Accidental President

Accidental President are a Punk Rock/Ska band from Leicester, UK. We've been around for 4 years, but have only recently started to break through. Over the years we have played with bands such as Mr Zippy, Caffeine, Fandangle, The Fight and Howards Alias.

2001 2003 Accidental President started off as 3 guys in a bedroom. Stef and Alex on guitar and Adam on bass they had no drummer as yet their first “practice” was in Adam’s bedroom. At this point in time all 3 had no experience playing their instruments, and spent most of the time messing around not really achieving anything at all. A couple of months passed and they decided to check out real practice rooms. Alex had made the decision to move to the drum kit and they started practicing at Big Wheel. A female voice in the form of Ashley joined the group as they played cover songs to pass the time. A number of months passed as Ashley left the band and new face Helen joined as her replacement. These times were really a chance to get used to playing music together as a band, and they wanted to move on to start playing their own stuff. Towards the latter part of 2003 Helen left the band. With no singer and no songs of their own, Alex and Stef were about to take a trip that would change all. 2003 2004 Returning home from their Geography field trip to Lanzarote, Alex and Stef were armed with 2 songs of their own. With the absence of a singer, Stef gave it his best shot in an attempt to get the melodies sorted. The decision was made that he would continue singing, and the band became a 3-piece. This was the first real Accidental President. Before this time they were just a few guys getting together to play a few cover songs and have a laugh. Now, they had their own stuff, and new songs came soon after. The infamous “Teachers” has been in the band’s set from the beginning and has only just been taken out as I write this. After just a couple of months playing together as a 3-piece they secured their first gig. Appearing at the Lamplighters in Leicester with Scottish rockers “Read it and Weep”. They nervously performed their 5 song set, and haven’t looked back. Over the next month or so their set grew to 11 songs as they went into their second gig, with “Fud-U-Like” and “The Mean Old Ladies”. Playing a few more gigs as the year played itself out, they recorded an EP by the name of AP:ep in a friend’s attic, that is rarely spoken of today. They also tried out a second guitarist by the name of “Jim”, which didn’t work out. After their first gig at The Shed, they got asked back to play with Golf Records’ Mr Zippy, and ska band Caffiene. Stef’s cousin Matt joined the band as 2nd Guitarist. Their ability to play their instruments was growing and the music started to evolve and speed up. With the addition of a second guitar their sound improved immensely. It was this time that they wrote “Too Ugly To Be A Pop Punk Band”, and “She” that found its way onto their 2005 release. The Shed was the setting for Matt’s first gig, the band went into a studio for the first time to record the 4-track “Too Ugly To Be A Pop Punk Band” (TUTBAPPB). 2004 2005 The 4 of them continued to play and write, although only appearing at The Shed for a couple of gigs throughout early 2004. In August of 2004 they travelled as far as Manchester to appear at “The Roadhouse”, which also finally saw the proper release of TUTBAPPB. The end of 2004 saw their first gig at The Attik. 2005 NOW Early in 2005, Adam left the band to do his own thing. In some ways this was a big blow to the band as he is a great friend, however the bass playing talent of Tom Foyster was brought in as his replacement, and the band have got better ever since. Matt's confidence grew as he started singing more - writing through the spring ready for a summer of gigs, songs such as “Anarchist” and "Friday" came to life. Now with 2 main vocalists, their 2nd release “I Don’t Need This” was also recorded at the great Parlour Studios. Armed with their new CD, mp3s and a few gigs around Leicester, they secured support slots with bands such as “Fandangle”, “The Fight”, “Whitmore” and “Howards Alias” (unfortunately Whitmore cancelled their tour when they split and so AP never played with them). The band has also been noticed by “The Punk Scene” website, “Demon FM” and “A bloke from Nottingham Evening Post”.

Descendents Reel Big Fish Pennywise Less Than Jake Rancid Dropkick Murphys The Distillers