Sam Wood (born 26 March 1989) is a British musician and songwriter, currently lead guitarist with

hard rock Hard rock or heavy rock is a heavier subgenre of rock music typified by aggressive vocals and Distortion (music), distorted electric guitars. Hard rock began in the mid-1960s with the Garage rock, garage, Psychedelic rock, psychedelic and blues ...

bands

Black Star Riders Black Star Riders is a hard rock band formed in December 2012. The band began when members of the 2011–2012 line-up of Thin Lizzy decided to record new material, but chose not to release it under the Thin Lizzy name. While Thin Lizzy continues ...

and Wayward Sons. After playing in several local bands in the

Leeds Leeds is a city in West Yorkshire, England. It is the largest settlement in Yorkshire and the administrative centre of the City of Leeds Metropolitan Borough, which is the second most populous district in the United Kingdom. It is built aro ...

area, he was asked to form Wayward Sons in 2017 by frontman

Toby Jepson Toby Jepson is a singer and songwriter, and is the lead vocalist and guitarist of British rock band Wayward Sons. He was formerly the lead vocalist and guitarist of Little Angels between 1984 and 1994. Between 2008 and 2015, he was the lead ...

, and has since co-written and performed on three charting albums with the band. In November 2022, he joined Black Star Riders.

Early career

Graduating from

Leeds Conservatoire Leeds Conservatoire (formerly known as The Leeds Music Centre, the City of Leeds College of Music, and Leeds College of Music) is a higher education music conservatoire based in the Quarry Hill district of Leeds, England. It was founded in 19 ...

in 2010, Wood was a member of various bands in Leeds before co-forming

alternative rock Alternative rock (also known as alternative music, alt-rock or simply alternative) is a category of rock music that evolved from the independent music underground of the 1970s. Alternative rock acts achieved mainstream success in the 1990s w ...

band Treason Kings in 2012. After releasing a

double A-side The A-side and B-side are the two sides of vinyl records and cassettes, and the terms have often been printed on the labels of two-sided music recordings. The A-side of a single usually features a recording that its artist, producer, or ...

single, "Your Suit", they released two

EPs An extended play (EP) is a Sound recording and reproduction, musical recording that contains more tracks than a Single (music), single but fewer than an album. Contemporary EPs generally contain up to eight tracks and have a playing time of 1 ...

produced by former

Little Angels Little Angels were an English hard rock band predominantly active between the mid-1980s and mid-1990s. The band reformed to play the Download Festival#2012, 2012 Download Festival. History 1984–1994: Early history and UK popularity Little A ...

frontman Toby Jepson. They performed on the

BBC Introducing BBC Music Introducing is BBC Radio's platform supporting unsigned, undiscovered, and under-the-radar UK music talent. The backbone of that network consists of 32 BBC local radio shows on stations across England and the Channel Islands, various ...

stage at the

Reading and Leeds Festivals The Reading and Leeds Festivals are a pair of annual music festivals that take place in Reading and Leeds in England. The events take place simultaneously on the Friday, Saturday and Sunday of the August bank holiday weekend. The Reading Fest ...

in 2015, and the following year they supported L7 on their UK tour.

Wayward Sons

When

Frontiers Records Frontiers Music (formerly Frontiers Records) is an Italian record label that primarily focuses on hard rock. The label was founded in 1996 by Serafino Perugino and is headquartered in Naples. History In 1996, Serafino Perugino began his care ...

contacted Toby Jepson in 2016 regarding a return to music after a hiatus, he recruited Wood as lead guitarist for his new project. Shortly after the band's first live performances, their first album, ''Ghosts of Yet to Come'' was released in September 2017. Co-written by the whole band, the album reached number 71 in the official UK charts. Among their live shows during 2017 and 2018 the band played in support of

UFO An unidentified flying object (UFO) is an object or phenomenon seen in the sky but not yet identified or explained. The term was coined when United States Air Force (USAF) investigations into flying saucers found too broad a range of shapes ...

and

Saxon The Saxons, sometimes called the Old Saxons or Continental Saxons, were a Germanic people of early medieval "Old" Saxony () which became a Carolingian " stem duchy" in 804, in what is now northern Germany. Many of their neighbours were, like th ...

. The band's second album, ''The Truth Ain't What It Used to Be'', was released in 2019, and reached number 69 on the UK chart, and number 3 in the UK Rock & Metal Chart. Tours followed supporting

across the UK and Germany, and

Steel Panther Steel Panther is an American comedic glam metal band from Los Angeles, California. Fronted by lead singer Michael Starr, the band formed in 2000 as Metal Shop and was also known as Metal Skool before adopting the name Steel Panther in 2008. The ...

across Europe. In 2021, a third album, ''Even Up the Score'', reached number 98 in the UK, and number 2 in the UK Rock & Metal Chart. The band also opened the main stage at the 2022

Download Festival Download Festival is a rock festival created by Andy Copping, held annually at the Donington Park motorsport circuit in Leicestershire, England (since 2003); in Paris, France (since 2016); at Parramatta Park, Sydney (since 2019); Flemington ...

, after a scheduled appearance at the 2020 festival was cancelled due to the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...

. In 2018, as a side project, Wood co-formed punk rock band Land Sharks, which includes bass guitarist

Steve Firth Steven Mark Firth (born 1 February 1965 in Halifax, England) is the bass guitarist for the English band Embrace. He studied art at Liverpool University, and also completed a psychology degree. Firth admitted that he only found out about Emb ...

and drummer Mike Heaton, both from Embrace. The band supported Embrace at three shows on their ''

The Good Will Out ''The Good Will Out'' is the debut studio album by British rock band Embrace, released on 8 June 1998, by Hut, Mobetta and Virgin Records. The band formed in 1993; by 1996, they consisted of vocalist Danny McNamara, his brother, guitarist ...

'' 21st Anniversary Tour in 2019. In 2022, Wood became the live guitarist for Oli Brown & The Dead Collective, who supported The Answer on their UK tour in March 2023. He also appeared on Brown's second EP, "Prologue", on the track "Sinking Ship".

Black Star Riders

In May 2022, Wood performed with Black Star Riders and

Thin Lizzy Thin Lizzy are an Irish rock band formed in Dublin in 1969. The band initially consisted of bass guitarist, lead vocalist and principal songwriter Phil Lynott, drummer Brian Downey, guitarist Eric Bell and organist Eric Wrixon although Wr ...

frontman

Ricky Warwick Ricky Warwick (born 11 July 1966) is a Northern Irish musician and the lead singer of the rock bands Black Star Riders and Thin Lizzy. He is also the frontman for the Scottish hard rock band The Almighty, with whom he achieved chart success i ...

's solo band, the Fighting Hearts, for a number of shows across the UK, standing in for Ben Christo. In November, he joined Black Star Riders after the departure of

Christian Martucci Christopher Anthony Martucci (born June 5, 1977), known professionally as Christian Martucci, is an American guitarist and vocalist. He is the lead guitar player for The Drowns, Stone Sour, Corey Taylor, and former member of Black Star Riders. ...

in June. He toured the UK with the band in February 2023, alongside returning members

Scott Gorham William Scott Gorham (born March 17, 1951) is an American guitarist and songwriter who is one of the "twin lead guitarists" for the Irish rock band Thin Lizzy. Although not a founding member of Thin Lizzy, he served a continuous membership after ...

and

Jimmy DeGrasso Jimmy DeGrasso (born March 16, 1963) is an American heavy metal drummer. DeGrasso played with Mama's Boys and Lita Ford before eventually working with Y&T and Megadeth and as a session and touring musician for Ozzy Osbourne (1986), White Li ...

. Wood remains a member of Wayward Sons alongside his role in Black Star Riders. On 12 August 2023, Wood performed with

at the Jailbreak Festival in Denmark, standing in for Brian Tatler who was performing at a prior engagement with Diamond Head.

Discography

Treason Kings

*"Mother" (EP) – 2014 *"Vale" (EP) – 2016

Wayward Sons

*''Ghosts of Yet to Come'' – 2017 (UK #71) *''The Truth Ain't What It Used to Be'' – 2019 (UK #69) *''Even Up the Score'' – 2021 (UK #98) *"Score Settled" (EP) – 2022

Land Sharks

*"Dancing in the Fire" (EP) – 2019 *"Rock-A-Lips" (EP) – 2020

Oli Brown & The Dead Collective

*"Prologue" (EP) – 2023 (on one track "Sinking Ship")

External links

Wayward Sons (official website)Black Star Riders (official website)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Wood, Sam 1989 births Living people English rock guitarists English male guitarists English male songwriters British lead guitarists 21st-century British guitarists Black Star Riders members