Portsmouth folk-rock heroes Bemis to mark founding duo's 30 years of music together with Wedgewood Rooms gig

​Gareth Howells and Richie Leo first met in 1993 through a mutual friend – Gareth’s housemate at the time.

The housemate wanted them all to form a rock band, but while that didn’t happen, Gareth says of Richie: ‘It was clear we had a connection and a lot of potential. We immediately started writing songs and working together musically, but we took a while to get a band together.

‘Once we'd been doing things tentatively for a while 2006 was when we tried to make a proper thing out of it and became Bemis.

‘We did play in folk clubs and stuff as a duo from 1993, so we didn't take that long to play live together. We were like best buddies straight away.’

Before meeting Richie, Gareth had been playing in another duo.

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‘That was clearly my thing for a while!’ he says. ‘We'd been getting a bit of attention and [renowned folk singer] Chris While was interested in doing something with us, Show of Hands had given us some support, and it sounded like we were getting somewhere. Then the other guy said: “I don't want to do this if it's going to be serious”. I was like: “Oh! I do!”

‘That was a blow for me, because for me it's all about harmonies.’

In their 30 years of playing together, Gareth and Richie have only ever had one argument – and that was onstage, mid-set.

‘People talk about the telepathy when we play, and there's a fluidity to it,’ he says. ‘We've always had the same ideas about what covers to do, and we're always in awe of each other's singing and playing. There's something about the way the two voices blend. Some people nicknamed us the Portsmouth Simon and Garfunkel in the early days.’

The Wedge gig will be divided into two sets, but as Gareth says: ‘First things first – there will be biscuits on the tables. It can't be a serious Bemis gig without biscuits!’

The first half will be just the duo.

‘We're going to have a short-ish set with me and Richie going back into the past and some of the stuff we did as a duo. Some of the songs we haven't done in ages as we don't tend to to do them with the full band.

After a short break it will be ‘Big Bemis’, with between seven and 10 musicians on stage depending on the song – including a trio of saxophone players.

‘One of our songs has got a brass section, but we've only ever very occasionally had one sax live, but we've got three lined up for the night!

‘We'll do lots of our own stuff, cover lots of different albums. There's one song we love doing in the big shows because it's quite a dramatic song – we don't do it in festivals – our own gigs are the only place we can really do it. It gets quite epic at the end of it!’

They play on Saturday, June 17, doors 7pm. Tickets £8. Go to wedgewood-rooms.co.uk.