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| It started back at the tail end of last century when Liam and Steven took up ‘jamming’on a Saturday afternoon before heading through to watch the mighty Saints in action. Bleh. After months of Steven hassling Liam to start playing bass, he eventually bought an electric guitar instead. Good job he did - he's pants on bass! The pair got themselves a drummer in the form of Kirsty Lingard and learned four hours worth of indie rock hits of the time, as well as all time classic sing-alongs.... The newly formed Mugwumps took part in the Webster’s High School Talent show and opened it with Travis’ “All I Want To Do Is Rock” before finishing off with originals “Forest Fire” and “Things Are Changing”. In 2001 all changed: the band was renamed Sonnet 65 after it was pointed out ‘The Mugwumps’ was already “an over used teen band name”, a young Ben Carr became the band’s Drummer, Greg Shaw made one appearance as bassist with Eggsi (Ewan Craib) taking his place soon after. In 2002 with the line-up seemingly stable at Liam, Ben, Eggsi and Steven the band gigged their little hearts out. However, all was about to change with Bethan Parkes joining in spring 2002, adding a whole new dimension to the Sonnet65 sound. With the new line up Sonnet recorded an experimental self-titled CD featuring a mixture of covers and original material before the W.H.S. gig with the fantastic Velvet Trousers where it got a surprising reaction and quickly sold. After that gig Eggsi decided to leave the band, O.M.R.’s Callum Blair stepped in to replace him. Soon after Steve took six months out to teach English in Sri Lanka and do a bit of travelling. During his absence Sonnet had a few couple of gigs with Liam taking on lead vocals and local ‘comedian’ Ewan Urquhart stepping in to give his mates a hand. However, not all was calm in the world of S65, Callum was dropped as the bassist, Eggsi came back…then quit again…then Callum came back!(EH!?) Steven got back on the 26th of February. Promptly after the band booked the Town Hall with the money made from the “Sonnet65” CD and, with top blokes Checkmate supporting, made their momentous return dubbed “The Boys Are Back In Town” gig. And then…Ben quit. The band knew it simply wouldn’t be the same without him so hunted high and low for another drummer named Ben and, while searching high, Sonnet found him in the form of Kirrie resident Ben Marrett.(YAY!) BEUGHN! July saw Ben’s Sonnet debut behind those electronic skins at the Live Farce at the Den. Big up, Atlas Acoustics! Mumble, grumble, grrr. At the end of July and then Liam and Steven embarked on their seven-date acoustic tour of County Mayo, Ireland. Ironically “The Way to Mayo” was never performed. The duo came back 10 days later and that weekend we went into Hastie Retreat and put down the music for all seven tracks on the Saturday, played Hook’s that evening and returned to the studio on Sunday to record vocal parts and so “A Thousand Voices Share My Head” was created. Covers were made up and set up a production line to make enough copies for the surprising amount of people who already wanted one. It was back to Hook’s for the Saturday of the festival where, for any Kirrie pub, the new album sold like hot cakes. So with the album done Callum, who had only temporarily stepped in to take Eggsi’s place, decided it was time to leave the band. There was one more acoustic Hook’s gig in October. Recently Ex. Velvet Trouser’s bassist, Keith has joined the band to complete the line up…Sonnet 65 are complete again! There are a few new songs in the pipeline, keep posted for gigs and demos coming up soon! |
| All you ever wanted to know about the birth of Sonnet 65... it was pretty messy! |
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