Doomed Confessionary: Aitor, Joseba, Mikel, David & Manu (Big Muff Brigade)
Big Muff Brigade is a five-piece stoner rock band from Basque Country, Spain. Aitor Granadero (vocals), Joseba Martínez (bass) and Mikel Becerra (guitar) started this project at the beginning of the year 2023. David Fernández (guitar) and Manu Forte (drums) joined the band a few months later.
In just three months, the five members found such a high level of complicity that they quickly composed their first full-length album and started to perform concerts.
Big Muff Brigade recently signed with Argonauta Records for the release of their debut album »π«, recorded at the Koba studios in Bilbao, Spain. They have already released a music video for the first single »Lost In A Canyon«.
Can you say a few words about your band?
Big Muff Brigade is a stoner-rock band from Basque Country (Spain). We started this project at the beginning of the year 2023 and in just three months, we found such a high level of complicity that we quickly composed our first full-length album and started to perform concerts. Our sound is based on the most rocking part of the stoner, always accompanied by the power of sabbathian riff, seventies drums and voices in the purest grunge style coming from Seattle.
What was the biggest challenge for the band?
Our biggest challenge is to do everything we do in the right way. All members of the band come from a long musical career (some of us even had past projects together), so we’re more efficient when it comes to meeting certain objectives. We’re a new band formed by experienced members who know how the underground scene works.
What can you be most proud of so far?
We’re very proud of the album we’re about to release and with the fact that we didn’t kill each other in the process. If you ask us in a month, we’ll probably be more proud of the songs we’re writing, but right now our favorite child is »π«.
What was your biggest regret?
The only regret we could have is that, even though we’re experienced musicians and have lived through all kinds of experiences, we’ve allowed certain bands and people to deceive us and not treat us with the respect that we treat them (which deeply hurts us that this happens in a scene that we love so much).
What was the best concert/tour so far and why?
There are many things that can make a concert “special”. If we focus on the execution of the songs, the best would be the one we gave last May at Rock Beer The New in Santander. On an emotional level, our debut a year ago at Groove Studios in Portugalete opening for a gorgeous band like Mutoid Man was the best debut we could have imagined. Finally, as for the connection with the crowd, the one we gave last March at Barracudas Rock Bar in Madrid, where we felt the warmth of a large part of the local stoner scene, was incredible. There are many special concerts as we said, but we know that the best ones are yet to come and we’re very excited to experience them all.
What is currently in your heavy musical rotation?
David and Joseba have been listening to a lot of Orbit Culture and High On Fire lately. On the other hand, in our province we’ve a festival that usually brings together great doom, sludge, post and stoner bands (both international and national) called Inkestas Rock Festibal and it usually helps us discover incredible bands. In past editions, Aitor discovered Celeste. Manu and Mikel discovered in this edition (in which we had the pleasure of playing a couple of weeks ago) Le Mur and Voul, two amazing bands from Murcia and Madrid.
What was the best advice you’ve ever been given as a musician?
A couple of years ago, Iker Rodriguez (sound-engineer in Chivo, our previous band) told us “don’t turn up the volume after a soundcheck.” It seems silly and something very basic, but some time later we saw that it wasn’t and that there were people who did it. On the other hand, when we’re composing we usually use as a mantra the title of a song by Distorsión, a legendary punk-rock band from our province. The title of the song is »Menos es Mas« (“Less is More”) and we use it when we want to tell each other that it isn’t necessary to put 12.000 different notes in a song to compose something good.
What are your guilty pleasures?
On the subject of guilty pleasures, we’re an anti-rock band. There isn’t a single gig we’ve played outside our hometown where someone in the crowd hasn’t asked us if we’re going to stay for a few drinks and they’ve always been amazed by our answer of “no, we want to go to the hotel to take a shower and sleep.” We’re good beer drinkers, but always within the responsibility of acting on behalf of the name of a five-person band. The only hidden pleasure we might have is that every time we finish a gig, before going to the hotel we always find a McDonald’s (McDowell’s if you’re a “Coming to America” fan like us) to eat like there’s no tomorrow.
Can you say something more about the current music scene in Valle de Trápaga-Trapagaran?
We’re lucky to have great bands around us, both experienced and new. Clear examples could be Wreck Totem and Green Sun Cult. Wreck Totem is an incredible band that has been making noise for many years and Green Sun Cult is a band that, although it has only been around for a short time, its members have been with past and different projects on the stages of our land for a long time.
Where can we see you live this year (concerts/tours)?
We’re preparing perhaps the longest tour we’ve ever had in our lives, which will not only take us across our country, but will also take us (if all goes well) to do a couple of dates in Portugal and France. The upcoming dates are: October 11th at Gong Galaxy Club (Oviedo), October 12th at Filomatic (A Coruña) and October 18th at Babylon (Leon). Anyone who wants to be aware of our upcoming dates, just has to follow us on the different social networks (Instagram, Facebook, …) or on streaming platforms (Spotify, Bandcamp, …).
What are your plans for the future as a band?
Apart from continue closing new dates, promote our new album as much as possible, do everything in our power to prepare a european tour and be able to take part of different festivals in our scene, we want to continue composing the songs that will make up what will be our second album (which we’ve been doing for several months) and to be able to start playing them in the next concerts.
How can people best support your band?
We’re a small, independent and fully self-funded band. We pay for every step we take and every euro we receive is reinvested in taking more steps. So when someone listens to us on streaming, shares a post on social media, buys a ticket for a show, buys something from our merchandising or simply tells a friend “hey, check out this band”, it means a lot to us and helps keeping the ball rolling.
Do you have any message for your listeners?
Thankyuss for your support, we’re really looking forward to you listening to our next album and seeing you at the next concerts singing, dancing and breaking your necks with us.
Bojan Bidovc // music enthusiast, promoter, misanthrop and sometimes a journalist as well