The Fishes And I

The Fishes And I are a four-piece band based in Southend, Essex, UK.

Made up of friends Tug (guitar/vox), Steve (lead guitar), Luke (bass) and Sean (drums) they thrive being a D.I.Y band. Early 90’s guitar driven rock married with the catchiest of melodies.

Initially The Fishes And I was the performing name of guitarist / vocalist Tug. It was around 2014 when Tug moved away from his hometown of Southend, Essex to Enfield, North London.

Tug recalls, ”Living in a new place and not being in a band for the first time in 15 years was tough. Throughout 2015 I was writing a lot of songs on my acoustic and then taking them out to play at open mic nights across London. I came up with the name ‘The Fishes And I’ as I had owned my own tropical fish shop for 12 years. I thought it was more interesting and memorable than using my own name.”

By mid 2016 Tug had moved again, this time to Letchworth in Hertfordshire. There he set about building his own studio so he could record the songs he had written.

”Originally I wanted to get the songs down so I had something to hand out at gigs. I started adding drums, bass and electric guitar to these songs I had written on my acoustic and I soon realised they sounded so much better as a full band.”

Tug looked to his former bandmates and friends Luke (bass) and Sean (drums) from Southend. Having previously played together before Tugs’ move away back in 2014, the band was quick to gel. By mid 2017 The Fishes And I were writing and rehearsing as a 3 piece band. On September 8th the band played their first show with the release of their debut E.P ‘Turning Tides’.

2018 saw them gig extensively throughout the Essex and Hertfordshire area building up quite the following. ‘Turning Tides’ went on to be streamed over 10,000 times that year.

In January 2019 Steve (Lead guitar) joined the band. Turning them into the four-piece they are today. Steve helped to propel the bands live show and add another dimension to their sound.

Tug added, ”Steve came in and lifted the songs to another level. Having him in the band takes the pressure off me a little so I can focus more on my vocals as well as bringing in song ideas too. I’ve played with him also in previous bands so he slotted straight in.”

Steve’s first live show came in March of that year and the band grew from strength to strength gigging consistently throughout 2019.

Towards the end of 2019 the band went in to Bleeding Ear studios in Southend to record new tracks and rerecord some of the tracks from ‘Turning Tides’. Whilst ‘Turning Tides’ had served it’s purpose the band wanted to put down a record where all the members were playing.

Tug recalls, ”The E.P was just me playing all the parts to programmed drums so it didn’t really represent the band as such. Especially when Steve joined, the songs evolved and we wanted to capture that as well as put down some of the new songs we’d written.”

The band recorded 10 songs with Dave Merry at Bleeding Ear finishing in early 2020. Unfortunately the band weren’t happy with the mixes and decided to remix and master the tracks in Tug’s studio.

Then the pandemic hit and live shows ground to a halt. With lockdowns preventing the band from even rehearsing, Tug took the time to work on the tracks.

Tug said, ”Like most bands we were in hiatus so I decided to take my time to try and get the songs sounding the best I could. We delayed releasing them so that we had material to promote when we could eventually go back out to play live.”

The band plan to release new singles throughout 2022.