Orange Spotlight: Godless Suns

Who are Godless Suns?

Pete – Guitars

Sarah – Bass/Vox

Dan – Drums

Sarah & I (Pete) are married (23 years at the time of writing) and have been in bands together for 21 years, 15 years as ZOCALO and the last 6 as GODLESS SUNS, we put out feelers for a drummer in the area, had a few cool auditions, including our good pal David Himbury of Gevauden and a few others, but Dan’s enthusiasm/talent/top blokeish-ness won out in the end.

Turns out Dan used to watch us play in Zocalo back in the day, we had no idea.

When ZOCALO called it a day, I didn’t want to stop playing and writing and Sarah wanted to change musical styles and do some low end carnage, so whilst watching Blues Brothers 2000 we both started signing the song that’s playing as they drive up to Queen Musettes(?) battle of the bands, which happened to be the Blues Brothers cover of Season of the Witch and that was our original name.

However, every band is Witch this, Bong that or Wizard something in our genre, so we embraced our inner sci-fi/gamer nerds and imagined what worlds without a deity would be like and came up with a story and put it to music.  A bit like Marvels ‘Watcher’ from the ‘What if….’ series, we tell stories of societies from planets of GODLESS SUNS.

Godless Suns started in 2016 after ZOCALO ended and we are based in South London/Southampton

Our music has been described as Desert-Doom, a cross between DOWN, C.O.C., Clutch and the standard sprinkling of Black Sabbath.

What inspires Godless Suns?

Ah, the never ending question, sooooo many to choose from. As a whole band….. most likely CLUTCH, we all 100% love them.

We also take inspiration from books, especially The Black Library, movies and the motivation I get from watching my friends succeed

What is life without music? I don’t even want to imagine what hell-scape that would be.

What Orange gear is important to Godless Suns?

Home practice is my Super Crush 100, epic tones at controllable levels without wearing out my main gigging amp the Rockerverb 100 MKIII.  Live it’s all about he Rockerverb, not that the Super Crush can’t do it, far from it in fact, it’s a perfectly capable amp, but there’s a little gear snob in us all, so it’s punishing glass for live for me.

Sarah has a headphone amp she uses for home practice, then makes our trousers flap with the Terror Bass both live and at practice.

Both of us started using Orange 7 years ago, and it’s a habit we have no intention of stopping.

Future Orange amps?

Definitely some thought going into a Pedal Baby 100 and a Fur Coat fuzz for a travel/flight rig.

The OR30 is a tasty piece of kit, and the Dual Dark tickles the pickle somewhat, but I’m out of kidneys to sell for the moment.

We would love to see a separate attenuator for the amps that don’t come with one built in so folk can enjoy their ear busting tones at more social levels.

What does Orange mean to you?

As stated earlier, Orange is the bedrock of the Godless Suns tone, and we have no intention of changing anytime soon.  All other amps can lead to outbreaks of scurvy

The very first time we saw Orange amps being used live was at a Corrosion of Conformity gig. We got that warm and fuzzy feeling.

We always associate Orange with musicians with taste, quality British design, and that I’m most likely at the right gig.

What really made us want to go with Orange, of all the amps I tried out and already owned (previously a dyed in the wool PEAVEY guy), Orange just did it for me.  The tone, the back shattering weight, the legacy, Orange has it all.

Having gotten to know a few of the guys at the HQ and seen their involvement and support for our genre and scene here in London, I can only say that all other brands are sorely lacking by your example.

What’s the most memorable Godless Suns moment?

It’s a toss up between our 4th gig ever being invited to play the BLOODSTOCK V.I.P. Stage and returning in ’21 for a Jager stage appearance and this years Masters of the Riff where we got to play with many of our friends and bands we admire.

What’s on the horizon for Godless Suns?

Writing, writing, writing, writing.  A short south coast tour with Famyne in September. Writing, writing, writing, demos, writing, demos, record album #2 (fingers crossed)

It’s hard to see the future of a band, at the moment we’re really comfortable in our lane, playing awesome shows with awesome bands, making friends and writing tunes. It’s not stressful and it’s still fun, and for now, that’s what’s important for us. But if someone wants to take a million pound punt on us then we’re good with that to.

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