Interview: Ferocious Dog "We always say we don’t have fans we have family."

With their new album The Hope charting in high positions folk punks Ferocious Dog have clearly found a way to a wider audience. Their music is known to be frenetic in a live setting but also has real substance and often moving lyrics. Out on tour in late November Gary Trueman chatted to singer Ken Bonsall and guitarist Ryan Brooks just before they hit the stage at their Holmfirth show. Up for discussion was the new record, the writing process and the reason why the band support the Combat Stress project.

Let’s dive right in and talk about your new album The Hope. It’s quite an emotional roller coaster isn’t it?

“Ken: I think there’s a bit of everything in it in this isn’t there. There’s the full on mosh stuff and the meaningful slowed down stuff. Stuff that stops you and makes you think. I think it covers every aspect of life and that’s what we tried to do.”

It’s a bit like a window on working class life in a way. You get a lot of humour coming through, which is quite gritty.

Ken: “That’s a northern working class thing that you’ve got to have in your back pocket in abundance. If you’ve worked down a coal mine for thirty years you get to laughing at things that are really tragic. You find that it gets you through it. You put little jokes in and plod on through. You make things positive.”

So really humour is a way of expressing sadness?

Ken: “It is yes. I think if you do it cleverly and you do it right it works perfectly.”

How much did the pandemic affect the way the album was written both in terms of being able to work together and also the content?

Ryan: “It’s funny that because it’s a year today (November 28^th) that we started writing The Hope all together. We had four or five days at the Bethel church in Worksop. We all got together and all had a few ideas. We did that and thought after Christmas it’ll be OK and we’ll carry on. Whereas what happened was that we went into a lockdown in December. So we really struggled to all get together in one place at a time. And that was the same with the recording process. It was me Luke and Dan that that produced the album together. We did a lot of it digitally which is different than I think the previous albums had been written. Before it was done in a studio but this time a lot of it was sent over. Ken would send some words to Dan or Dan would send some fiddle parts to me. I would send a guitar part to John. There was so many ways that things were going on. It was a challenge but I think it paid off. It’s strange, I don’t think we’ll ever work like that again. We did the best we could in the circumstances, that we could do. We made the most of what we had because we hadn’t played live for ages and this was the next best thing, to create music. We created an album that reflected on that time and the frustrations we were having as artists.”

It was kind of a ferocious dog learning new tricks then?

Ryan: “Definitely. Everybody did. Everything was done so differently. Everything was very in house. We’re all very proud of what we’ve achieved with it. We were all looking forward to this tour so we could show what we’ve been working on for a long time.”

The album did really well chart wise as well. It was number 31 in the main chart and number one in the folk chart. How do you account for that, the sales and spreading of the word about the band?

Ken: “We don’t know. All we can do is our best and promote. Luckily we signed to Graphite Records who we owe a lot to for the reach and promotion. This is our fifth studio album. We wouldn’t have a clue how to get it out there to the masses whereas Graphite Records did. That’s what they do, they’ve got people who do this day in and day out for the bands on the label. We owe a lot to them, but at the end of the day you’ve got to have a good album. People aren’t going to buy it if it’s not good. Dan took the reigns and said he’d produce it. It’s an album produced by us and that’s the difference. The work that went into it was meticulous. Before we’d go to a recording studio that we’d had over the years and we trust to produce it, to do our sound, what he thinks Ferocious Dog is. Dan’s always said he’s never been a hundred per cent happy with the sound that’s come back. This time he’s very happy. He’s worked so hard with Ryan and Luke. I think that’s what you can hear on The Hope. It’s a massive sound.”

The balance is really good too. You’ve got six people in the band so you’ve got to have that haven’t you?

Ken: “You’ve got to have pockets where you can hear things breathe. You don’t realise the massive files that went into just one song. Rather than it sound cluttered and just a wall of music, it’s about knowing what sounds best for Ferocious Dog. Slowing the songs down slightly. We always play at a hundred miles an hour live but it’s a different animal (on a record). On an album you’ve got to make the songs breathe. So when you can hear the banjo come through you drop other things out to give it more impact.”

You’re on tour at the moment supporting the album. Presumably you’ll be doing something next year as well? And you’ll be appearing at Rebellion festival too.

Ken: “We’ve played there twice before so it’ll be nice to get back to Rebellion. We’ve really had a good time there. We didn’t know what was going to happen because it’s a punk festival and we’re classed as folk punk, so you never know how the punk police will take you, but we blew the people away. We can’t wait to get back to show our new stuff at Rebellion. We know how well the band has come on.”

Ryan, you’re fairly new to the band. When did you join?

Ryan: “I joined in November of 2019. It’s been two years but with the lockdown and the Covid situation it’s not been many gigs. That’s why I was glad I got to do a lot of writing for the album.”

You rolled your sleeves up and got stuck in then?

Ryan: “Yeah, we had to. We wanted to do something bigger than had been done before. We wrote this album and we want to just keep pushing.”

Your influences are quite a lot different to what people might expect. You’re a big Avenged Sevenfold fan and like a lot of metal as well as other stuff. Do you think you’ve brought a little bit of that into Ferocious Dog?-

Ryan: “I think so. I have a few compliments about my guitar work which has been lovely, that it sounds heavier. That’s to do with me and Luke and what we use on stage. We’ve spent a lot of time working on the guitar sound. It’s not a metal band and I’d never want to change Ferocious Dog but if I can bring something I enjoy to the band, like in Punk Police, I loved doing that.”

Also you’re quite the football fan too. Do you follow the national team?

Ryan: “Yes I do, I enjoyed the Euros. It was brilliant for the country to come together after such a bad time. I enjoyed the summer, it was nice.”

Do you think that even though sports fans and music fans follow a completely different thing they do have some similarities?

Ryan: “I suppose it’s the togetherness when they are together. Being in a stadium is the same as being next to somebody in a music venue that you’ve never met before. If someone scores a goal you celebrate with them. It’s the same as if you’re having a great time at a music venue. There can be people there you’ve never met before but you’ll be singing the same song together. I think that’s special.”

Ken can we talk a bit about your son Lee Bonsall. Ferocious Dog were actually named by him. Can you tell our readers a bit about Lee and what happened?

Ken: “One of the first ever shows was me and Daniel. He was just a small boy playing the violin for the first time. We started playing Pogues covers and stuff like that. We got a write up in the local paper. I think we were the first band on and we got asked what the name of our band was. Lee my son was holding my hand as we were talking, he was only a toddler, just starting to talk. We’d recently got him to say ferocious dog and people thought it was cute. Lee said ferocious dog and it went in the paper and just stuck. We always thought we’d change the name but as time went on we stuck with it. Then Lee went off to fight in Afghanistan and came back a different person. He took his life through PTSD. Daniel took over the running of the band and said that because of Lee naming the band he would try to get it as big as he possibly could. So as big as we see Ferocious Dog in life, that’s down to Lee. He can always live on in Ferocious Dog.”

You’ve got the Lee Bonsall memorial Fund which was set up following his passing. It’s important to recognise and treat PTSD isn’t it?

Ken: “It’s something you get thrown into. You don’t really want to get into it until it’s thrust upon you with losing your son. We knew nothing about PTSD. When we went to the inquest and they asked at the end about if we wanted money. We said money won’t bring Lee back but we’d like to try and stop other families going through what we had or stop another veteran doing what Lee did. We started working with Combat Stress and we set up the Lee Bonsall Memorial Fund in his honour and remembrance, to keep his name going. Having a platform like Ferocious Dog, people get into it so we wrote The Glass which is about Lee’s last days. Me and Daniel did it and I think it’s the quickest song we ever wrote, because it was purely from the heart. One of my best friends who knew Lee growing up, he wrote Broken Soldier which is on this album. It’s a fitting tribute from Andy Hawkins. The video for it we worked hand in hand with Combat Stress. It’s hard hitting, we made it that way on purpose because we want people who know somebody who’s got PTSD, to show them that video and say, this is you. At the end it says if you are someone or know someone with PTSD phone Combat Stress on this line, the help is there.”

You have this amazing fan base that’s growing at a huge rate. There’s a big mix age wise too. Why do you think that is?

Ryan: “It’s nice to see because with this tour from when I first played we seem to be getting a younger audience. I don’t know why that is. Maybe it’s the chart positions. We’re using social media a lot more. There’s also the fans that have stuck by the band from the start. It’s incredible to see the same people down south and then back with us when we’re playing in Nottingham. They follow us around the country and to me that’s incredible. The dedication they put in in working weeks. When we did a headline weekday tour and they were coming to every gig. They must have been more tired than us. It’s amazing the support we’ve had through this tour. We can’t thank them enough for their support.”

Ken: “Touching on that with years ago. Ferocious Dog music covers every spectrum. You can have a kid on their dad’s shoulders who’s six, the teen ager next to them who’s 16 and the grandad with them who’s 60. You do see families like that. The music is for everyone. We get videos of kids in the car on the school run and Ferocious Dog is playing and the kids are going mad to the music singing along. That’s lovely. We love to see that. We always say we don’t have fans we have family. If you come to Ferocious Dog it’s a family thing, we look out for each other and help each other.”

And a question for each of you to consider. Imagine Ferocious Dog are playing a gig and you can each choose one act alive or dead to share the stage with you. Who would you choose and why?

Ryan: “Nirvana. Just because of the music. I love their music. If ever I had got the chance I would have loved to have met Kurt.”

Ken: “That’s a hard one. Straight away I was thinking I’d love to have The Dubliners on stage with me. Then I thought I could have The Pogues. But if I’ve got to pick one it would have to be Rancid. Just because I absolutely love Rancid.”

Out Come The Wolves is an amazing album.

Ken: “There’s no fillers on that album. I’ve seen them a few times and I just love the energy on stage. Tim Armstrong and also Shane McGowan, they’re brilliant front men. For the punk ethos, that’s what it’s all about. Tim isn’t a brilliant singer, he’d never get through X Factor, but it’s distinctive. Take him away and it’s not the same.”