THE DEBUT EP
11.12.20

introducing

York-based indie rock outfit, Cold Culprits, will release EPisode1 on 11 December 2020. The debut EP is available as a five-track limited edition signed CD, as well as through digital downloads and streaming services.

Listen to the tracks below, read the story behind the songs, get the background on Cold Culprits and download the press photos.

LISTEN

Cold Culprits · Full Moon, Empty Promises

Cold Culprits · Ribcage Beats

Cold Culprits · Here Comes The Neighbourhood

Cold Culprits · Sweet Apathy

Cold Culprits · World On A Wire

BEHIND THE SONGS

FULL MOON, EMPTY PROMISES

EPisode1 begins with the swaggering lyrics, wandering bassline and overdriven guitars of Full Moon, Empty Promises. But the opening track started life as nothing more than a catchy phrase.

“I had those four words going round and round in my head one night and thought it would make a great song title,“ says Andy Watson, the guy behind Cold Culprits.

“Working backwards from the title was a first for me. I’ve ended up with a funkier, more wayward and vocally-dependent track than usual, with fuzzy guitars, bass and plenty of toms shaping the feel of this one.”

RIBCAGE BEATS

The second track on the EP, Ribcage Beats, is a total rebuild of a previous Cold Culprits song, Candy Thief.

Reimagined and retitled, Ribcage Beats is a back-to-basics, no-nonsense indie-rock anthem about doing whatever comes into your head. Gone are the synths, keyboard bassline and electropop drum beats of Candy Thief, replaced with raucous guitar riffs, a pounding bassline from a cheap bass guitar and unrelenting, sneering vocals. The result is a far more dynamic and cock-sure song.

HERE COMES THE NEIGHBOURHOOD

Stripped-back and slowed down, Here Comes the Neighbourhood creates a relaxed contrast to guitar-heavy tracks like Ribcage and Apathy.

“I wrote Here Comes The Neighbourhood on a piano, which is something I’ve never done before,” says Andy. “I needed a song to form the centre of the EP and change the mood, slow things down. I struggled like hell to get the right feeling on a guitar. Though once the piano riff was in place, I strummed some acoustic guitar chords in the background to flesh it all out.”

The result is melodic and almost folk-influenced. But this is no grief-stricken ballad. Andy’s piano and understated vocals are melded with off-kilter lyrics that breed a sense of growing unease. ‘Don’t look too far down the boulevard’, we’re told, because everything’s not quite what it seems in sunny suburbia…

SWEET APATHY

Sweet Apathy brings us straight back into guitar territory.

“I can almost hear the blood, sweat and purpose spitting out of the speakers when I listen to this one,” says Andy.

“Sweet Apathy began with me sprawled on the sofa and hitting a bunch of chords on my Telecaster custom. Usually, I’ll start writing the words first and then flesh it all out on an acoustic guitar, but I just fancied bashing the electric and thinking about gigging. Then I got behind the drums, hammered out a rough drum beat, then back to the guitar and cranked up the amp. This is the fastest it’s ever taken me to write a song.”

The result is an unapologetic anthem to killing time, with dive-bombing guitars, spiky vocals and a thrashing drum beat.

WORLD ON A WIRE

Written after a John Wick TV binge-session, World On A Wire has a gritty, raw cinematic feel.

“I recorded most of the parts on a beat up old Fostex multi-track tape machine,” says Andy. “I wanted to get an old-style analogue sound and capture that hot, overdriven cross-talking feel that you just don’t get from a digital mix.”

The result is exposed and unadulterated, with distorted vocals, stabbing, twisting riffs and a relentless drum beat. “This is more in your face than my usual stuff,” Andy says, “much darker, dirtier and angrier. Recording this to tape just made the whole thing feel a lot more fun, and I didn’t want it to get cleaned up too much in the mastering.”

ABOUT COLD CULPRITS

WHO ARE THEY?

Cold Culprits isn’t a band, it’s Andy Watson, a musician and freelance writer living in North Yorkshire.

Andy got into music as a young kid, when he found an old cassette tape in the street and took it home to play on his dad’s tape player. The music on it blew his tiny head off. He had no idea at the time, but it was a band called The Skids. That cassette tape cemented Andy’s love of guitar-driven punk rock.

Andy has been strumming guitars for years, but only decided to get organised and write original music in 2020. Before that he was gigging the regional pub circuit with a covers band and playing open mics.

As a solo musician, Andy learned how to play drums and keyboards to flesh out his guitar and voice and bring Cold Culprits to life. His debut single, We Will Bleed, was released in April 2020.

WHAT’S WITH THE NAME?

Cold Culprits is a salute to The Germs, a 1970s LA punk rock band. It’s a loose connection, along the lines that germs are the culprits behind the common cold, or ‘cold culprits’. The Germs were unstable, self-destructive and incoherent. They also wrote some awesome lyrics, setting the words to completely unintelligible songs in the few short years before they imploded.

RECENT PRAISE FOR COLD CULPRITS

“Genuinely concerning, soul-baring lyrics”

RGM Magazine

“This track rocks people, it races along at a pace that thrills, guitars roar and snarl in the background. The vocals sneer in a wonderful way. It makes you want to dance madly and who can ask for anything more?”
Local Sound Focus

“Imagine Brett Anderson (Suede) fronting The Raveonettes.”

Rock Regeneration Magazine