The k’s ryan breslin
When Ryan Breslin met singer Jamie Boyle, he’d already shared stages with huge bands including The Who, The Killers and Aerosmith as a session guitarist in his older brother’s band Slydigs. Wanting his own creative outlet, he formed The K’s with Jamie and his school friend Dexter Baker. With Jordan Holden later completing the line up. Selling out the likes of Manchester’s O2Ritz and Academy.
Now, signed up with London’s Solo Agency alongside the likes of U2, Beyoncé and James, the future is looking mental for the Earlestown band. We talked to Ryan a few days after the band were denied entry to Sweden and forced to sleep in departures! 😂
First of all, how’s freedom? Swedish Shawshank Redemption. Morgan Freeman sat in the corner narrating your prison time. What happened?
It was fuckin nuts man. Just turned up and we'd all been on the ale, went to passport control then some women came over and was like don’t think we should let them in. Took our passports and we're like "what the fucks goin on ere?" They were like, we cant let you in, you've not got an exemption to play even though we had UK, Sweden, embassy letters fuckin all signed, covid certification and stuff. Nothin we missed on our end. They give us all these police letters, all in Swedish and we're like "we cant read em!" Said you're guna have to get the next plane home and the next one was 24 hrs, fuckin el. You know the bit when you get off the plane? It was that room. The next morning the police, border control turned up and escorted us to get coffees. Word got up the chain then the boss came out and said we'd made a mistake, the press have been ringing us all day. It was fuckin mint! Turned out good in the end, all the airport chanting Free The K's and stuff. Our agent in London, they manage Sting and they were like, “Fucking Sting knows the King! Get Sting to ask the King for royal exemption!” By the time it all went through like the appeal process, we'd missed the festival so we were like fuck ya's, we'll get home. They kept half of our equipment. The next day we were playing Hardwick festival and it only turned up about half hour before we went on stage. To sum up, it was a fuck up!
How's tour been so far?
It’s like we got our lives back. Like when you used to get let out after being grounded as a kid for robbing ya dads beer.
Another date added to the tour I suppose.. James in Scarbourgh. Looking forward to that?
Yeah that’s guna be fuckin mega init supporting them.
Have you played there before? Scarborough?
I don’t think we have ya know. Might have played a smaller venue there but definitely not the open air theatre.
Ive worked there a few times meself, its fuckin mint!
Is it the outdoor one?
Yeah.
I know that sounds stupid and its in the title but some are indoors! That’s been well good to be asked to do that, it’ll be cool.
Any other tour date you’re particularly looking forward too?
Looking forward to getting to Ireland. The roots of my family over there. The Dublin shows guna be class. Then the likes of Manchester Academy. We’ve had that scheduled for so long, and people have been waiting so I think that ones guna be special. You was at the last one weren’t ya?
Yeah its where we did the Glass Towns Vid wasn’t it.
Glass Towns vid yeah, that’ll be a special one.
Sold out isn’t it?
Yeah, it was sold out anyway because we were in Academy 1 but had to downgrade because of covid.
the k’s - glass towns
The first time we worked with The K’s. Filming their sold out show at Manchester’s Academy for the official video of their single Glass Towns.
“Nearly ended up in a fight with Keanu Reeves! Yeah, Staples centre
arena in LA was probably my favourite.”
Fave venue you've played so far? With and without K's.
Ooo fuckin hell. With The K’s, probably Kendal Calling 2019. That was just fucking insane. We turned up and you don’t know if anyone was guna be there because its not sort of your crowd a festival is it, and they had to shut the tent down for health and safety, there was that many people inside it was absolutely insane.
The other one, probably the Staples Centre in LA. That was good. Ringo Starr was there. Nearly ended up in a fight with Keanu Reeves! Yeah, Staples centre arena in LA was probably my favourite on that tour in America.
A question I was going to ask later, if you’d ever got into any trouble. But you just mentioned you almost got into a fight with John Fucking Wick?!
😂Yeah we were playin in LA and they’d had names on seats like whose sitting where and we’d just come off stage and sat down. I didn’t read the names on the chairs and I was sat in Keanu Reeves chair. Security came over an was like this is Keanu Reeves seat, can you move he’s coming over. And I was going fuck off I wana sit here. Safe to say I got moved by about 9 security guards. And after that fuckin Louis (Ryan’s brother, and guitarist in Sly Digs) got Jimmy Carr in a head lock. He was going on about the Thatcher way an all that shit so Louis got him in a head lock. Fuckin ell that was funny.
One city/venue you’d love to play?
Probably Las Vegas. Caesars Palace. We were meant to be doing Caesars but we had to pull it on the last minute on that America tour I was wounded so Id probably say Vegas Caesars.
You’ll get there one day I’m sure.
Yeah, Ill start a fuckin magician act if not.
Which song do you/are you looking forward to playing live most?
Probably Valley One because weve never played it live. The reception to it, without playin live has been unreal already and I reckon when we do somewhere like The Ritz, Manchester Academy, houselights go off, couple of spotlights on and bring the piano out, I reckon that’s guna be pretty special. A bit of a goose bump moment, so that’s probably the track. Jamie’s the same as well, can’t wait to play that.
Pre gig playlist/tour bus playlist?
Ooh la la - The Faces. We walk on to Talking Heads. Dexter likes the Spice Girls. We put a whole host of shit on.
Who puts the least effort into load in?
Dexter definitely. He’s like a fuckin magician himself. When that fuckin rooms empty and everyone wants to load out, he just disappears out of thin air. Usually find him in the woods having a joint or summut. He's a fuckin nightmare.
How important are your team? Ste, Kev and Nikki have been with you a long time haven't they.
Yeah, fuckin ell known them years. Its good, we all knew each other prior to the band. Worked together, keeping that close knit team is well important because you need trust and every one needs to be doing it for the cause you know what I mean, for the right reasons. If one cog trails in the machine then it all breaks down. So to have that trust is well important. You could hire fuckin randomers for like 100s of pounds and they’ll shine ya shoes before a show but its not the same as having the people that you trust to do the job right and doing it for the right reasons, not just money.
Describe the hour before walk on. Superstitions? Rituals?
We usually go for a spag bol! Jord will have a steak and ale pie though. Few beers and sing Ooh la la before we go on.
Ive seen Jamie butting walls!
Ha yeah fuckin ell. Each to their own.
How would you describe your fans?
Shit hot. They’re ace. Loyal, you know what I mean. Every single word the fans know. Its amazin. As a young band its hard to get hold of fans so to have the fanbase that we have makes it all worthwhile. When you’re playing songs and you hear em screaming it back you think fuckin ell ya know what I mean. Gives you that drive to do it, and we're a live band, its what we're best at so its just mega to have that response.
They don’t shut up do they! Its like the footy almost. All singing in between songs.
😂 I know I know! They’ve got their own chants now, few bits creepin in like Dexter’s bass, show us ya bass show us ya bass. He’s got some writing on the back. The past few dates on this tour its been FREE THE K'S cause of Sweden so we’re guna act on that. Get some merch and fuckin milk it!
Get Sting to announce it for you.
Imagine!
Think about the biggest gigs you’ve done..What’s going through your head when on stage? You’ve finished tuning up, you’re stood there, what ya thinking?
You don’t really think. You go into a sort of state of mind, summut just comes out of ya. I know it sounds a bit weird, a bit mad, if you’ve not done it you won’t know to whoever’s readin but you just sorta become one, I dunno, in the moment. You play the guitar, the piano, sing the song or whatever and it just flows out. Or in Dex's case it doesn’t flow out and he hits a load of fuckin bum notes.
A moment on stage/studio where you thought "fuck, this is insane"
During a show, when we kick into a song, when they start screamin the words back before we’ve even started. That’s why I think Valley One is guna be so special ya know what I mean because I don’t think Jamie’s guna have to sing, I reckon its guna be word for word. And that’s fuckin tingles down your spine when shit like that happens.
You took part in the Music Venue Trusts track "All together now" supporting grassroot venues in the country. We seem to be losing more and more of these mint little venues. How important are they for up and coming bands?
It says it all when Sound Control (Former venue in Manchester) our fist gig ever as The current K's line up, when we properly became the K's, and that’s knocked down now for flats so if it weren’t for that we probably wouldn’t have done a gig together, and fuckin who knows if we’d have been together now ya know what I mean? If bands haven’t got that first gig, that first little venue someone says come and play this, then how the fuck do you start playin? Cant go to the arenas straight away. Its critical, if you’ve not got those small venues its a fact that live music will die. The only way to do it would be YouTube or summut and go play a massive gig once some fucker gives you a load of money. Its hard work being in a band! Gotta rehearse, load of people in a band who fucking end up hating each other and all gotta stay in the same room😂. Fuckin graft, if you’ve not got them venues to blow off steam, perform your songs, its impossible. Unless you pay thousands being some rich bastard somewhere.
Which musician/song made you pick up the guitar?
Chuck Berry. Probably my main influence. When I heard like Johnny Be Good, Maybellene, stuff like that I wanted to pick up a guitar. Keith Richards, all the old blues guitarists, BB King stuff like that. Muddy Waters, used to watch them and think fuckin el, like me Grandad had them all on records, Johnny Cash. That sorta got me into playing guitar and song writing. Me and me brother used to sit as kids trying to do it.
First song you ever learnt?
First song I ever learnt. Weirdly I didn’t learn any chords or out, I just learnt ‘Half the World Away’ by Oasis and once I nailed that I was like fuckin yeah, go showing everyone! Then I was like, its alright this! Did a bit of playing around to some blues tracks and that’s how I got into the lead role.
First song you wrote? And was it dreadful?
Errrm Yeah! haha you start off writing some shit don’t ya but if you don’t write them shit songs you won’t get to the good ya know what I mean.
I think its the rule isn’t it. Everyone’s first song is shit. You think at the time its mint.
Writing about love when you’re fuckin 13 yrs old or summut its just fucking stupid init haha but you gotta fuckin start somewhere. You know when you’re writing and you get something now and its like fuckin ell that’s really good and you bring it to the band and it gets even better. It develops into a K's track and that’s what we love doing, bringing them ideas in and it falls into place.
Where are The K’s a year from now?
Probably still scratching our balls if they don’t let us on tour next year. I reckon we're guna be all over the show, been earmarked for a load of European tours and stuff like that. We've just signed with Solo agency which is massive for us. They’re guna be pushing us all around the world from next year so I think its guna snowball into something big.
Graft paying off. How long was this in the works for?
We went down to London for the signing about 2 months ago. We just got chattin. John Giddings who runs the Isle of Wight festival, he runs Solo. He just emailed and said “do you want the main stage at Isle of Wight?” We're like fuckin yeah course. Then he’s like “Do you wana get serious, do you want an agent?” And we're like fuckin dead right! He’s a top guy, down to earth. Fuck me if you name one person he’s either managed, or booked them. Prince, Bowie. Hes well connected. He digs the music, he’s into guitar bands. That sort of love for guitars, things like that for a band, its critical to have some one who loves the same things as you, Instead of some fucker sat in an office on the other side of the world who doesn’t have a jar of glue. Think its guna be really good for the band. We just need to get in front of people. As I said before, the best thing we do is play live.
Best advice another musician gave you?
Fuckin ell. Ill have to think about this one! Don’t think I’ve ever had any advice! Fuckin brother told me don’t eat yellow snow.
That’ll do!
Yeah that’ll do 😂
Advice you'd now give?
Don’t eat brown snow.
Just keep your head down and enjoy it. If you lose enjoyment then fuckin stop, no point if you don’t enjoy it. Just stick at it.Youll have shit times and you’ll have good times. If you stick at it long enough more good times will come won’t they. Just gotta believe in what you’re doin. And don’t eat brown snow.
If you were to colab with a non guitar artist, who you pickin?
Beyoncé. All day long. Fuckin right. Funnily enough she’s linked with Solo Agency so.. could be a possibility! That’s what I’m holding on to!
I’d love to see a vid with yous and Beyoncé! In leotards dancin with her.
Be fuckin class wouldn’t it!
Lastly. The fella from Bill and Ted turns up with his phone box and says to get any 4 bands to play alongside of. Who you gettin?
Fuckin ell! Ermm. I’d have the Beatles, don’t wana pick the obv ones! I’m guna go The Bee Gees erm.... Fuckin ell! Why'd you throw a question at me like that?! Could have prepared me.
😂😂 Bee Gees, Stones, put fuckin Spice Girls down for Dex. I dunno, I’ll think of something mint when I get off the phone I bet ya.
Fully expected you to say Hendrix.
Hendrix! Yeah fuckin Hendrix! Oh no, Chuck Berry! What am I on about. Right so, Chuck Berry, Bee Gees, Spice Girls, Stones and Beatles. That’s 5.
You headlining or on first?
We’re fuckin headlining. No actually! We're on first so we can get pissed and watch them all.
Good Point.
Done!
Catch The K’s on tour now.
Tickets available here THE K'S | THE K'S ARE ON FIRE (theksareonfire.com)
Thanks to 𝚁𝙸𝙲𝙺𝚈 𝙰𝚃𝚃𝙴𝚁𝙱𝚈 (@rickyatterby)
Jake Kelly (@jakekellyphotography)
Jonathan Buck (@buckophotography)
Desh Kapur (@deshkapur_concert_photographer)
For the live photos.
All videos filmed and edited by Wez (@wez.dale)