Anyone who has loved rock music over the last decade or so will be familiar with David Jakes and Jack Wrench. Jakes was the broodingly intense singer with Lonely The Brave; a complex character blessed with a once-in-a-generation voice. And Wrench was the explosive drummer with Arcane Roots, a man equally at home with math-rock complexity and sheer rock power. When Jakes left Lonely The Brave for mental health reasons in 2018, and Arcane Roots split later the same year, their musical futures looked uncertain, to say the least. Certainly, few would have expected to see Jakes, a man uneasy with the spotlight that always seeks out frontmen, back on stage. But, here in 2024, these two exceptional talents have been united in Interlaker, who might just be the sensational rock band you’ve been waiting for since they walked away from their former projects. Jakes and Wrench – who only knew each other vaguely from their previous bands – brokered their new partnership on Instagram; exchanging casual messages, discovering a mutual love of REM and Pearl Jam, before progressing to swapping demos and song ideas, eventually writing and recording their brilliant debut album entirely online. They met in person once towards the end of the process, Jakes says, just to “make sure we got on well together, and it was all good – otherwise it would have been awkward!” Songs such as ‘The Hunger’ and ‘Ghostride’ summon up elemental rock muscle in a way that few have been able to muster in recent times, while ‘Call Out The Wolves’ and ‘Coming Out’ have a grasp of rock dynamics that could more than hold their own alongside their grunge-era heroes. “We both approached recording the album with a zero-pressure attitude,” asserts Wrench. “We were both just up for writing music again.” That method allowed Jakes, who holed up in his parents’ house over the summer to record his parts solo, to ‘put everything on the line’ in his performances, recording as and when the mood struck, in his constant quest for vocal perfection. “I tend to over-analyse everything, but it seemed to work out alright,” says Jakes, with typical self-deprecation. “I’m a bit fixated on my vocals.” He won’t be the only one. His voice, always the purest expression of emotion even amidst a maelstrom of instrumental chaos, scales new peaks throughout the album. The difference this time around is, his range has been extended, pushing his voice into previously unexplored locations. The album also features the positively upbeat likes of ‘End Unknown’ and ‘Miracle’ and the fragile beauty of ‘Carving Circles’ and ‘Be The One’, alongside the U2-play-Sabbath alt-rock stridency of ‘Bottomless Pit’. “Dave’s voice and songwriting craft will always retain an identity, so we can push the music in any direction,” says Wrench. “The biggest kick I got out of the recording process was presenting Dave with a musical backdrop where I was like, ‘I have no idea where he will go with this’. I’ve never heard Dave singing that blend before.” Jakes’ occasionally impenetrable, yet always expressive lyrics are also at their very best, covering what he describes as “everything in life: stuff about my daughter and family, drinking too much, mental health, all that malarkey… But, sometimes, even I’m not too sure what it’s all about, to be quite honest with you,” he adds with a smile. The band – augmented by live members including Wrench’s brother – made a triumphant live debut at London’s Omeara last year, and have more shows scheduled throughout 2024, including a slot at 2000Trees Festival. Make no mistake, Interlaker’s ambitions for the band know few limits, with Jakes targeting “the peaks that Lonely The Brave and Arcane Roots achieved – and beyond.” In a changed environment for rock music, both acknowledge that could take time, but now the duo are back from the brink, they’re determined to build things the right way. “When we started, we weren’t thinking about a record,” says Wrench. “We were just writing whatever felt right, regardless of genre. And we’re going to keep that mentality.” “We really like those early Pearl Jam records; they’ve got such variety in them,” concludes Jakes. “Right from the start, we decided we wanted to do slow stuff, fast stuff, heavy stuff, happy and sad stuff. That should be the most exciting thing about being in a band and writing music: you can do whatever you bloody like.” And rest assured, Interlaker are one tale of the unexpected that everyone is going to love.

LP pressed on apricot coloured vinyl.