, school-yards and Sunderland’s city center, meant that Sunderland knew long before we did. It wasn’t romantic, it was cold, and it was necessary. 

Frankie ran a bar at the time; it served poorly-kept lager at a price which regularly angered natives already juiced up on their cheap angry dust. Michael was a teacher who seemingly taught nothing but how to cope with being a teacher who teaches nothing. Den was handsome and enigmatic (turns out that was thrush) and I was getting older and less talented by the fortnight. The other one, with the benefit of hindsight, has been erased from the band’s history. We then recruited Mick Ross, who soon after was granted the freedom of The Cluny.

Having no aspirations beyond playing music and putting on shows the way we wanted to hear it and see it, we set about the North East, not giving a fuck as we went. We played the shows we wanted to play, politely (to their faces) said ‘no’ to the shows that made no sense - they were usually spearheaded by a promoter we thought was a wanker.  A demo recorded in a fucking freezing back room later, and Bob’s your uncle.  I’ll get to Fanny being your aunt later. 

We found a home with independent loose cannons Wichita Recordings who continue to tolerate 5 pig-headed wankers until they read this.

After dealing with the bombshell that Brian Connelly from The Sweet was dead, we recorded our first long player with Edwyn Collins from the 1980s.  Over 3 weeks we endured being treated with respect and love from the Collins family and in return we got drunk in their house and watched a man put his testicles in Edwyn’s didgeridoo.

Our debut album Hunger entered the hit parade at number 32. The week after it didn’t bother. 
Then we went around the world a bit. 

We ate chicken cartilage in Japan, we tried (unsuccessfully) to get mugged in New York, drank beer from bags in Australia, confused Morrissey in Sweden, soiled beds in Germany, had chips in Wrexham and we have enough anecdotes from Holland to give my dad another heart attack. To all the countries I haven’t mentioned, just take it as read that we are sorry but that it will also probably happen again. 

Not being huge fans of liars we do try not to bullshit too much ourselves. We haven’t got 150 songs for our second album, we don’t always love one another, we frequently contradict ourselves and we are not the best band in the world*. We do play as hard as we can to whoever we play for, we do not take anything for granted and if we behave like dicks, it’s because we are dicks, not because we are dicks in a band.

We have been privileged enough to support The Vaccines (showed them my penis a lot), The Kaiser Chiefs (again, penis), Florence & The Machine (invented a game involving a well known confectionary and a penis). I could make a list of bands that we have played with to make us look cool but I've forgotten (Primal Scream) most (The Walkmen) of (The Beatles) them if I’m honest.

Last time round we played all the festivals you pay a fortune to attend and always said ‘thank you’ to the caterers, from Glastonbury to Deershed and then back to Split fest in Sunderland. Which is especially handy for me because I live round the corner and I had a dicky tummy. 

But these things are a privilege.  Over the course of the last few years, we’ve seen every backstage wanker in shades and boring band bastard going, and Harry Enfield and Steve Davis. We saw people ‘accidentally’ dropping snapper bags out of their pockets and one unfortunate band who thought it was a reasonable idea to take one of Dennis’s beers.

We remain a product of who we are, where we are from and what we do. And what we do is start our own record label (Pop Sex Ltd), curate our own Pop Sex Nite events, make our own merch and run our own shop. The bare minimum simply won’t do. We have seen the bare minimum and frankly we don’t care for it. 

We have another record coming at a time when the way we consume music is changing. A transitional period when bands and artists are afraid of something without really knowing what to be afraid of. We can only try our best. 
Its hard.
So what.

Dave

PS We didn’t forget about the pizza advert thing.

*that’s Focus.


Proud Honey are a psychedelic Indie rock band formed in Glasgow. We hope you like the new tracks and will continue to keep tabs on further songs we will be adding to our profile. In the meantime thank you for listening and your feedback is very much appreciated

Epitaph Records is an independent music label founded in Los Angeles by Bad Religion guitarist Brett Gurewitz. Early releases from a variety of punk heavyweights spawned what became known as the 90s punk explosion. 

Along the way Epitaph proudly launched its sister label ANTI-, representing unique and distinguished acts. From the beginning Epitaph’s mission has been to serve the musicians on its diverse and creative roster - an artist-first model, radical twenty years ago, and much imitated today. 

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