SLAK
By Resonate | June 16, 2026
WORDS BY LUCIA BROWN
Slak is an indie-alternative band originally from Pembrokeshire, now based in Bristol, consisting of four members: Drew John on vocals, Reuben Swindlehurst on drums, Jak Matera Byford on bass and Tom Jenkins on guitar. Blending the energetic and upbeat sounds of the current indie scene with raw and emotional lyrics, Slak is one to add to your radar. Having released three songs with many more to come, you’d have to buy a ticket to their next show to hear more. They are already making waves in Bristol’s local music scene.
The band caught up with Resonate in The Full Moon pub. After introductions, we began the deep dive into all things Slak.
First of all, tell us about your band origins – where are you from, and how did the band form?
Tom: I met Reuben in primary school, and we started jamming in his shed. We then met Drew in secondary school. Then Jak texted me saying he was going to buy a bass and we needed a bassist, so that happened. We started doing cover gigs, then in college we started writing original songs, and that’s when we started putting more into the band.
So where did the name come from? How did you decide on Slak?
Jak: The band name was originally called Ruin Remains, then I joined, and we had to change it up. Drew said The Slackers and we said, “That’s so shit.” Then we said Slak, and we’ll just keep that for now.
Tom: We had it as a kind of placeholder, but then we sort of forgot about it.
Drew: It’s short and sweet.
Talk us through your band image…
Drew: I think it’s good that we present how close we are as mates.
Tom: We’re not just bandmates, I think, because we’ve all known each other for so long, and we’re all quite different people as well.
Jak: When we all met, we were all very different people, but we all found that one thing in common.
Tom: I don’t think we present ourselves as a band sometimes. Like on stage, I’m not gonna have a go at the others if they do something silly, like it’s just funny.
Drew: We don’t really argue either.
You’ve announced that you’re going on tour with Trampolene in the summer. How are you feeling ahead of the tour?
Drew: We’re feeling excited, it’s gonna be big for us. We’re doing four to five gigs in a row, and we’ve only ever done about two or three.
Tom: It’s gonna be something completely different. We’ve been wanting to get onto a supporting tour for a while, but we just didn’t know how to. Jak was sending out loads of emails and ended up contacting Trampolene’s manager, and they asked if we’d like to join them on tour.
Reuben: I like that it’s in South Wales too, so it feels familiar.
As you’re a Welsh band, what does it mean to you to be going on a tour with all Welsh dates?
Jak: Patriotic. Right now, we’re Bristol-based, so I think it’s a good departure from focusing on Bristol to go back home and revisit that scene.
Tom: It’s nice to not play where you’re from. When you go back, it feels homely and, especially playing with a Welsh band, it’s gonna be great.
Your latest single is called Trophy, what would you give each other a trophy for?
Drew: I would give Jak a trophy for his trim [Jak has debuted a newly shaved head].
Jak: I’d give Tom a trophy for mixing Trophy pretty well and Reuben a trophy for how many hours he’s got on Fortnite.
Could you talk us through your songwriting process? What inspires your writing?
Tom: It’s a lot of different things, there’s never been a real technique where we’ve been like “right boys, let’s do this.” It always just comes out of nowhere; Trophy started as a guitar riff that came around after we got back from Reading Festival in 2024, and we just started jamming. Then I came up with the chords, recorded a little video, and that became the intro and main body of the song. I think lyrically we all work together; it’s never just one person that does the whole thing.
Reuben: I think we’re all on the same page, but we like different music. We also know what’s good and what’s bad. We draw on aspects of all our own musical taste and kind of put them together. Sometimes we tell Jak off for sounding too shoegazy or Drew for sounding too much like Ed Sheeran, but when it’s all together, it’s a nice blend.
Who are you each enjoying listening to at the moment? Do you have any favourite upcoming artists?
Tom: I think we’re all gonna say quite similar ones. I think at the minute I’m enjoying Keo, I think they’re class. I got really into Wunderhorse and Fontaines, and just the whole up-and-coming indie band scene.
Jak: I’m gonna say Esmerelda Road.
Reuben: Tooth. Geese, but I don’t think they’re really upcoming.
As you guys are new-ish to Bristol, what have been your favourite venues so far?
Tom: I always hear good things about The Louisiana.
Drew: Such an intimate venue.
Jak: Very historical as well. So many people have played there.
Tom: I’ll take my hats off to the Exchange Basement. We played there a while ago before it got fully refurbished. Then we headlined there in January, and it felt really close and intimate. It’s a great vibe in there.
Reuben: Small venues where the crowd is really close to the stage. When you’ve got crowds that are sitting down or standing at the sides of the room, you don’t get the same energy.
Jak: I like The Croft.
Tom: I thought Thekla was good, I liked the sound and the stage, it’s almost like The Louisiana and The Exchange, where you’ve got a lower stage with the crowd there almost on the same level. Thekla’s just a really cool venue.
Do you have any gig highlights you can share with us?
Jak: I feel like recently, a highlight would be selling out The Exchange Basement.
Tom: Playing Mr Wolf’s, that was a really good energy. When we first booked that gig at The Exchange, and we said it’s gonna be a headline, and we were like “boys, we’re gonna sell this out” and it was getting closer and closer, and we did.
Reuben: One of my favourite gigs we did was at Lounge, like the chain, and all our mates and people from home came. It was just really low pressure; we just drank and had fun while playing. It was Christmas, so we did loads of Christmas songs.
Tom: It was just a good time; we didn’t have to worry about who was in the crowd.
You guys recorded at Rockfield Studios. What was that experience like?
Tom: It was surreal. You can just book an Airbnb there, and I did that, and the owner came out and asked if we wanted a tour of the studio, and I didn’t know anything about recording a band; I just knew a lot of bands had recorded there. I was mesmerised by all this stuff. It was just really cool that it has such a long history and these famous albums that had come out of there. They were talking to us about when Queen was there.
Reuben: It was all very homely, like you stay in the house and they bring you dinner like a little holiday. I do feel like musically we did waste it a little bit, we didn’t get what we were looking for.
Tom: There was still a lot we took from it, putting it into some other mixes. It was really great to be in a studio where our inspirations and the reasons for us playing music have recorded.
Finally, what can we expect from Slak in the future?
Tom: Mainly just the Trampolene tour. We’re currently in the middle of writing a new song, which I think is gonna do very well, very energetic, like 100 miles per hour from the start. We’ve just been working on a whole new setlist because we’ve been doing so many gigs, so we’ve just been nailing transitions.
Jak: Phasing out some older tunes as well – we’re not playing Heart to Heart as much now. It’s just because you can tell it’s very Arctic Monkeys-inspired, and that’s not really our sound anymore.
Tom: It’s like we’ll write a new song and we’ll take an older one out, then when we do a longer headline set, we’ll put them back in. I think our sets have a lot of diversity, so we do old song, new song, old song, new song, so it splits it up nicely. Even if someone might not like one, they might like the one after.