The Demon Barbers

The Demon Barbers

The Demon Barbers are a United Kingdom group playing English folk music, with elements of celtic rock, folk, folk punk and folk rock. The band forms around Damien Barber and Bryony Griffith, and its line-up also includes Will Hampson and Lee Sykes, with Ben Griffith on drums. Their instruments and roles cover vocals, guitar, concertina, fiddle, melodeon, harmonica, bass, drums and rapper, with dance also built into the group’s performances.

Background and style

Damien Barber becomes a professional folk musician at the end of the 1980s after growing up in rural Norfolk and attending a folk club from the age of five, where Walter Pardon is resident. His early influences include Harry Cox, Sam Larner, Tony Hall and Peter Bellamy. Although he has strong traditional roots, he proposes an electric folk group at the end of the 1990s, and the band takes its name from Peter Bellamy’s nickname for him. The project develops as an electric folk act that combines traditional song and tune material with amplified instrumentation and dance traditions.

Performance and dance

The Demon Barbers incorporate Morris, Clog and Rapper Sword into their shows as the group develops. Their public performances include song, tunes, dance and folk-rock, and their presentation expands to include dance competitions, rapper dancing, clog, bass and drum loops, smoke machines and UV lighting. The band’s members all have links with dance, which shapes the direction of the act.

As the project continues, it becomes The Demon Barber Roadshow, and later develops into a broader stage show called Time Gentleman Please. This performance includes an elaborate set, a narrative structure and material ranging from the Abbots Bromley Horn Dance to street dance.

Recording and recognition

The Demon Barbers release a steady stream of albums as the group develops. A notable example is The Adventures of Captain Ward, which is recorded and promoted alongside the stage show Time Gentleman Please. The band also works with Bellowhead at the BBC Folk Awards and earns regular award nominations, including Best Live Act in 2009.

Notable live reputation

The band develops through a series of monthly Sunday-night performances in Bradford that function as live rehearsals, often featuring leading folk acts as support or headline guests. These shows help shape the group’s evolving sound and performance style, and the band also gains attention at festivals and at Cropredy.