It’s just over 4 years since I wrote a blog. You get out of the habit, and to say there has been a lot going on in that period is a supreme understatement. We’ve all got our stories to tell, and in regards to The Senton Bombs, I’ll be telling some of that here.
We started this little band in 2004, which seems ridiculous, but come next year we’ll have been around in some form or another for 20 years. Two decades. That’s some stamina. The reason for our sustainability, or survival, is that I’ve never been a fan of ‘calling it a day’. We’ve had quieter periods, line-up changes where key members have departed, other projects, burnt out some and lost our love for it… and then rediscovered it all over again. It never seems right to say the Bombs are done. Because, until we’re ‘singing from the grave’, I don’t think we will be. All that being said, it’s probably a good time to establish where we’re at, right now.
A bit of history may help. From 2004 until 2009 we were very much in our formative years. In those first five years we played countless gigs and really made a name for ourselves as an up and coming band, but had neither the professionalism or understanding for how to truly take a band forward. In 2009, we set about recording and releasing our first studio album, Sweet Chin Music. Johnny joined the band just after Scott and the line-up which has stuck together for the last 15 years was in place. This was the point we started to get out of the North West and test our sound on audiences across the UK and Europe. We found a home in the punk scene and later the hard rock scene, and over the next ten years until 2019 we played around 200 live gigs. That may seem like a lot to some and not to others, but to be playing roughly twenty a year, some years double that, as we all worked our day jobs, got married, had kids, and the rest, it’s a pretty decent figure. Throw in recording, rehearsing, shooting videos, traveling and you get the picture on the time investment.
In February of 2020 we supported The Supersuckers for the second time in what turned out to be one of the last gigs for them, and us, when the global pandemic hit, closing venues and halting bands across the globe. Whilst the music stopped, many musicians, gig-goers and venues reassessed. For some it changed their views and it’s not been the same since. For us, the timing was near perfect. We had really reached burnout in 2019. We’d been traveling far and wide together for what seemed like forever. Our gigs were getting bigger, with bigger venues, bigger bands, bigger crowds, but our enjoyment was getting smaller. Personally, I'd been struggling with increasing tinnitus since I was a teenager and fear my hearing was beginning to suffer was real. In short we needed a proper break. What happened forced us into it, and the result, since 2020 we have only played live five times. Granted, every time has been special. Amazing turnouts and atmospheres, but, what had become a weekly occurrence has almost become annual. We put the finishing touches on our 2021 album ‘Aerial Threat’ and then put our feet up.
After the recent Chapter Zero ten year anniversary party it really made me think about how lucky we are. One, to have each other, a special bond on and off stage, with a catalogue of songs that is deep, varied and always fun to play. Two, to still be relevant. A great crowd cheered and danced through every song and to still have that, for a band who never truly smashed through the glass ceiling, is pretty special. So, that considered… here's exactly where we’re at…
We have some unreleased music we’re going to put out there, most of it was unlucky it didn’t fit the sequencing on various albums, so we hope you like it. We’ve also got some dates confirmed for 2024 as we celebrate our twenty years, some announced, some yet to be… but, safe to say, we’ll be hitting the stage again and making our noise, on the same reduced schedule but we’ll be out there.
I can’t speak for the others and I won’t try, but for me, I love this band and love the journey we’ve travelled. As a self-taught musician with limited skill but a penchant for a hooky song and catchy lyric, we’ve come way further than we had any right to. Playing on festivals with Bad Religion, Backyard Babies, supporting Bullets & Octane, the Suckers, reviews in Classic Rock and features on the cover CD, airplay on Kerrang, Planet Rock, BBC, hundreds of fantastic reviews… if you told me we would achieve any of that twenty years ago I would have laughed. But we’re here, we did it, and when we feel like it, we’re still doing it. To the people who check out our live shows, listen online, and just generally dig what we do, I can’t thank you enough. Creativity is something you do regardless, but the feedback, the response, the enjoyment of others… that’s what really makes you smile.
In conclusion, we’ve got a lot of cool stuff to announce for 2024, and we’ll always have something in the tank when this ol’ machine needs a spin on the road, but know it, and know it well… The Senton Bombs will never die! How can it? There is nothing quite like this, for us at least, and there is certainly no rest for the rockin’. Much love.
JC
