Almost 15 years into their career, Godsticks are still winning new fans with their blend of dark and complex music. Bandleader Darran Charles talks through the highs and lows of making their sixth studio album, This Is What A Winner Looks Like, and tells us why he doesn’t mind if you call them ‘prog metal’.

Words: Cheri Faulkner Images: Eleanor Jane

Winning formula: Godsticks with new bassist Francis George (far right).

"Take no shit!” vocalist Darran Charles yells at us through his webcam, pointing a finger. “That’s my one piece of advice,” he explains when we ask what he’s learned throughout his 14-year tenure as a member of Godsticks. “I actually never wanted to be in a band,” he says. The group’s formation was nothing more than a college project that Charles was forced into as part of the curriculum at the London Guitar Institute. As a module, he was expected to put together a performance with other members. “I didn’t like it at first because it was just nerve-racking,” he recalls, “I had to spend eight hours a day studying and practising and that.”

Prior to this, Charles had had dreams of composing music for other artists and remaining behind the curtain, but after a few live shows he decided that he could see himself on the stage instead. He dropped the “fantasy” of composing for others, gritted his teeth, and placed an advertisement for other musicians to join him.

“The setlist I put together had music from Zappa, George Benson, Steve Vai… a mad variety of musicians,” he laughs. “Just one person replied, that was it.”

That one person was Godsticks’ first bass player, Jason Marsh, and together he and Charles put together a setlist that Charles says they had no audience for.