The B-Bar can be found at the top of a short flight of stone steps just up from Plymouth harbour in this maritime city’s historical Barbican area. It’s here in this arty venue-slash-comedy club-slash eatery that Haunt The Wood began their very first residency just after they formed nearly nine years ago, building a small but growing following with each gig they played.
“When we started, we were getting maybe 30 or 40 people,” says Haunt The Woods’ guitarist Phoenix Elleschild, nodding towards the compact stage half a floor below us as we sit on the B-Bar’s even-more-compact mezzanine level. “By the end of it, there were 130 or 140 people in there.”
“Way more than should have been in that room,” adds drummer Oliver Bignell.
A decade on, that early promise has blossomed into something more powerful. The four-piece’s second album, Ubiquity is a transcendent listen, channelling folk, alternative rock, prog and something far more intangible into a set of songs that are simultaneously grand and enigmatic.
The four men arranged around tables on the B-Bar’s mezzanine floor are, with the best will in’s misguided attempt to paint the West Country as a magical Avalon that’s psychically and spiritually separate from the rest of the UK. “Yeah, people turn up to our gigs in a horse and cart,” says Bignell drily.
