Well over 30 years in the punk scene, there’s very little that Teeside-based Snide Remarks haven’t seen or done.  Remaining focused on their core strengths, the band continue to put out inspired new material and play live shows with severe energy and passion.  Damian Robinson caught up with Snide frontman Barry Walker to talk about their upcoming shows and upcoming record.

Hi Barry, you’ve got a number of shows coming up in the next couple of months.  Do you find that your reputation as a one-to-watch band is a help or a hindrance?

To be honest with you, we’d play the same set and with the same enthusiasm whether there was 1, or 1000, people in the audience.  What we play is energetic, in your face, rock and roll.  It has meaning and when we play we try to make sure we capture that meaning.  A long time ago we literally did the show with one man and his dog in the audience, I remember we really went for it.  Punk, or energetic rock and roll as I prefer to define our music, should always be about giving your all.  As it happens, sometimes the smaller shows are the best shows.

For people who’ve never seen Snide before, what can they expect from a show?

We try to play every show as if it was our first ever show.  If you’ve seen the history of the band, you’ll know that it’s definitely not (laughing).  We’d like to think we’re an entertaining band, with lots of energy and also a one who tries hard to bring in audience participation and something unexpected.  As it happens for our next few gigs there will be something unexpected, but I can’t say too much now, just watch this space.

We’ve noted that you’re in the recording studio now, will we hear some new tunes in the show?

As a band we’ve just finished our new album ‘Life is hell’ which is getting mixed as we speak.  Hopefully it’ll be ready for our Rebellion show in August.  We’re really happy with the record and it’ll be very different from our last with more dimensions.  We may do some new tracks yes.

That sounds interesting, are there any particular themes on the record?

There’s continuing ideas across all of our records to be honest.  One of the tracks I’ve written is called ‘punks unite’.  It was written at the time of the Scottish referendum as a plea for us to stay together and stay united.  It seems that now people think it’s about Brexit, which in a way it could be, but it was written well before the Brexit vote.  To my mind, punk still means something today and if you look closely you’ll see there’s a pretty lively underground scene throughout the North East.  Some of the bands, I feel, don’t get the recognition they deserve but they’re there and they’re still saying interesting things.

Snide Remarks play a number of shows throughout July and August.  A full tour guide, as well as details about their new music, can be found on http://www.snideremarks.co.uk/