'We started punk because that's all we could play and then we just got weirder and weirder'

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The origins of The Sour Patch Men can be traced back to somewhat rudimentary jam sessions in Innisfail more than 20 years ago.

A core group of what would eventually become the six-piece bluegrass outfit started as a punk band called Strange Lovecraft when they were in Grade 7.

“We all kind of moved away and did our own thing and then came back and happened to meet in Calgary,” says banjo player Alex Klipper. “We were just kitchen jamming and jamming around campfires, maybe eight years ago.  We were all playing acoustic guitars and it sounded really ridiculous. So I got a banjo and Bryce (Willigar) bought a mandolin and we just tried to learn the chords on these other instruments and we did that for years just for fun.”

While the Sour Patch Men’s humble beginnings and lack of early gigs may make them sound like a less-than-professional enterprise, things changed two years ago when the members decided to “make a more serious go of it.”

The band seems to be making up for lost time. In the past two years, the Sour Patch Men have released two EPs and two full-length albums. Their first full-length, 2025’s The Second Best Band in Bowness, has been nominated for YYC Music Award for Folk Recording of the Year. The (sort of) title track, Best Band in Bowness, also landed the band a nod for Songwriter of the Year.

On Saturday, The Sour Patch Men will celebrate the release of their second full-length, 4/4 Waltzes, with a record launch at the King Eddy.

As with its predecessor, the songs on 4/4 Waltzes offer a mix of influences. Opening track Little Boy Blue is an old-timey stomper. Closing track Kilimanjaro is a blue-grass story ballad. There are not one, but two songs called Jesus: The bluesy Jesus 1 and the considerably less reverent, Celtic-folk number Jesus 2.  River, meanwhile, is a shout-along gospel-blues gem.

While the band boasts some convincing bluegrass chops, their manic energy and gang-vocal choruses show they haven’t forgotten their early punk roots as Innisfail seventh graders.

“We started punk but we just got weird,” Klipper says. “We started punk because that’s all we could play and then we just got weirder and weirder. Some of our songs are from Strange Lovecraft, revamped to bluegrass style.”

“It was more just a logistical thing. I happened to have a banjo and we weren’t plugging our instruments in, so we were all trying to use acoustic instruments and we just kind of forced it. We’re not playing traditional bluegrass. It feels almost like there is a punk-rock energy to it. Over the course of eight years, we’ve gotten more competent and we are better at faking it and fitting in with the bluegrass bands.”

As with The Second Best Band in Bowness, 4/4 Waltzes was produced by Taylor Cochrane of the Calgary art-punk band 36?  Their debut full-length was a celebration of Bowness, where many of the Sour Patch Men resided at the time.

They joined the Bowness Stampede Parade and would put on free community shows in the neighbourhood. They soon discovered they were following in the footsteps of the Bownesians, who had long-since retired but were coaxed into the studio to record with the Sour Patch Men, who had written The Best Band in Bowness in their honour.

“We wrote a song about them and I was able to track down the phone number of the leader of that band and invited him to the studio,” Klipper says. “By total coincidence, the entire six-piece band was free that day and all just showed up in the studio and wrote a song on the spot and we just shoehorned it into our recording. So it’s kind of got a Day in the Life kind of vibe, like the Beatles song-within-the-song. It was a very magical moment. These guys haven’t played a show in 15 years. They just showed up and it was like they had been playing forever.”

4/4 Waltzes expands the band’s sonic palette while still offering a wide range of roots music. They still have one foot in the punk-rock camp and will be playing on the same bill as some punk bands in September.

“With traditional bluegrass, you are going to watch masters of their instrument, just like jazz,” Klipper says. “If you go to a jazz show you are going to see great instrumentalists and bluegrass is the same. We are way more focused on songwriting and the experience of putting on a show. That side of music is our focus and we just go as fast as we can and sometimes it gets derailed and it’s always fun.”

The Sour Patch Men will play the King Eddy on Saturday, Aug. 29, at 8:30 p.m.

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