Green Gardens

Hi, we’re Green Gardens! We’re a 4-piece pastoral rock band from Leeds. Last year we released our debut album This Is Not Your Fault with Come Play With Me records and EMI North. The record was made in Armley, West Yorkshire with our sweet friends at Greenmount Studios, and it’s a record that deals with a lot of the feelings of grief and blame that we were processing at the time. We took it out on tour at the end of last year, and are celebrating it again through a deluxe version of the record which is out in April. This features some cuts which we couldn’t fit on the record, as well as some live reworks of album songs. After playing these songs so often, we like to find new ways to approach and sit with them, to try and make every show a totally unique experience. With that in mind, here are some things we love to have around us when we take the album out on the road: HIWATT GUITAR AMPLIFIER HEAD Chris got this amp head from his dad John, who used to tour with it. It’s one of the best-sounding amps any of us have ever heard. It’s so present and warm, but never harsh or ugly. John was one of the sweetest and coolest guys ever, and it’s so special to be able to use this head at our shows. It’s also got his name spray painted in massive letters on the side too for posterity (just in case there was any doubt). STEVE JACKSON & IAN LIVINGSTONES ‘FIGHTING FANTASY’ BOOKS Anyone who’s ever read one will know how cool these books are. They’re single-player role-playing gamebooks. One of these will take us about 3 hours to work through, which is cool because there’s absolutely nothing inspiring about motorways — especially in this country — so it’s nice to take a step away from that. Sometimes we do the battles properly, sometimes we make it up. There are also loads of them; for our tour in April 2024 we’re bringing Starship Traveller, Caverns of the Snow Witch and Den of Dragons (not actually Fighting Fantasy that one, but similar). There’s an X/twitter account (@FFMuseumofart) which is archiving all the art from them at the moment too, which is inky and 90’s and totally great.
 HAGSTROM FUTURAMA 3/4 BASS GUITAR I (Jacob) love this bass. It’s a 3/4 scale which means I can throw it about — not that I do. When I got it the neck was so twisted and knackered, but I took it to Beej Guitar Repair in Leeds and they did such a good job on it. It’s got good thuds and sharps. GALAXY SAUCE HATCH The sauce hatch is a big hatch full of sauce on the ceiling of the Ford Galaxy which we tour in. It’s quite self-explanatory, and for food emergencies only. Bob made pineapple chilli sauce once, but it regrettably never made it to the hatch. Our current occupants are BBQ + Sweet Curry. PROG Music can be a contentious subject when we’re out, but prog is the glue holding this band together. It’s become a bit of a dirty word when you’re talking about new music — I wish we could market ourselves as a prog band but it makes us seem like we’re Porcupine Tree, which we sadly don’t have the mettle for. For the record though, here’s where we each stand on favourites: King Crimson (Bob), the first two records by Yes (Chris), Mike Oldfield (Beaman) and Peter-Gabriel era Genesis (Jacob). Green Gardens This Is Not Your Fault (Deluxe) is out now.