Singled Out: Scattered Hamlet's Swamp Rebel Machine

Southern rockers Scattered Hamlet recently released a video for their new single "Swamp Rebel Machine" and to celebrate we asked Adam Joad to tell us about the track, which comes from their forthcoming album. Here is the story:

This tune is built on one of Adam Newell's heaviest riff to date I think. It's slow, driving and with the slide it captures the essence of that Delta Blues that's always a major driver of our approach to music. Swamp Rebel Machine was picked as the title track for the album because it captures the spirit of the album. The theme of it is pretty typical of my approach in that it's autobiographical, it celebrates back woods culture and it hints at the supernatural. For me I feel like my life was always driving in a single direction and when I tried to move in a different direction I just kept getting pulled back, "It's in my blood it's in my veins." It's all like the motor that drives our machine and that's what the song is about. Shiny chrome, Old Crow Bourbon, Red Man Chew etc. I sing about a lot of themes you'd find in country music, real country music, not modern Nashville pop to be clear.

Sound wise we went with late 60's and early 70's Marshalls dialed back on the gain so the player's emotion could come through. It's most played on a 70's Les Paul but the slide stuff is on a Fender. The basic foundation was cut live at the same studio they did the last Motorhead album so there's good metal ju ju in there. We really didn't think about radio play, what's cool right now or any business crap like that when we wrote and cut this. We just wanted to make the best tune we could and do it in a style that we know we like and that all the people out there on the road we've been seeing would respond to. To me making a copy of a copy of a copy is silly and futile. There's plenty of people doing certain things well and we just didn't want to copy that for some short term success or the approval of some industry insider. We did what we wanted to do with this album, if it sucks it's 100% our fault but we did it our way and came up with something I'm extremely proud of and that shows growth as a band. Anyway, you don't have to be from a swamp somewhere in Louisiana or from a hilltop in Appalachia like me to appreciate this and we hope folks dig it and its authenticity.

Hearing is believing. Now that you know the story behind the song, listen for yourself here and learn more about the band right here!

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