THE BALERS: KICKING UP COUNTRY DUST IN THE SOUTH WEST

By Resonate | March 4, 2026

Forget the idea that country music is still exclusive to the dusty plains of America – The Balers are here to prove you wrong. The six-piece firecrackers, originating from our very own Somerset, are proving that the genre is explosive, electric and here to stay. 

Resplendent in West Country charm, a shared love of boot-stomping choruses and a brotherhood of friendship, the band have quickly become a beloved name in the South West music scene, promising to deliver ‘good time music’ every time they take the stage. 

Ingrained in south-western grit yet rooted in Americana tradition, their sound leans proudly on the twang of the banjo, the soulful flourish of the harmonica and shuffly bluegrass rhythms that will find your feet moving before you’ve realised that the verse has started. 

The Balers are demonstrating that British artists can be just as vivacious as anything from across the Atlantic, and with momentum and popularity rising, now feels like the perfect time to sit down with Nathan, Aaron, Luke, Jay and Harry- five out of six of The Balers – to talk roots, rise and the road ahead for the band. 

To start with, can you tell our readers who The Balers are and how the band first came together here in Somerset?

Arron: We’re a rocky, bluesy country band from North Somerset that formed about five or six years ago, just before lockdown, after Harry and I spent a lifetime watching his dad play bluesy piano in pubs around Bristol and joking that we would start a band one day. I decided to learn the banjo at age 28, turned up at Harry’s house three months later after a few lessons, told him to get a guitar, and then we did our first open mic night three weeks later. It just got bigger and bigger from there, and now we’re a six-piece. 

How would you describe the feeling of being in a band? Like what’s what? What can you liken it to? Is it a brotherhood? 

Nathan: Yeah, there’s definitely an insane closeness that is like a brotherhood.

Just from travelling around together, going away on holiday together just for the crack or driving around the country playing shows, you know, getting up to a lot of mischief together as well. I love them all dearly, and I’d certainly be lost if I didn’t have that all now.

What’s made you want to be a country band and promote this country music?

Arron: My parents’ musical taste influences it. My mum was into rock like T-Rex and Aerosmith, and my dad was into similar, but a little harder, stuff like Led Zeppelin. And so there’s definitely a rocky intro, but there was a lot of country mixed in with, like Creedence and The Rolling Stones. And then, between the ages of about 22 and 27, when I started learning the banjo, I didn’t really listen to anything else apart from country. And when I came to Harry (Drummer), he was a techno DJ at the time. He was a bit unsure about country, but then once he started listening to these artists, which are a bit more folk, a bit more blues or a bit more rock, he got hooked straight away. But we are more of a rock band with a banjo.

So when you’re writing these country songs that you want to release and want to perform, what kind of inspiration do you take? Do you take inspiration from Somerset, your surroundings, or do you come with a little funny anecdote? What’s the process behind that?

Arron: Some of it is from having wild nights out in Bristol, you know, wild nights out when we were younger, but even now too. But Harry tends to go down a different route and write about blue-collar work in the Mendips. He’s got a good song called Working Class Dream, and it’s very much about this area and eating the rich. I write more about relationships. Without delving too much into it, I had a rough time for a few years, which has been very inspiring.

Nathan: I get an idea somewhere, and it will just sit in my head for a long time until I’m long home or long since returned from a trip. If it stays there long enough, it’ll form a story and some kind of narrative out of it. But I guess I’m more anecdotal in my writing and a little less rooted in real life. I’m a bit more of a dreamer. Romantic, should we say?

Country music has got quite a few genres, as we know, but how would you describe your own sound as a country band? 

Nathan: So there’s always some Americana threaded through the songs, but it’s pretty nice being able to flip, you know, sometimes a song will come in, and if I write it specifically, I’m not writing ever from a country aspect. My songs are more likely to become punk rock songs, but then they get put through the lens of banjo harmonica, lovely train rhythms, acoustic guitar, and they come out sounding like a shuffly, slowed-down bluegrass, and it was never where my head would have put it. Inversely, Harry will come in with a straight country song, and he’s always writing in that lens, but by the time it goes through our machine, it can come out sounding like a punk rock song. If you came in at a different point in our set, watching us live, and you saw one song, you could go away thinking we were a completely different band than if you came in 10 minutes later. It might sound pretentious, but we span a few genres. 

Can you give me three words to narrow down your sound for our readers?

Good time music. 

Why do you think that the UK country scene is growing so quickly at the moment? What do you think is influencing that?

Arron: Everyone loves Beyoncé. But seriously, I think the country genre is growing overall, including in the UK, because the people who play and write it are actually solid musicians. Because the country artists out there can genuinely play and they’ve written their own music, in a time where there’s so much more stuff online, so much more AI, people were yearning for a bit of authenticity. And you can’t help but appreciate that.

Can you recommend to our readers any interesting Somerset folk and country artists you think are really good right now?

The Wandering Hearts are a wonderful, wonderful vocal harmony group. Fantastic songs. Just pure, pure joy. Not too local, there’s a girl called Susanna Clegg. She’s from Lancaster way, and she’s just put out a debut EP, she’s got a massive set of pipes, plays guitar well, and she’s on a tour at the moment. Chris Garcia Sullivan – he is a folk singer-songwriter from two minutes up the road in Bristol. Again, his stuff’s doing pretty well online. It’s only been out a few months, and he’s. It’s getting really well received. He’s a really, really good voice.

In three years, where would you like to see yourselves?

Overseas, doing a legit tour and vinyl printing. The idea of being able to break out and do a good chunk of shows in a row in a van is something we all would love to do. Also, reaching the festival scene, being able to bring the kids, that’s definitely a goal. 

Everyone has an unpopular music opinion. What are some of yours in the band? 

Nathan: Taylor Swift hasn’t made a good song since her first album. Nobody cares what the lyrics are. I don’t like mediocracy, specifically Coldplay. Something drab is worse than death. 

Q. If you had to pick one song by any artist that you wish you’d written yourself, what would it be?

Nathan: Probably a Coldplay song, because at least then I’d be minted. 

Q. What is next for the bailers? Any new music, news gigs or projects that we should keep an eye out for?

We’re going to release an EP of four songs we are recording together soon. And then we’ve got a bunch of local gigs before Christmas, including one at The Golden Lion on Saturday 20th December for the ‘Swamp Stomp Ho Ho Hodown’.

With ambitions that span far beyond the Somerset scenery that surrounds them, The Balers are showing no signs of slowing down and are, in fact, just getting started. The band brings something to the music scene that is both comforting and familiar as well as excitingly new and unexplored: a blend of warm, rustic charm enhanced by that recognisable rock-country flair. At the centre of it all, a love of live performance, a genuine fondness for each other, and, of course, an unwavering belief that music should give everyone a good time, utterly shapes everything the group delivers.

For a band powered by energy, talent and a whole lot of heart, the path ahead looks gloriously golden for The Balers. 

WORDS BY PHOEBE CULLEY