Prelude To The Hunt

From: Aberdeen, Scotland
Lazy equation: All Pigs Must Pie + Gaza x Charger = YES PLEASE.
URL: Facebook // Bandcamp

Thrash Hits Verdict: 
If we had to pick one set of set of people guaranteed to recommend good new bands for us to check out, then it’s people in other good new bands. That’s how we stumbled across Prelude To The Hunt – their name kept popping up in the mutual Facebook Likes of other bands we’ve previously highlighted in Future Hits. If people we like thought they were good, we owed it to ourselves to check them out – and boy, were we glad we did. Prelude To The Hunt are one of the fiercest things we’ve heard in an age. We caught up with the band’s guitarist, Scott Bowden, to get the inside story.

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Describe your sound in 3 words
LOUD VALVE AMPLIFICATION.

How did you meet?
We all used to play in a technical death metal band around 7 years ago called We Shall Be Blessed. We were a band for about 4 years before we split in 2008. We played up and down the country, but rarely toured. After the split, we all went our seperate ways, Chris [Stewart, vocals] and Kev [Rae, drums] started  a powerviolence project called Uncalm, Ryan [Page, bass] continued to play in his melodic hardcore outfit Sunset Squad, and I joined a band called My Minds Weapon and moved away from Aberdeen.

What made you want to start a band?
Hurt. Loss. Anger. Take your pick.

I moved back to Aberdeen in 2010, and immediately wanted to get back in a room with the people who mattered the most to me. It must have been close to the first week that I was back that we got in a room together and started writing music. I  played bass in previous bands, and in this project, moved to guitar as I wanted to take on a bit of responsibility in the songwriting.

Where did the name come from?
I’m not really sure. I’m a big Neurosis fan, and I tried to think of the sort of thing that they might call one of their songs, and that’s about it.

Where did you grow up? How do you think it’s affected your music?
All of us – except Ryan – grew up in Aberdeen which is an extremely grey and miserable city in the north of Scotland. However, when we played in previous bands together, the scene was a much stronger thing, it was all very tight knit, and there was a lot of positive networking going on. Lots of great communication between everyone, and lots of good bands, so it had nothing but a positive effect on us. And that stuck with us. It was very nice to see that people outside of your band would care enough to help you out as much as they possibly could, from people helping put out records, giving a floor to sleep on, booking shows for us up and down the country, telling their friends about us, coming to see us play, it was all a truly great and positive thing. These days, things are quite different, but that DIY ethos still sticks with us, even to this day, and we still have some really great people who help us out, and we are eternally thankful for that.

What are your non-musical influences? 
I’m not really sure to be honest, if this is something you mean that is outwith the band that influences the band in someway, then I don’t know. Because it is me that generally starts writing all of the music, I guess my day to day life can influence the band. But this is a tough one to answer, because I am thankful for everything I have these days. Sure, I have my good days and band days, just like anyone else, I just choose to use the bad days to fuel Prelude To The Hunt. I guess my amplifiers play a large part in influencing the band as well. Sound and tone really matter to me, I’m forever trying out new things to expand our sonic sound.

So far, what has been the best thing about being in a band?
Definitely getting to write and play music with some of my truest and best friends. They have been with me through thick and thin, so getting to sit with them and butt heads about song structures and general song writing, and just playing getting to play alongside them is an honour in it’s self. It is definitely the best thing for me. Although, obviously the release of playing live is a close second. A very close second.

What bands do you consider as part of your scene or as your peers?
Depends, in the Aberdeen scene, we have Grader and Shiner doing the hardcore thing. But there isn’t a strong hardcore scene up here anymore. Some good bands from Aberdeen that are worth checking out are Filthpact, Cavalcades, Clearer The Sky, Dweller, Entrosolet, and Glassman. All great guys who contribute to Aberdeen in a positive way.

What marks you out as different to other bands around at the moment?
I’m not sure to be honest. I don’t want to pick apart what I feel we are better at or worse at than other bands. We mean everything we do though. We sit, almost endlessly writing and re-writing songs until we are happy enough to play them for ourselves, we care about achieving good guitar tone, both live and on record.We care about what we do, and if others are into it, then that’s cool, and so far, so good.

What’s the best show you’ve played?
We have played some pretty awesome shows so far being in this band. We managed to support Knut and Keelhaul which was great considering we have been fans for quite a few years now. The first show we ever played was immense. The support we got for that was unbelievable.

What have you got planned for your album/the future?
Next year, we plan to head back into the studio and record the follow up to our debut EP, First Rites, with Tom Mitchell in Clearwater Studios in Perth. He did the last one, and we have known Tom for a very long time, so he is the logical choice having come from a similar background to us, he knows what we are looking for and can take our thoughts and opinions on board to achieve the results we desire. We have around five songs ready to go pretty much. Whether we do annother EP or an album remains to be seen. Other than that, we are hoping to expand the band to a five-piece to achieve the most out of the new material that we can.

What other band should everyone find out about?
Everyone, without a doubt, should listen to Cursed.

Tell us a joke.
Why did the pie cross the road?

Because it was meat n’ potatoes.

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First Rites is available now through Prelude To The Hunt’s official Bandcamp page, for the entirely reasonable price of £4. Go check them out on Facebook and they’ll keep you in the loop as to when they play shows.