Last month Skateism hit up Slam Dunk South, a festival in Hatfield. It was a massive success, and went off smoothly, with a great line up. We managed to catch Trash Boat, the winners of the Fresh Blood competition (which gave them the chance to open their stage, at midday). This band play some serious rad pop-punk, rivalling any THPS playlist, including Millencolin and Goldfinger; both of whom were playing alongside them at Slam Dunk this year!
Hey guys, can you give us a brief history of the band?
Tobi: We formed a year and a half ago, since then we’ve just been plugging away, writing music, and playing shows. Dan, Oakley, Ryan, and James, were all in a band before this, and I live like an hour away. They found me over the internet, I was singing in my other band and then we formed.
Dan: It was beautiful.
How does it feel, having won Kerrang!’s Fresh Blood competition?
Dan: Pretty unreal really, I mean we saw the competition we were up against, and we were just happy to be put forward at all.
Yeah, you were up against Palm Reader, Astro Boys, Zoax.
Tobi: I totally thought Astro Boys were going to win.
Dan: Yeah I thought Astro Boys would win, so it’s a fucking honour.
So you weren’t expecting the win?
Dan: Not at all, not at all. I mean in the back of our minds we were thinking ‘What if there was that one in a million chance that we could actually win?’ But no, we weren’t expecting it.
Having seen your crowd today, and at Leeds (SLAM DUNK NORTH) yesterday, how do you feel?
Dan: We’ve been so surprised, so surprised.
Tobi: Seeing kids go fucking crazy is what we’re in it for, it’s the one.
How’s the response been for your Brainwork EP?
Dan: Generally really positive, I’m yet to read a bad review.
Tobi: We’ve had some ‘alright’ ones.
Like what?
Tobi: I skim through them.
Dan: I ain’t got time for that.
Tobi: Yeah, no time for haters.
Totally. What’s coming up for Trash Boat?
Tobi: We’ve got tours and festivals: Blood Youth, Download, Hevy Fest, and alot of maybes. Thing’s we’ve been put forward for but not been confirmed yet. Plus this Summer we are going to be writing music, but we don’t have a release date yet.
Dan: It’s in the works.
When you write, do you have specific areas assigned to members, or is it more of a free-for-all?
Tobi: Yeah, I write the lyrics and vocals, and stuff like that.
Dan: it’s very half-and-half, Tobi takes care of the lyrics completely, Oak writes the majority of all the songs, and then we’ll chip in occasionally.
And who are you hoping to catch today?
Dan: I missed H2O yesterday, so I’m going to catch them.
Tobi: The advantage of playing Slam Dunk is you have three days in which to catch all the bands you want to see, so anything I missed yesterday, I can catch today or tomorrow.
What do you think about the link between Punk and Skateboarding?
James: For me, the link is rooted in when I used to play THPS, because there was so much Pop-Punk on those playlists. So I started skating, then got into Pop-Punk, so without skating I wouldn’t have been so involved in this sort of music. Rock on, keep shredding, and allow the Mongo.
So that’s Trash Boat, go see them at a show, and pick up their EP “Brainwork” now!
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(Live Photography: Ed Mason)
