Their first single was only released last summer but the collective history and talent of Derry boys Parker meant that their debut album has been highly anticipated. Last month, scarcely a year on from their debut release, Parker released that debut with Never Let This Go. Reviewed here a few weeks ago, it’s a celebration of a sound honed in fiery live performances, married to strong production by Cahir O’Doherty (New Pagans, Fighting With Wire, Jetplane Landing). That production lends a modern, polished sound to the band’s melodic punk, heavily influenced by US college rock sounds.
Parker vocalist and guitarist Dylan Bradley breaks down the album’s influences, including the work of producer Cahir O’Doherty and their search for “three-piece moments”.
Fighting With Wire – Into The Ground
I think it goes without saying that there is a clear FWW influence on our music, and having Cahir produce the album made that even more so. If you listen to songs like ‘Ruin My Life’ and ‘Never Miss’ you’ll hear this most clearly. ‘Into the Ground’ is a heavy, fast rock song full of “three piece moments.” A three piece moment is something we learnt from Cahir and FWW and particularly songs like ‘Into The Ground’. It’s where you want to make a song sound like a huge rock record but do it in a way that can be re-created by three people. Never Let This Go is littered with three piece moments and that’s something we wouldn’t have been able to figure out how to properly do without bands like Fighting With Wire.
Foo Fighters – My Hero
Another band that clearly influenced this record is Foo Fighters. Gil Norton’s production on The Colour and The Shape is something we wanted to recreate in some ways on our record, particularly the drums and lead guitar parts. I think you can can hear this tonally in songs like ‘Ride On’.
Jimmy Eat World – Bleed American
Despite being hugely successful I think Jimmy Eat World are a band that still don’t get enough credit. They are a band that could be on a bill with Blink 182 and Green Day, but also play with rock bands like Foo Fighters and Pixies. They bridge a gap between melodic pop-punk and straight up rock music, which is somewhere that we aspire to be. They have had a huge influence on our record and continue to be a huge influence on our band in general.
Menzingers – After The Party
The Menzingers are a band we’ve always loved. They’re one of the biggest bands in the modern punk community, which is a community very close to my heart as I’ve been playing in punk bands for most of my life, but sonically they are in my opinion a rock band – again a place in which we see some similarities to our selves. We love the ethos of punk, and we love the sound of melodic rock.
Pixies – Letter to Memphis
The Pixies are one of my all time favourite bands and Trompe Le Monde is one of my favourite Pixies albums. It’s a record that we discussed at length while making our own, and one we definitely took a great deal of influence from. Particularly Black Francis’ style of singing is something I took a great deal of influence from on this album. The dynamic changes in their vocals are unparalleled and I feel like it’s something that we learned to use as a tool to make our songs more interesting while keeping it limited to guitar, bass, drums and two vocals for the most part.
Weezer – Tired Of Sex
Anyone that knows Parker, knows that we love Weezer. The sonic rawness of songs like ‘Tired Of Sex’ and really everything on the first three Weezer albums is something that we tried to recreate. Those first three Weezer albums sound like a band playing their songs in a room, and we very much wanted our album to sound like a band playing their songs in a room.
Burning Airlines – Outside The Aviary
Burning Airlines were a band I was unfamiliar with until we started making this record. There songs are littered with beautiful discordant little lead guitar parts that carry over heavy drums and bass, which is a technique we applied frequently on this record. Again, it really helps with those “three piece moments.”
Placebo – Every You And Every Me
There’s some songs on the record that are a little bit different from what we usually do, and one in particular is ‘Home With You’. I love bands like Placebo and The Smashing Pumpkins and I really wanted to have a song that represented that on the album. The fuzzy tight guitars, solid closed hat drums and heavy dirty bass with whispered vocals is something we don’t normally do, but we loved doing it on this record, and I think Placebo is to thank for that.
Maximo Park – Apply Some Pressure
Maximo Park isn’t really a band I was ever particularly into, but one night on tour in 2020 my friend played this song in the car and I immediately thought I’d love to write a song like that. It opened up my horizons to a lot of bands from that era (particularly Bloc Party) and I think it added a new layer to my approach to songs. I absolutely love the staccato guitar and minor chord verses with tight driving choruses style that a lot of these bands have, and it was a huge influence on me when writing for the album, particularly on songs like ‘Never Miss’.
Blink 182 – Feeling This
I feel like without blink-182 this band wouldn’t have existed. Me and Michael first starting jamming together when we teenagers because of blink and I feel like you can still hear that influence in our music today, particularly in songs like ‘Superhero’ and ‘Let’s Not’. Blink are one of those bands that I’ll always love and no matter what I’m listening to at a particular time in my life I can always see my self coming back to them.
