After two friends sponsored each other in Alcoholics Anonymous, they started making music. As they gear up for a summer of 40 festivals, the band tell their harrowing yet uplifting story<\/p>\n
On stage in a Camden pub, Barry Quinlan, frontman of Irish rockers Bleech 9:3, shares the intensity of Joy Division\u2019s Ian Curtis. He hunches and jerks around the mic stand and his eyes bore a hole in the back wall as jubilant teenagers expand and contract in a circle pit. The gig in mid-May has the same I-was-there energy as early Arctic Monkeys or Fontaines DC<\/a> shows; with major labels signing Bleech 9:3 on both sides of the Atlantic, dozens of festival dates this summer and a wildly impressive, impassioned five-song debut EP, the band will soon be playing much bigger rooms than this.<\/p>\n But when I meet Barry and his three bandmates earlier on that day, there\u2019s none of that twitchy energy. Bleech 9:3 bring calm to a meeting room in their management company\u2019s offices as staff bustle around outside. That stillness is hard-earned: Barry and guitarist Sam Duffy are each other\u2019s sponsor for Alcoholics Anonymous (AA). Quinlan smiles: \u201cIt\u2019s an anonymous programme, so we\u2019ll say \u2018alleged sponsor\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n
![](\"https:\/\/i.guim.co.uk\/img\/media\/87b2461fbddcd27f81d174b6bf472b4a6c805c2a\/1344_0_6132_4908\/master\/6132.jpg?width=140&quality=85&auto=format&fit=max&s=152fcbd571c1af9d27368aa35b139f43\" "\\"\u2018Addiction")
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