The Psychs, on the face of it, are your typically gritty rock n’ roll band. With a series of pulsating singles having already taken them to iconic scene-fest Other Voices in Dingle, the four piece have evolved from an earlier, mellower sound into singles like their latest ‘The Bullet Song’, a quick-fire effort lent depth by their use of church organs.
I caught up with vocalist Billy Kid Jones ahead of the band’s show at the Workman’s Cellar on February 3rd.
Congratulations on the impending headline show. What can we expect from you as a live act?
…The unexpected.
Can you tell me a little of the backstory of how you came to this place?
Myself and Ben (guitar) were travelling around doing a bit of a Gimon & Sarfunkel thing and then one day we decided we wanted more and had this fire in us that demanded a bigger and more hard-hitting sound. Ben put out the call, straight off the bat we met Clampo (Bass). We had a drummer but parted ways mutually, went 9 months without a drummer! which I don’t know if you’ve ever been in a band that has drums in their songs but no drummer but it’s difficult. Then rather miraculously we met Aaron (drums) the rest is history.
What’s the inspiration behind your particular style of music?
We all come from different musical backgrounds, Country, Funk, Jazz, Blues but we all meet at the communal water fountain of classic Rock n’ Roll.
You formed in peak covid era. Did that have any impact on your development as a band?
Yeah but sure if that was a bingo number the whole hall would cheer, it definitely was a major obstacle but I mean we’re still here so…if anything it proves we don’t give up easily.
You’ve already had quite a few cool experiences as a band. Have any stood out?
Opening in the 3Olympia, Other voices and of course most recently being on Fanning at Whelans which was so different to what we’ve done. Normally playing live you’re like some Vampire that can just sleep til noon then crawl out of whatever lair you’re in and roll onto the stage, on Fanning we had to play those songs first thing in the morning! You try screaming about Drinking on a bus at 9:00am on a Monday…
What’s been your favourite experience as a band so far?
I know myself and the boys would all agree that opening in the 3Olympia Theatre has been the highlight so far. It was insane, it was a real “who let the dogs out?” moment. We didn’t know quite what to expect but the crowd was so amazing! I remember myself and the lads looked at eachother and we all thought the same thing “we could get use to this”
How much music do you have together at this stage, and what’s the plan for getting it into the world?
Off the top of my head we have published around 12 songs, but that’s just those we’ve recorded, we’ve a reservoir of unreleased tunes and they just keep coming, even now they’re oozing out of us! We’ll just keep chugging along, keep thinking of exciting new methods of delivering them to our fans and keep making music we love and with a bit of luck people love it too!
Can you tell me the story behind your new single ‘The Bullet Song’?
The Bullet Song speaks for itself really, it’s a song from the perspective of a bullet. Of Course it also plays on the idea of judgement and that if you make a gun with your hand, there’s three barrels aiming back at you… it’s also just a cool f*cking tune!
What are the long term plans?
Three M’s: Mustang, Mansion, Money..No, our long term plans are to just play, at the heart of it all we love playing, and we love playing so much it’s all we wanna do, so our goal is to spread our music and play all over the world. We have so much to say really, so much to do, but if I had to narrow it down I reckon we’ll start to think about the dirty “A” word…album.
