Wildwood Kin are a band that have had a tremendous 2016 so far, they've appeared at loads of festivals, have had a single played on Bob Harris's show on BBC Radio 2 and they're currently touring with the one and only Seth Lakeman! They're also playing a massive UK tour throughout November and December and play a homecoming show at Exeter Cathedral on December 17th, definitely one for your calendars! 

We caught up with them earlier this year at LEMONFEST in Newton Abbot just after they had finished their set on the main stage....

So, what about this weather? Perfect for a festival?

I guess it's not too hot and it's not raining so I’d call it perfect at the moment, not sure if there’s rain due later on or not, we’ll see….

I seem to bump into you guys a LOT at local festivals, you’re also playing at Poltimore in Exeter, are you planning any larger scale events this summer?

We’re doing the Cambridge Folk Festival and of course Glastonbury which we’re really excited about, we’ll be playing in the Greenfields, Toad Hall and a few other, 5 in total I think, it’s going to be pretty full on! We have a gig booked for every day of the event but you know what it’s like, we may get pulled in to cover something! With Glastonbury you never really know!

Just a case of having your instruments on hand!

Absolutely!

Many friends or family members attending?

We have a few friends heading up but family are a bit gutted as the tickets sold out really quickly and they weren’t able to get any!

So, smaller festivals such as Lemonfest and Poltimore House are a far cry from the sheer magnitude of Glastonbury, would you say that you prefer the smaller or the larger events?

I guess as we’ve never been to Glastonbury before it's hard to say, I prefer the smaller festivals as they are much more intimate but I guess we’ll just have to wait and see!

I personally feel that Glastonbury has become too big over the years, it’s like a pop up city, 900 acres!

And in a way, I guess that's what makes it such an amazing event! There are definitely pros and cons to every festival and each gig is different, just a case of rolling with it!

I find that smaller events are much easier to plan for, it’s hard to plan at Glastonbury as there are 100 stages and the physical moving around can be a chore in itself what with the condition of the ground and the sheer volume of people so it’s quite tough to be at a certain place at a certain time, more a case of just exploring and seeing where you end up!

I know what you mean, it can take ages to get around! It's definitely going to be a new experience for us!

What acts are you particularly looking forward to seeing at Glastonbury?

Sigur Ros are one of our favourite bands EVER so we hope to be able to catch their set, Explosions in the Sky are also playing, we’re also going to watch MUSE as our manager (Sarah Woodward) loves them!

MUSE are the first band to have ever headlined all 3 nights at Glastonbury over the years, they played in 2004, 2010 and now 2016, setting a new record!

So, back to Lemonfest, who are you looking forward to seeing?

We’re great friends with Mad Dog Mcrea and supported them a few weeks ago so we’ll be watching them later this afternoon, we are also doing a live session for BBC Radio Devon so we need to find out what time that’s going ahead!

Okay, I’m gong to ask each of you what your top three tips are for surviving a larger scale music festival….

Doggy bags…….(we won’t expand on this!), dry shampoo, wet wipes, sun cream, sun hats, wellies, sturdy boots, festival Garb, glitter, head dresses etc, some booze though we hope that they will provide some for us, we’re always looking to blag as much as possible as things aren’t cheap at Glastonbury and the more we can get for free, the better it’ll be for our pockets!

Your new EP will be landing soon, I was chatting to Sarah (Woodward - Manager) earlier and she says that the mix sounds amazing, are you happy with it?

We’ve not really heard it yet owing to us being really busy and we’ve not heard every song yet so it’s all going to be a bit of a surprise for us, the rough mixes and the demos were great but the final cuts are going to sound so good. A good friend called Jamie Evans produced it for us and he has worked so hard on getting the best sound out of us, he’s not been producing for long but he’s a musician himself which is what makes him so good to work with as he knows what he wants and how to go about it.

Did you find it easy working with him, was it a case of you telling him what you wanted and as a result, he was able to transform that into the end product?

I guess we didn’t really know what we wanted it to sound like at that stage so with Jamie’s ideas, it was great and we were able to say no if it didn’t work for us, it's the first time that we’ve worked with a producer that felt like working as a team, it can become a bit of a dictatorial process but with Jamie, it's just like having an extra member of the band! He’s more of a friend than a colleague, we all get on really well and that’s what we feel has created that the synergy that is going to make the next EP shine.

So, after the EP launches, do you have many more festivals?

We have loads! We’ve also been working with Seth lake man and appear on his new album which is due for release in September and we’re touring with him in Nov/Dec, quite a big tour, arenas, all over the place so we’re looking forward to that!

Ladies, thank you so much for chatting to us, all the best for the rest of the festival season, I’m really looking forward to your new EP and will no doubt catch you

Keep up with the movements of the ladies at the following social media channels;

Official Website

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Soundcloud