Interview with Pete Devine of Pete’s Rock News and Views (https://petesrocknewsandviews.com)
PD: What type of artist are you?
HB: We’re a 4-piece alternative rock / indie rock band, based in Leicester, UK.
PD: Tell us the brief history of yourself.
HB: Initially, Her Burden was an alias for a solo project started by the band’s singer and lead guitarist, Joshua Jones. After releasing some music, he met guitarist, Luke Spencer, at a house party. Luke had already listened to Josh’s songwriting and wanted to jump on board. From there the band was formed.
After gigging and releasing some singles and EPs, as well as a few lineup changes in the rhythm section, drummer Matt Newton became friends with Joshua through university and joined the band. Following on from this, long-time friend and supporter of the band, Sam Dickman, was asked to join as the band’s permanent bass player, thus completing the lineup we hear today.
After a big 2019 for the band they went into hibernation when 2020 became the year of COVID and cancellations. However this time wasn’t wasted, as the band have been working on improving their songwriting, production and live performance, ready for late 2021 onwards.
PD: Who are your musical and non-musical influences?
HB: In the beginning, the Her Burden sound was heavily influenced by pop-punk / punk rock bands like Green Day, Blink-182, Sum 41 and Fallout Boy. However, as the line up has changed, we’ve begun to lean into the more indie, pop and alternative sides of rock. Our latest tunes can be described as modern brit-pop or alt-rock, with influences ranging from Oasis to Yungblud, Nirvana to The Rolling Stones.
PD: What are your dreams and goals?
HB: Like many bands and artists, we’d love to take this to a professional level. Writing music and performing our art live around the world for a living. In the short term, we’re a DIY band through and through, and we love to create stuff – so that’s what we plan to do. Make the best music, visuals, videos, shows we can possibly make, and have fun doing it. Hopefully we can bring more and more people along for the ride with every song we release and every gig we play.
PD: Who writes your songs, what are they about?
HB: Usually an idea, riff, chorus melody will come from one of the band members. From there we workshop it as a band; building and shaping it as each member adds their own flavour to the sound with their instrument. Along the
way, the singer, Josh, will write the melody and lyrics to finish the song.
Lyrically our songs cover subjects like relationships, mental health and societal pressures.
PD: How do you promote your band and shows?
HB: For a band at our level, social media is key for us when it comes to promoting ourselves and our upcoming releases, shows, merch etc. When possible, we make sure to push for radio, online press, ads and playlists to promote ourselves across the board, but being able to speak directly to the people who have chosen to follow us, and invest their time in what we do, really helps us get people to our shows and gain new fans.
PD: What do you think about downloading music online?
HB: In a way it’s a double edged sword – as music lovers, it’s great to be able to discover new, and all types of music so easily. And as artists and musicians we are always able to find new music to learn from and inspire our songwriting and instrument playing.
That being said, like many up and coming artists and bands, we feel the frustration when we see what our music is being valued at when people listen to us online – especially on streaming platforms like Spotify.
PD: What song do you wish you’d written and why?
HB: “Good Riddance (Time of Your Life)” by Greenday – as a band it would be great to write a song that is this simple, yet enters the zeitgeist and connects with so many people.
PD: What are some of your pet peeves?
HB: Rudeness and not respecting / not being grateful to those who support you and help you.
PD: What is your proudest moment in music?
HB: 2019 gave us plenty of moments to be proud of. We released a debut album called “Say What You Want” – a collection of re-recorded old tunes and some new tunes that we have been playing over the years since the band’s formation. On top of this we performed at Liverpool SoundCity, supported The Hunna, Toploader & The Zutons, and played to a 2-thousand strong crowd at Swanbourne Music Festival. To top it off we got to hear our music be played on BBC introducing a number of times.
PD: So what are you working on at the moment?
HB: Prior to (and during) the COVID lockdowns starting in 2020, we recorded a number of tracks. The first of these to be released was “Way Too Good For Me” on 3rd Dec 2021. Our next tune, “Figure It Out”, is being released everywhere 25th March 2022. From there we plan to release new singles over the course of 2022 to 2023.
We’re still getting our name back out on the live scene, so no tours planned for the time being. That being said, we’ve got shows lined up in Leicester (next up – 26th March @ The Soundhouse), and are scheduling more shows and festivals across the UK. Follow us on socials to keep an eye out for new shows we get booked on.
PD: What music have you available online and where can we buy it from?
HB: Our music is available on all the usual streaming platforms/digital download stores. You can access the links here: https://vibe.to/herburden
We also have a bandcamp page where people can listen and download our newer music: https://herburden.bandcamp.com/releases
Keep an eye out on our socials as we plan to release new merch, physical releases and more.
Her Burden links:
Band/Artist location – Leicester, UK
Website – Facebook – You Tube – Soundcloud – Bandcamp –
Twitter – Instagram – Apple – Spotify – Amazon – Deezer – Vibe.to –
Check our page for Her Burden
