PUNK rock and folk music might seem poles apart but a Warrington band have had success all over Europe by merging the two.

Expect a chaotic but well crafted show when the Roughneck Riot take to the stage with banjo, mandolin and accordion.

The six-piece band are headlining Warrington Music Festival’s Golden Square stage on Saturday, July 19.

“It’s quite strange really,” said Matty Humphries, who sings and plays mandolin.

“We’ve never felt like a real band so it was nice to be asked and it’s good to know we’re getting somewhere.

“It’s a really good music festival as well. It’s getting better each year so it’s good to be a part of it.”

The band will be showcasing songs from their third album, Out of Anger.

Matty, aged 24, added: “We write fast, energetic political punk songs but we’ve managed to incorporate banjo, mandolin and accordion into them with influence from traditional folk.

“As a live show, there’s a lot of energy, jumping about and falling over.

“We’re hoping by the time we get to play it will be a bit rowdy. I don’t know if everyone in town will be ready for it but I’m expecting it to be good fun.

“If the audience are enjoying it then we feed off their energy. It will be great to see other Warrington bands that we like on a big stage too.”

Former Padgate High School pupil Matty started the Roughneck Riot with bassist Ryan Taylor and Simon Cowley in 2005. Simon has since left the band.

“We just wanted to be a standard punk band really,” said Matty, who was just 15 at the time.

“We did loads of Rancid covers and we didn’t really think about doing it properly or that we’d get anywhere.”

But after a couple of years Matty started playing mandolin and introducing a folk element.

At the time he was listening to bands like the Pogues, Dropkick Murphys, Flogging Molly and the Levellers.

He added: “Then in 2009 we started to take it a lot more seriously. We realised that people actually wanted to see us which was quite cool.”

Since then the folk punk band have taken every opportunity to tour Europe with other artists from the scene.

They recently hit the road to support Italian ska band Talco with dates across Germany.

It was a far cry from their first gig at the former Highwayman pub in Manchester Road in 2005.

Matty, whose band have almost 8,000 ‘likes’ on Facebook, said: “We got to play in huge venues to mostly sold-out crowds every night with those guys.

“It’s one of the things that makes you want to carry on. Germany has just got an incredible scene.

“There are people who’ve never heard of you or are not really into punk and they will come and watch you just because it’s something new and interesting.

“Everyone seems to have a really good attitude towards it there and the venues treat you like kings even if they don’t think you’re that famous.

“It’s surprising when we go abroad and somewhere we’ve never played and there’s people singing our songs.

“I don’t think we’ll ever get used to that. It’s a really strange feeling but it has given us a bit more confidence to go to places where we’ve never been before.”

- The Roughneck Riot will headline the Golden Square stage in Old Market Place on Saturday, July 19, at 10.30pm