The Sheepdogs’ Ryan Gullen + Ewan Currie Discuss New Album

On Tuesday (March 17), frontman Ewan Currie and bassist Ryan Gullen of the Sheepdogs joined Loudwire Nights to celebrate the recent release of their latest album, Keep Out of the Storm.

Listen to the full conversation in the player near the end of this article.

“It’s a labor of love and you agonize over all kinds of little seemingly inconsequential details,” Currie shared with Loudwire Nights‘ Chuck Armstrong about what it felt like to have the album finished and ready for the world to hear.

“Then it doesn’t come out for awhile and you kind of forget about and then you start hearing it again, on the radio and stuff, and you’re like, ‘What? This sounds pretty good.'”

The recording of the new album was unique for the Sheepdogs; they did it over the course of several sessions and each session featured a different drummer. While this might cause some stress for others, the Sheepdogs seemed to thrive with the constant change in the studio.

“It’s cool having different drummers come in, they’re all our friends and they all have a different flavor that they bring to the record,” Currie said.

“Knowing who was coming in, we tried to be like, okay, today we’ll work on this song and do this differently. Some groove a little more different, some rock a little harder. It was pretty fun having different folks come in.”

Gullen shared a similar sentiment as his bandmate.

READ MORE: Everlast Discusses His New Album, Reflects on His Legacy + Confronts Those Who Want Him to Keep Politics Out of Music — Interview

“You’re ll in the room sort of working out the song together, adding this element of uncertainty,” he explained.

“I think there’s something to be said about making art when you’re uncomfortable … When you feel super comfortable, maybe sometimes you’ll not get lazy, but you’ll maybe be more apt to fall into old habits.”

What Else Did the Sheepdogs’ Ryan Gullen + Ewan Currie Discuss on Loudwire Nights?

• The challenge for Gullen working with a different drummer in each session on the new album: “As a bass player, it challenged me to play a little differently. I probably did different things, I probably interacted with the drums different, interacted with the guitars different and so, as a result, I think we created these songs in a way that they wouldn’t have been created had we not been put in that scenario.”
• Having won awards and graced the cover of Rolling Stone magazine, what else remains on the band’s “bucket list”: “I don’t really think about bucket list items as much. I think it’s much more practical. Maybe this is just because of the position we’re in, where we are wearing all these different hats, but we’re kind of just trying to keep things ticking along. When we started the band, our goal was pretty simple, it was to make records and it was to tour and play shows to promote them. And that’s still what we do.”
• What it’s like running their own record label: “It’s a labor because it’s a whole different ballgame. I manage the band, we run our own record label and this is all the things that we wanted. It’s not that we didn’t do this out of necessity, it was more so like, we’re very clear in what we want and how we want to do things. I’ve always been a big believer in [the idea that] nobody cares more about their art or what they’re doing than the person who’s making it … I think in this situation, we want to be able to do this the way we want it.”

Listen to the Full Interview in the Podcast Player Below

Ryan Gullen and Ewan Currie joined Loudwire Nights on Tuesday, March 17; the show replays online here, and you can tune in live every weeknight at 7PM ET or on the Loudwire app; you can also see if the show is available on your local radio station and listen to interviews on-demand.