50 LIONS – MINDSNARE – THE BLACK DAHLIA MURDER THIS IS HELL – THE CHARIOT
ISSUE FOUR – MARCH 2010
CONTENTS FEATURES The Black Dahlia Murder ... p.6 50 Lions ... p.8 This Is Hell ... p.16 Mindsnare ... p.18
THE USUAL Quickfire: The Chariot ... p.5 Bands You’ve Never Heard Of ... p.24 New Music ... p.25 Obituary: Best of 2009 ... p.28
Editor-In-Chief: Sarah Petchell Photo Editor: Craig Nye All layouts by Cooper Brownlee and Sarah Petchell Photos: Craig Nye, Lachlan Hicks, Chris Cooper, John Hatfield, Sarah Petchell Words: Sarah Petchell, Raj Wakeling, Lindsey Cuthbertson, Michael Anderson, Craig Lukic, Sam Webster, Brett Muskett Logo by Joel Birch of Umbrella Creative Studios Cover: 50 Lions. Photo: Craig Nye This page... Photo by Chris Cooper
The views and opinions expressed in No Heroes are not particularly those held by the publishers. All content is copyright to No Heroes 2009 For information including contributing, advertising and general comments email: info@noheroesmag.com
EDITOR’S LETTER PHOTO: SARAH PETCHELL
I’m on a plane while I type this. I’m at the end of my two week holiday in Melbourne where I got nothing accomplished that I planned to and I don’t feel the slightest bit guilty about it. It was a holiday. I wasn’t supposed to do anything except relax. But the reason why I feel inspired to write my Editor’s Letter now is that I’ve spent the last couple of days sitting in a car reading zines that I’ve picked up here and there, looking for inspiration, new music and just getting stoked on the whole idea of them. Recently I bought a bunch of zines from a girl in Canberra. This was just a chick that was putting out little A5, black and white photocopy jobs on things that she thinks is interesting, from The Misfits to Riot Girrrrrrl. It’s people like that, that aren’t afraid to go out there and do things just because they want to, or just because they feel that they have something to share with the people around them, that really inspire me. That’s one of the reasons why I started this magazine in the first place. Cooper Brownlee, who helps out with our website did the same thing as this girl from Canberra did and he’s
built an empire out of it. For him, it was his passion for BMX that did it. Seven years ago he started a black and white zine that he put together in Microsoft Word and stapled together at his desk. Now it’s a 90+ page, full colour magazine that has 2500 of each issue printed and goes out to bike stores across Australia. And you know what, that zine is still free! Add on top of that a website that gets 300,000 hits a month, merchandise and now collab parts with Colony BMX (an Australian based bike company) and he’s truly living the dream! I would like to think that I’m somewhere between the girl from Canberra and Cooper. I hope to one day be able to get this thing in print (so expensive!). There are so many things that I feel I have left to achieve and to offer and so many ideas floating around in my head. I hope you guys all stick along for the ride because there honestly are going to be some great things coming up in the coming months. But for now, what have we got lined up for this issue? On the cover we have Byron Bay’s
50 Lions. Vocalist, Oscar McCall, had a chat with us about their new album, Where Life Expires, their new member and new direction. I spoke to Trevor from The Black Dahlia Murder, Raj spoke to Josh from The Chariot and Trevor from This Is Hell answered a few quick questions on the eve of their first Australian tour as a part of the Soundwave Festival. But the thing I’m most excited about with this issue is the massive feature we have on Mindsnare. After being “broken up” for about 18 months the band are back together and having so much fun with it! When they were in Sydney recently, Raj and I caught up with Nigel and Beltsy for their first interview in two years! We also welcome to the team this month, writer Lindsey Cuthberston, photographer John Hatfield and writer Brett Muskett. As per usual, if you want to contribute to the mag in any wwy feel free to shoot us an email: info@noheroesmag.com Next issue is definitely going to be bigger and beter and we have some exciting announcements on the way! Until next time... Sarah
THE CHARIOT
INTERVIEW: RAJ WAKELING
WARS AND RUMOURS OF WARS WAS DEFINITELY A NEW STEP IN THE EPIC DISCOGRAPHIC HISTORY OF THE CHARIOT. IT WAS ALBUM NUMBER THREE AND IT CHANGED THE WAY THAT NOT ONLY FANS LISTENED TO THE BAND’S MUSIC, BUT ALSO THE WHOLE WAY IN WHICH THE CHARIOT GOES ABOUT WRITING AN ALBUM. NO HEROES SPOKE TO LEAD VOCALIST, JOSHUA SCOGIN, ABOUT THE ALBUM, TOURING AND AFRICA…YES, I DID SAY AFRICA! So tell me a bit about the new album. Where are you guys taking your sound, in terms of the writing and the recording? “One thing we did a lot while writing, this time, was that we would come to a part in a song and we would ask ourselves what would The Chariot do right here, then we would try and do something different – something fresh and spontaneous – because we knew we could always fall back on what would have just come natural to us. So it was very fun to explore the different avenues. “We also did a sort of balance thing with recording, which we’ve always done. You try to start at the beginning at the beginning and work your way to the end of the entire track. And if you mess up, you do it again all the way from the beginning. It’s so it feels more like a live show rather than a perfect sounding recording. Anyone that has ever seen us live would know that we love playing live and we just wanted to replicate that.” You talked about breaking the boundaries and changing the rules
a bit with this album. Are there any particular examples you can give? “On track four, ‘Impress.’ there is this sort of slower, kind of sludgy riff that is pretty different to anything The Chariot has ever done before. The things that make it even more different are the really clean guitar lines on top of that and there are no vocals, as well as a long part where you hear the underlying distorted guitars backed by bells. But that track is one of my songs because it is so different for us. I mean, it just stands out like a sore thumb in my humble opinion, in a very good way.” Did you feel any sort of hesistance in making those sorts of decisions? Were you at all worried it might not work so well with your fans? “Not really. We’ve been very grateful and very blessed that there are people that do tend to like our band. But at the same time, we write records that we want to listen to and play. A fan may see us play that song once a year, but we have to play those exact, same songs like 300 times a year. So our main goal is to write songs that we enjoy and that we want to hear and play. In this respect we didn’t really take into consideration how much people will like this. We just went with our gut instinct and let the chips fall where they may.” Do you still get a kick out of playing the much older material you guys have written and are known for? “Yeah, it’s funny you bring that up because on this tour we have three records that we have to represent in a set and there are just certain songs that we like or we can’t drop as they’re too fun to play. So what
we’ve ended up doing is meshing like three songs together: you know, we might do the beginning of one song, transition into the middle of another and end on another song altogether. A medley, if you will. “But the songs from the new record are still really fresh and spontaneous and exciting for us to play them. It’s one of our favourite sets we’ve ever done, and rightfully so because we have so much material to work with!” You’ve already mentioned that you’re on tour at the moment, so is it all about touring for the rest of the year for The Chariot? “Basically. This tour [the Scream The Prayer tour] ends in a week or two. The we have a couple of weeks back home and then Oh, Sleeper and us are doing a run of the U.S. before we go out with Norma Jean. After that we’re talking about, and hopefully are going to pull off, a world tour next year, which will include Australia, Africa, Europe, Russia, Mexico and head into North America. So that’s what we’re doing right now and that puts us on the road for a while. That’s why we’re in a band – to travel and play music.” You mentioned Africa. That’s not really a place that I hear a lot of bands are heading to. “I’ve never been there before, but we have been invited. There are people there – booking agents or whatever the powers that be – that think it will do well so they’re planning on bringing us over. After that is hopefully Australia and New Zealand, so there are a lot of places we’re planning on going to that we’ve never been to.”
THE BLACK DAHLIA MURDER INTERVIEW: SARAH PETCHELL
WHEN YOU NAME YOUR BAND AFTER AN UNSOLVED MURDER FROM THE 50’S YOU’RE NOT EXACTLY SETTING YOURSELF UP FOR THE MAINSTREAM. THAT BEING SAID, THERE AREN’T MANY METAL BANDS IN THE WORLD THAT CAN CLAIM THE FANBASE THAT DETROIT’S THE BLACK DAHLIA MURDER CAN. ALBUM NUMBER FOUR, DEFLORATE, WAS RELEASED LAST YEAR TO MASS ACCLAIM AND AN INCREDIBLE #5 POSITION ON THE BILLBOARD INDEPENDENT ALBUM CHARTS – AN AMAZING FEAT FOR A NOT EXACTLY MAINSTREAM BAND. NO HEROES CAUGHT UP WITH VOCALIST, TREVOR STRNAD, WHILE ON TOUR ABOUT THE NEW ALBUM, TOURING AND HOW LITTLE THEIR HOMETOWN ACTUALLY MEANS TO THEM.
I’ve been told you guys are about to go onstage so, for the uninitiated, what’s a Black Dahlia Murder show actually like? “Usually it’s pretty chaotic. We like to push the crowd to respond – everybody is encouraged to sing along, crowd surf, stage dive – to do this as much as possible, and basically just to come together for a good time. We’re just trying to pull people out of their normal lives for just a second, to have fun and forget about their problems.” How important is touring and playing live to the band? “It’s the most important thing to us to be a good live band and it’s the main thing for our fans too, to be able to see us and hear us in a live setting to get the full live experience. We’ve always considered ourselves to be a live band more than anything.” What are the best and worst things about doing live shows? “The worst is that it’s hot up there and shit will go wrong. So your equipment is frying or something will break or the monitors don’t work. That’s kind of a bummer, but we usually make the best out of any situation that we can. “The best thing about a show is just being able to play, and starting to play. Then everyone just goes nuts immediately and bodies are going everywhere. You just get such a rush, and you feel like I AM THE KING OF THE UNIVERSE
RIGHT NOW. It’s just all such a pretty cool feeling.” I read that you guys are on tour something ridiculous like nine months out of the year. “Yeah, that sounds just about right. We get a few breaks here and there between the tours, but primarily we’re gone. It’s just part of the amount of devotion that you have to have to be able to be in this band. It’s part of the deal for us to push it as far as possible and play as many shows as we can play in order to promote our band.” How do you guys not kill one another, having to spend that much time together? “I think weed is probably the biggest factor. We just relax and everybody in the band is a positive person. No one is really that negative that they’re going to drag down the whole operation. There’s just no room out here to be a jerk. You’ve just got to roll with the punches. It’s a lot like camping at certain times.” I guess the fact that you’re on tour so much would account, in part, for why you’ve had so many line up changes. But my question is, how does a band survive that shit? “I think in the early days it was a lot harder. Now, our status has afforded us the opportunity to look at really good players from all around the world to play in the band and to be something
“I feel that the production levels of the recording are fantastic. This is the best that it’s ever sounded. But it’s the songs that really demonstrate that we’re still growing as musicians and as songwriters. We’re still challenging ourselves – there is some stuff on this record that is faster and more technical and in-depth than anything we’ve ever done before. We’re definitely still growing! “Then adding Ryan in on guitars has just added another level to the music. It’s a positive and awesome change. There is also a lot more variety to the songs than maybe what we’ve done before, and that’s not a bad thing!” Does having new people in the band reenergise things as well? “Yeah for sure. We had come to a standstill with John [Kempainen, former guitarist] and Ryan just wanted to come in and create music, so he wrote songs for the album and came in really confidently and delivered for us. He’s a cool and fun guy to hang out with, and I think he’s more Black Dahlia now than any of us in terms of the party. He loves his beer man, let me tell ya!”
that they want to be a part of. So it was harder in the beginning. “Now, I mean, we have these really great guys with us. Ryan Knight coming aboard was one of the best things that could have happened to us. Everyone is just really professional and just has their mind on pushing this band as far as possible, so we’re happy. It was all part of an evolution.” So does that mean that the current lineup is the most stable that you’ve had in a long time? “Yeah, for sure. We just know that everybody wants to be here and that everybody just works so hard and plays their asses off while being just cool to one another.”
That kind of raises the question about how important is the “party” to the band? Like being on the road, drinking and smoking weed and having fun. “That’s just a necessary evil, as far as I’m concerned, to live this way. The idea of having a couple of drinks before a show and having that party environment is kind of what keeps you going in a way. I think it helps a lot of people identify with the band as well. People want to party with us, and that’s cool to us!” I’m just curious about some statistics I read about Deflorate before I did this interview. You guys reached #43 on the Billboard Top 200 charts and the album came in at #5 on the Independent Albums chart. That’s a pretty big achievement for a band that isn’t exactly mainstream, so how do you feel about figures like that? “I think it’s a huge honour and a huge compliment that people buy our music. You know, metal is always been a bit of a pariah in a lot of people’s eyes so to get on that chart with a bunch of pop acts and bands like that it’s super awesome and I don’t know what else to say about it except that I’m flattered!”
I better talk about the new album for a bit, and the first thing that I want to know is what exactly does Deflorate mean? I guess both literally and as the album’s title... “It’s a bit tied into the flower – dahlia – being the band name. I also just meant it as an encouraging verb for metal fans, I guess. It’s for people that are out there rooting for the bad guy that likes metal, you know. Because the bad guy always likes metal so it’s urging the masses to spoil the innocence and corrupt the moral fabric.”
Do you think that this is a reflection on the fact that kids into metal and hardcore are one of the last groups of music fans that still do buy CDs? “Yeah, I think that in hardcore and metal there is a lot of creativity going on in terms of packaging with the artwork only being a part of it. There is always cool artwork coming out and there is always something to see and share going on. This is something that the fans want to have and it’s just another way of supporting their scene.”
How is the album different or better to what you’ve written previously?
I’m interested in your take on modern metal, because a phrase that’s been
thrown around is that “brutality is a fashion statement,” like a lot of younger bands are writing music that is as fast or as heavy as they can play without any real focus on the quality of the music. Do you agree with this? “I see that. I see that there are a lot of young bands out that all they want to do is just have the most slamming breakdowns or the most extreme vocals in some way. I think that they’re kind of forsaking a lot of the songwriting that was present, especially in the old guard of death metal – that really catchy stuff that is more than play as fast as humanely possible or doing as many pinch harmonics as possible.” And just to completely change direction, how much is Detroit an influence on Black Dahlia’s music and the music you guys listen to? “I don’t think it’s really much of an influence, you know. There wasn’t really much of a metal scene in Detroit when we were starting out. Like, there wasn’t an older band that we sort of looked up to or anything like that. And that’s how a lot of bands get started, looking at other bands and wanting to add their own take. “But we were just looking at bands from Europe, pretty much, and just combining it with a few modern elements, like more blasting and stuff like that. It all just came together like that with all the different things that we liked at the time.” Would you say that between you guys starting out and now, that the metal scene in Detroit has grown? “I don’t know. It’s hard to say because we don’t really spend much time at home or playing at home, unless it’s part of the tour and that’s it really.” What do you think is the most important thing that you’ve learned about yourself while you’ve been in the band? “I think just to be more confident. I think a lot of confidence has come to me over the years I’ve been with the band, but especially in the last couple of years just from having done all these great things and hearing the kind words of so many great people out there. It’s just cool! “I’ve spent so much of my life feeling like a nerd and an outcast, you know what I mean? But now we’ve kind of carved our own world where we can just hang out with people like us anywhere in the world.” Do you feel like you’ve accomplished everything that you’ve set out to do with the band? “I think we’ve accomplished everything I ever dreamed of and more with this band. All my expectations have been met and I just can’t believe the point that we’re at right now and all the cool stuff that we’ve done. And it’s exciting and still really exciting for us to do it. So we just want to be the best band we can and just keep doing it!”
50 LIONS
INTERVIEW: LINDSEY CUTHBERTSON AND SARAH PETCHELL PHOTOS: LACHLAN HICKS I WAS IN YEAR 11 WHEN I FIRST HEARD ABOUT THIS BAND CALLED SHOOT TO KILL AND THEIR VOCALIST OSCAR MCCALL. I WAS SITTING IN CLASS NEXT TO A GIRL WHOSE FOLDER WAS COVERED IN BAND PHOTOS AND IN AMONGST THE COLLAGE SHOTS WAS A GRAINY BLACK AND WHITE IMAGE OF A YOUNG MAN, WITHOUT A SHIRT ON, SCREAMING HOARSELY INTO A MICROPHONE. THE SHOT JUST OOZED PASSION AND I IMMEDIATELY ASKED WHO THE PERSON IN THE PHOTOGRAPH WAS. THE GIRL TURNED TO ME AND REPLIED AIRILY, “OH, THAT’S JUST MY FRIEND OSCAR. HE’S IN A BAND CALLED SHOOT TO KILL. I THINK YOU SHOULD CHECK THEM OUT.” SO INSTEAD OF COPYING MY ALGEBRA HOMEWORK INTO MY NOTEBOOK, I JUST WROTE DOWN OSCAR’S BAND NAME INSTEAD. I lived less than an hour away from Byron Bay at the time (we’re talking around 2003 here) and the hardcore scene there was starting to gain the momentum that has spawned the genre’s intense popularity. I was still discovering punk music, and my band mates soon began showing me this aggressive, new music that I’d never heard anything like before! It wasn’t too long until those same friends from the coast invited me along to see Evergreen Terrace, I Killed The Prom Queen, Parkway Drive and Shoot To Kill, who were, coincidentally, playing their last show before breaking up. To cut a long story short, my very first time at a show was watching Oscar and his older brother Winston
tear the intimate audience a new one. Not only that, but I distinctly remember being knocked over in the crowd by an excited Oscar as Evergreen Terrace broke into their version of U2’s, ‘Sunday Bloody Sunday.’ There was no malice in the action; it was just a simple case of Oscar’s passion for hardcore getting the better of him, as well as his desire to join the insane pile-on’s that were occurring up the front of the stage. History will tell us that Shoot To Kill burned and faded away and out of the ashes arose 50 Lions, featuring ex-Shoot To Kill members McCall on vocals and Byron “Boz” Carney on bass guitar. The band quickly blew up in Byron Bay and it wasn’t long before the rest of Australian hardcore sat up and took notice. It was hard not to: 50 Lions were pounding out a sound that was pissed off and simply made your auditory synapses fizzle out. Just go to one of their shows and stand in the middle of the pit, and you’ll come away knowing what I speak of…that and perhaps a black eye or two. A string of support slots for bands such as Comeback Kid, Terror and Madball soon followed, and 50 Lions proved time and again that not only could they whip a pit into a lathering frenzy, but that they could also hold their own with some of the biggest international live acts in the genre. 50 Lions have now released three albums and several EP’s and their latest record, Where Life Expires, could well be the pinnacle of their careers. They are a band whose back catalogue is a very clear indication of their musical and lyrical growth. Not only that, but they strive to build off what they’ve done before and actually achieve it with success. It is not just yours truly who believes Where Life Expires is their best album to date, vocalist McCall believes it too. “It’s heavier than what we’ve previously released. It’s more mature, and in my opinion the songs are a lot better; they’re well structured, a little catchier; I’d go as far as to say that this album will appeal to more
people as well. It doesn’t sound like we’re still in High School anymore,” he says. It hasn’t been exactly smooth sailing up to this point. In recent times the band have had two new members join the ranks, the most notable being Her Nightmare vocalist Baina stepping in on guitar. As well as this, McCall relocated from his home town down to Melbourne. “Having to deal with new members is always hard,” McCall explains. “Obviously when somebody leaves the band or you have to kick a member out for whatever reason it’s difficult to fill that place and be able to tour and write music with. “Baina’s got different musical interests to us and is a really good guitarist, so when it came to writing the new stuff he had a lot of input into it. He’s a different guy with different ideas and a different approach to writing music, and you can notice that on the new record.” Having some members in Melbourne and some still back in Byron Bay, the dynamic of the band has changed considerably; but if a band is defined by their adaptability to their surroundings, then 50 Lions is stronger than ever before. “For the last few years there have always been members of the band living in different states, so we’ve gotten used to writing music via programs like Garage Band and Logic. So when we come to practice before a tour or write music we bring all that together,” McCall says reflectively, before pressing on with his answer. “When Dan was in the band he was in Melbourne for the last half of his time with us, and Micky has always been there too, and now we have Baina as well as myself living there so we’ve had time to get used to it. Cheap flights help out a lot, as well as the internet. It’s kind of good in a way, because we don’t have to see each other all the time. We hang out on tour and come together to record, and that’s about it.” When you think about some of the bands who have broken up and dis-
banded due to petty squabbles that are blown out of proportion on the road, 50 Lions might well be onto a good thing here. It’s no secret that 50 Lions have made a habit of touring nationally, but it is only in the last eighteen months that they have taken their live show outside Australia. Now signed to US label Six Feet Under Records (with labelmates the likes of Trapped Under Ice, The Mongoloids and Trash Talk) the band has begun to make significant inroads into the American market. But in fact it is in Europe, however, where the band is finding their sweetest international success. “The definite high between recording Time Is The Enemy and Where Life Expires was touring Europe the second time,” explains McCall. “I think when we went there the first time it was pretty stressful, but our last trip over there came together really well
and the shows were much bigger, so there are some positive things there now for us.” “Europe’s probably my favourite place so far when it comes to touring. The way people treat you at shows is a lot different over there. In the hardcore scene there, when you rock up to a show you get fed and always have a place to stay. Kids will come out every day of the week and even drive five or six hours to see a show, which is something that doesn’t happen in Australia very often anymore. Having people look after you is another thing that you don’t really get here as well.” When it comes to bands, they usually fall into two categories: those that place a huge amount of emphasis on their recorded product (ala The Beatles’ last few albums) and those that just use their records as a tool to continue to be on the road, sleeping in the van and on lounge room
floors, living on an impoverished diet of processed shit and fast food. Three guesses as to where 50 Lions’ priorities lie, and it’s very firmly in the latter category. “Playing live is the only reason that we do what we do,” McCall says. “After The Boys Of Summer Tour we’re heading straight over to Europe again as well as America and Japan.” “The main thing for us in the future is to tour more internationally. We’ve probably done enough in Australia for the time being. Don’t get me wrong, it’s always good to tour and keep playing shows here, but we all want to see and visit new places. We have a label in the States now for this release so it’s easier for us to tour there now. Obviously Europe is something that is easier for us to do now as well, but we’ve still only seen about a third of that continent, so
the same page when it came to their disappointments in how the seven inch turned out. “Sam can do the sound that you want for vinyl. We were in the market for somebody both here and abroad, but at the same time we didn’t want to go and spend huge amounts of money like some people do to record overseas. “We weren’t happy with some of the things on the seven-inch when it came to putting it onto a proper CD, and Sam said to us that he wasn’t too happy with it either and told us the things that he thought needed to be changed, which as it turns out was what we were thinking of as well,” he says. “One of the good things about working with Sam in the studio is that he helps out with giving opinions on the songs rather than just being an engineer and turning the knobs and pressing buttons. In the studio he’s now become something like our sixth member of the band.” When talk turns to the future of Australian hardcore, there is no denying that the new generation of bands is more than ready to continue this country’s already outstanding musical legacy. McCall probably has more of an educated opinion on the subject than most. After all, the dude tours and hangs out with them for a living.
there are still places that we haven’t played a thing to yet.” McCall is also very skeptical about the old adage in the entertainment industry: it’s not what you know that gets you places, it’s who you know. To some people, that is beginning to seep into the framework of Australian hardcore. Whether this is true or not is a completely different argument though, but in McCall’s eyes there is some truth to the claim, and his answer reflects that. “To a point that’s probably correct,” he says in the response to the question. “If you don’t work hard from day one, you’re not going to last very long. You need to be on the road a lot and you have to start from the bottom and work your way up, build a reputation. MySpace is there to a point, but it doesn’t help that much. It’s a good tool but it’s definitely not something to base the band’s success on.”
In other words, if bands are getting a supposed leg up the ladder, it is the audience who is able to see through the smoke and mirrors. 50 Lions however started from the bottom with what they knew from being in small local bands and worked at it like a pack of dogs until they reached where they are today. They are now one of the more prominent hardcore bands in Australia, and it’s not because of any piggy back rides. It also helps that in Where Life Expires 50 Lions have an album that best epitomises what the band is all about: playing live. The band opted to record again with Melbourne producer, Sam Johnson, who helmed the control panel for their self-titled seven inch. McCall is quite honest when it comes to explaining the reasons behind sticking with Johnson, one of the reasons being that they were on
When questioned about his favourite up-and-comers, McCall is quick to not only list a few, but also explain that the growing number of venue opportunities has given younger bands much more of a chance to hone their craft in front of an audience. “There are some exciting bands coming up, as well as a resurgence of venues,” he replies. “For a while there it was hard to find a venue, especially for all ages shows. So there are some great opportunities for young bands at the moment. There’s Word Up from Byron Bay who have been working hard, a band from the Gold Coast called Ghost Town, Blkout! from Perth. It’s good to see bands getting out there and touring off their own backs.” So seeing as the hardcore landscape of Australia appears to be changing, does Oscar believe that the definition of hardcore is evolving as well? “The best way of defining what
“...I think that they’re all a bit spoiled. Australia is becoming a bit too much like the States in that regard and oversaturated with bands, and I hope that it doesn’t get any worse.” – Oscar McCall
hardcore is that reaction from the crowd and the stage where there might not be otherwise. It’s also a mentality thing as well, especially when it comes to bigger bands. Take Parkway for instance: they’re a metal band but they’re all hardcore kids at heart and I think that it shines through with the way they present themselves. They’re not about cultivating an image, they just be themselves. So it’s about the music up to a point, but then it’s also about how people portray themselves in the music as well,” he says.
Parkway to do their merch for them, and all the crew from Melbourne would come across for the show. When the tour moved on to Melbourne all the Adelaide kids would come over as well.
When asked about how influential his home town was on the formation of the band’s sound, Oscar is quick to dismiss it entirely.
This is probably one of the first times that a member of a band has spoken negatively about the recent influx of touring bands. But then again, the glory days of bands and fans driving through hell and high water to see a band play a show is becoming rarer by the day.
“Probably not musically. I think we’d still sound the same if we came from somewhere else. Growing up in Byron Bay gave me more of a certain mindset more than anything. It’s a really small town, everyone knows each other, and it’s just a chilled out place, so it’s more to do with how you look at things which is the main difference.” It’s now been six years since the fifteen year old version of myself was knocked flying by a sweaty and shirtless McCall as he screamed at Evergreen Terrace to play “Sunday Bloody Sunday”. There’s no denying that just like time changes, people do as well. McCall and 50 Lions have seen parts of the world that a young surf rat growing up in a seaside town could only dream of. So how does he think he has changed since all those years ago? “As time goes on this world gets a bit smaller. You see these bands when you’re young – maybe thirteen or fourteen – and you look at them like they’re rock stars. Then as time goes on they turn out to be some of your best friends. Like I said, the world gets smaller and you realise that it’s not such a big deal when it comes to hardcore; the people in the bands you look up to are people just like you. “Hardcore in general has changed a lot since the internet came along, as well as nowadays everybody has access to cheap airfares which makes touring a whole lot easier for everyone,” he says. “No one really travels far to see a show anymore except if it’s a band that they are really dying to see, which I think is a real shame. I remember when I’d go to Adelaide with
“Kids don’t really travel anymore. Everything has split off and they’re all doing different things, and I think that they’re all a bit spoiled. Australia is becoming a bit too much like the States in that regard and over-saturated with bands, and I hope that it doesn’t get any worse.”
Perhaps the scenes are becoming more segregated, and perhaps we
are far more spoiled than the average hardcore fan ten years ago. Regardless of this, the fact is that hardcore still remains. And it is still kicking its legs and screaming against the world as strongly as it ever has in Australia. And when it comes down to the McCall brothers, you could safely say that they are the epitome of what the genre of hardcore is all about. Here are two young men who illustrate the fact that when it comes to this kind of music it doesn’t matter how technically gifted you are, or how attractive you look, or how sweet you sound. What it is about is energy, desire, ambition (not in a bad way) and most of all, heart. They don’t come from a musical background, but they have both found themselves involved in a profession where music is their bread and butter. And as McCall
says, he wouldn’t have it any other way. “When it comes to hardcore and music in general it’s something that you pick up as you go along,” says McCall. “We have and have had members who don’t come from musical families and have started off just wanting to play guitar in a hardcore band and basically teaching themselves. It’s all about learning: you learn how to sing, you learn about gear and about touring. Winston and I have always been pretty quick learners and been up on education with all those kinds of things. “I couldn’t play a guitar if I picked one up, but I probably know more about gear than most people. I might not be able to play riffs, but I’m able to pick up on what is and isn’t working in a riff and give suggestions about how to change it. So I know a bit, but I’d call it more of an idiot version of music!”
Oscar says that he isn’t alone in the world of hardcore, and when you consider how most kids started out as bedroom warriors, jamming to their favourite records, he’s probably right. It has also given bands their distinct styles - just listen to Oscar roar over the top of Where Life Expires and you can tell that what’s coming out of his mouth is unique and simply one of a kind. “I think if it came down to music theory about eighty percent of kids in hardcore bands out there would probably fail; they might have different names for notes or incorrect chords but it’s just the way it goes. If you can play it and pull it off, you can do it, and that’s the main point. It’s not about the music (theoretically) that you’re playing; it’s more about the sound that’s coming out of you.” As the conversation finishes and respective phones are hung up, it’s good to see that a musician is as
unapologetic and as confident as he is in life as on the stage. You may not agree with everything that Oscar says, but at least he’s saying something and more importantly, it’s something honest. That in itself isn’t something you don’t come across in a band every day. Most musicians are quite content to spit out the same politically correct answer time and again, so when a person like McCall comes along and tells it how he sees it, it is a truly refreshing thing. 50 Lions haven’t exactly had it easy. Living in separate states, personnel changes and the long hard rigours of the road have not made them give up. They’ve survived it all and emerged a stronger band for it. When you put it all together, you can safely come up with one strong conclusion: 50 Lions are a band who will never die wondering.
LONG ISLAND, NEW YORK IS THE HOME TO ONE OF THE FASTEST, CATCHIEST, METALINFUSED HARDCORE BANDS TAKING ON THE SCENE RIGHT NOW. AND NOW THIS IS HELL ARE GETTING READY TO INVADE AUSTRALIA ON THE SOUNDWAVE TOUR AND ASSAULT THE EARDRUMS OF THEIR AUSSIE FANS WITH THE MATERIAL FROM THEIR EXCELLENT DEBUT, SUNDOWNING, AND IT’S EQUALLY FANTASTIC FOLLOW-UP, MISFORTUNES. ON THE EVE OF THEIR AUSTRALIAN DEBUT, NO HEROES MANAGED TO GET VOCALIST, TRAVIS REILLY, TO ANSWER A FEW QUESTIONS FOR US ABOUT WHAT IT’S LIKE TO BE IN THIS IS HELL. You guys formed from a string of Long Island HC acts. Did that have an impact on the development of your sound at all? Just the fact that you all, originally, came from so many different bands… Umm, I don’t think so. Just because This Is Hell doesn’t really sound like any of our previous bands. So you guys seem to be pretty proud of the Long Island music scene that you come from. I guess what I’m curious to know is what’s it like? What’s the best and worst thing about it? There are a lot of new, up-and-coming bands and younger kids around, so that’s always cool. I would say that the worst part – and it’s not just Long Island but the hardcore scene in general – is that the kids are so fickle and just jump from band to band. And then, on top of that, they don’t tend stick around in the scene for more than a year or so. What sets the Long Island scene apart from other scenes? We always have great bands. Full stop. Do you think being from Long Island has influenced or inspired your music in any way? I don’t think so. And I don’t mean that in a negative ways. I just don’t think that anything would be that much different if we were from
somewhere else. What are some of those up-andcoming Long Island bands you were talking about that everyone should check out? Incendiary, Stray From The Path, Ice Age, Kills & Thrills, Spectators and Backtrack. You guys recently signed to Rise Records. Why that label? Just because you guys sound completely different to a lot of the other acts on that label… To me, the most important thing is having a label that actually gives a shit about your band and will back you. I’m not interested in what the other bands on the label sound like because, at the end of the day, that isn’t my band and I don’t care what anyone thinks about our label and shit. Know what I mean? We signed to Rise because they’re good people and run their label well. Then, and most importantly, they like our band! What is the best and worst thing about being in This Is Hell? The best thing is getting to tour the world and record albums. The worst part is the lack of funds in my bank account! What is it about music, specifically hardcore, that made you stop and go, “Hell yeah! I want to be in a band!”? Growing up, I was going to hardcore shows and seeing kids stage-diving and singing along while just losing their minds. That’s inspiring and I wanted to be a part of that. What is so appealing about hardcore to you? Why is it the best genre for you to express yourself? I don’t think that it’s hardcore that is so appealing to me. To me, the honesty of our songs and the honesty of most other hardcore bands’ songs is what appeals to me. Just the fact that I can listen and relate or feel like I wrote it myself is always a good feeling. If you had to name your Top 5 albums of all time, what would they be? My answers would probably change if you asked me this same question tomorrow. It’s just way too hard a question! But, for today, I’ll go with these five in no particular order… 1) Dear You – Jawbreaker 2) Angel Dust – Faith No More 3) Far Beyond Driven – Pantera
4) This Year’s Model – Elvis Costello 5) Midnight Marauders – A Tribe Called Quest Can you give us any hints about album number three? Like, when will it be happening? What will it sound like? All those sorts of hints… We are actually in the studio right now! Andrew is tracking some bass across the room from me as I type this. We finish up in about five days. The new stuff is turning out great. It’s a bit more metal than our previous records, I think. It has a nice bit of Anthrax, Leeway, Metallica and Cro-Mags influence to it all while still sounding like classic This Is Hell. At this stage, I think it’s going to come out in late June. What influences you when you are writing for a new EP or a new album? What music do you listen to or what books do you read? That would be a question that you would have to ask Rick because he writes all the music. I don’t really think that he goes out of his way to listen to anything in particular, you
THIS IS HELL
INTERVIEW: SARAH PETCHELL
know? You guys tour pretty hard. I read at one point that you did 200 live shows a year. How do you survive such a hectic touring schedule? Yeah, we’ve done a shit load of touring in the last few years. I’m not really sure how we survive to be honest. How do you not kill one another spending that much time together on the road? We are all just too afraid of jail. There you go. That’s how we survive then! How do you get yourself psyched up to get onstage and play? I don’t usually get psyched until I’m up there and we’re actually playing. Then, if the crowd is great that will get me even more psyched. What is your favourite song to play live and why? At the moment I would say that it’s “The Search” just because it’s a fairly new song and Rick has a shredding solo in it.
You’re also coming out for Soundwave. How excited are you to be coming to Australia? Me and the whole band are excited beyond words! We are getting to tour with so many bands that I love and tonnes that we are already friends with. It’s all pretty unreal to be honest… The response to the announcement that you guys were being added to the bill from all your Australian fans has been pretty full on. What’s your take on it all? Were you expecting a response like that? It’s really nice to see that people are super stoked to see us. We’ve been dying to tour Australia for years now and I’m just so glad that we’re finally getting to do it! What can Australian audiences expect of you guys? In a nutshell, over the top good looks. If This is Hell (God forbid!) were to end tomorrow, what is the one legacy that you would want to leave behind? I think it would be that we’re a great live band. So I would want to be
remembered for that because I think a lot of bands currently are great on album then you see them live and they’ve awful! It’s sad. What is the most important thing that you’ve gotten from being a part of This Is Hell? That would have to be the life experience for sure! I’ve been able to travel all over America, Canada and Europe playing music. I’ve played shows in places that most people don’t even know exist and I don’t think I ever would have seen were it not for the band. What’s the most significant thing that you’ve learned about yourself while you’ve been in the band? I’ve learned that, no matter what I think or feel from time to time, I’m not totally worthless. Post-Soundwave, what’s next for you guys? We’re touring Europe with Agnostic Front throughout March and April. Then we’ll be releasing the new album. After that, complete and utter world domination!
MINDSNARE INTERVIEW: RAJ WAKELING – PHOTOS: JOHN HATFIELD
SOMETIMES I FEEL LIKE IF IT WASN’T FOR MINDSNARE, I WOULDN’T BE INTO HARDCORE, I WOULDN’T BE WRITING FOR THIS MAGAZINE, AND HALF THE BANDS THAT END UP GETTING REVIEWED OR INTERVIEWED PROBABLY WOULDN’T EXIST. YET, SOMEHOW, I DON’T THINK ANYONE IN THE BAND WOULD AGREE WITH ME. WHAT I HAD EXPECTED TO BE A PANTS-WETTINGLY NERVOUS FACE TO FACE SESSION WITH TWO OF THE GODS OF THE AUSTRALIAN SCENE TURNED OUT TO BE ONE OF THE MOST RELAXED, FRIENDLY AND INSIGHTFUL INTERVIEWS I’VE DONE IN A LONG TIME.
December 12th, 2009. It’s around seven in the evening, and in a quiet lane behind Leichhardt’s Bald Faced Stag, Beltsy and Nigel of Mindsnare are sitting on the stairway entrance to the local Italian quarter. In a few hours the two long time friends will take to the stage to deliver yet another satisfying set of uncompromising Australian hardcore. For now they are chilled out and in the mood to discuss just about anything. When drummer Gordy left the band to devote more time to his young son in 2008, the boys were vague as to the future of the band, leaving fans across the country to wonder if they would ever get the chance to catch another Mindsnare live show. It’s little wonder then that tonight’s show is completely sold out. Mindsnare are back, if only for a couple of shows, and no one is leaving anything to chance. So what’s the go? Are they back, is it over, and if Gordy quit, why is he playing tonight? God damn it boys, why must you tease us so? Beltsy explains, “When Gordy said that he was gonna leave, we made a point of not saying we were splitting up, because we’re always keen to do it, we just didn’t want to have anyone else drumming at that time. If Gordy was ever gonna be interested again we wanted to be able to fall back into it without it being a reunion.” Fans of the band will agree that Gordy has become central to the Mindsnare sound. He has a speed and fury that are almost unrivalled, except maybe by his own work in other bands. But there are still a great many excellent drummers out there who could’ve filled his shoes adequately, so why not just get a ring-in for a few shows here and there? Beltsy says, “It’s not just the drumming. Personality is a big part, especially when you do go on tour and stuff like that. Gordy was with us for eight or nine years before he pulled the pin. I definitely wasn’t keen to try it out with anyone else. There was the option, you know, a few people offered…” Nigel interjects. “Even if we got someone to do it just as well, if we didn’t enjoy hanging out with that dude we would’ve just thought, ‘This sucks!’ It really would’ve soured everything we did. If we never played another show after this again we’d still be happy and we wouldn’t regret anything.”
On this point the two disagree. Beltsy thinks he’d like to drag it out for as long as he can, but Nigel cites examples like Guttermouth, who were here earlier in the year with one original member and four ring-ins. It’s the sort of good natured musical debate you come to expect from guys who have been making music together for so long that it’s become almost impossible to insult each other anymore. This time Nigel seems to be losing the argument, trailing off until Beltsy shuts him down. “Yeh, I know what your point is, but it’s just wrong!” The bottom line seems to be that the boys are in it for the fun of playing shows, and that’s really all that has kept the Mindsnare motor running over the last decade. I couldn’t tell you the number of times either member said, ‘We just wanna play music’, over the course of the interview, but it was probably about half as many times as either
one said ‘fuck’ or ‘shit’. (For the record, they fit 41 fucks into a 17 minute interview. That’s 2.4 fucks per minute!) Beltsy even stops me short when I make the mistake of suggesting that they’ve put in a lot of hard work to get where they are today. “It’s not fucking work man! I work in a place where there’s a lot of musicians and shit, and every week they say, ‘Are you working this weekend?’ And I’m like, ‘Fuck no, I’m working now! I’m gonna have fun on the weekend and play some gigs!’ Their idea is that this is their day job, and then they’ve gotta fucking work on the weekend as well. I could never be like that.” The conversation shifts to tonight’s show. The boys are clearly excited and in good spirits. They know it’s a full room and they’re ready to do what they love best. Having seen a number of reunion shows from various bands recently, I’m expecting
to hear the standard formula of two parts new stuff, one part old, with an encore of more old stuff to keep the die-hards happy. “If it was up to me, I’d play the last two records and fuck everything else off,” says Beltsy. “Well, maybe not everything else, but I’m the sort of person that’s fucking like, ‘Let’s move on and do something different and play that shit’. I mean, we’ve done the old songs to death. I’ve got nothing against playing the old songs, but with hardcore, it’s not like you can go on and play for fucking two hours and cover your fucking whole entire career.” “The other side to it is I feel like we’ve gotten better as a band with every record we’ve done, so I don’t wanna go back and play songs I would listen to now and think, “Fuck, that’s pretty shit!” I’d rather play songs that I’m happy with at this time. I don’t know. Everyone’s asking us to play old songs and all that sort of shit. Every now and then we
bring out a couple of old songs and everyone stands there like, ‘Oh fuck, I’ve never heard this.’” To be fair, few bands have managed to stick it out as long in this scene as Mindsnare, so audiences could be excused for not being familiar with some of the earlier material. Beltsy and Nigel say they enjoy seeing the new blood enter the fold, even if it does make them feel like a couple of old farts. Nigel notes, “If you’re fifteen right now, then you weren’t born when one of tonight’s songs was written. At this, Beltsy laughs, shakes his head and says, “Maybe that is a sign to hang up the fucking boots!” “I think it’s good that kids still wanna go see heavy bands and all that sort of stuff. As time goes on everything changes and there’s so much different stuff out there, and kids still seem to be going out and supporting heavy music,” says Nigel.
Having touched lightly on the huge changes that have taken place within the scene over the last decade in particular, I decide to prod a little more. After all, this is a band that pre-dates the rise of the MP3, file-sharing, MySpace, and the immense commercialisation of nearly all aspects of this once exclusively underground scene. Beltsy says “It’s hard to say it’s a bad thing, like when we started playing, if you had a good bill there would be like 30 or 40 people there. As much as it was fun back then, I’d fucking hate to go back to that. I’m happy to play anywhere but it’s fucking cool when there’s a room full of people, because hardcore feeds of the fucking crowd. It’s a bit hard to do that when there are 30 people sitting down at the back going, ‘Next!’” Nigel, who runs the stalwart Australian hardcore label Trial & Error, doesn’t see anything wrong with bands pushing the genre into new directions either.
“It has to evolve otherwise it would just die. If everyone was still playing the same style that was being played when we first started, there’d be a whole lot of shit bands around. It would’ve been fucking dead a long time ago. We’d all be doing something else tonight. Stuff’s got to evolve and change.” Both Beltsy and Nigel agree that the early and mid 2000’s marked a significant shift in the scene, not just stylistically, but culturally. Coincidentally, two of the band’s best-loved albums came out during this time, 2001’s Hanged, Choked, Wrists Slit, and 2004’s The Death. Not only were these albums an impressive step up in terms of speed and technical prowess, The Death provided listeners with a comprehensive list
respect, the boys aren’t too worried about being recognised for their own contributions to the scene. They do, however, take exception to fly-bynight scenesters looking to make a quick buck out of the latest fad. “I couldn’t give a shit if someone doesn’t have a clue, I just hate it when cunts come around and start thinking they’re running the fucking scene and then six months later they’re gone. It always seems to be that way when something blows up,” says Beltsy. Nigel nods, “Yeah, It’s always the dudes that talk loudest, telling everyone they’re wrong and they shouldn’t be doing this and they shouldn’t be doing that, and then six months later
of bands who Mindsnare thought were worth checking out. For several months after I purchased that record, it was my bible! Beltsy reflects, “I don’t know if it mentions it on the record, but the reason we did that is when we were getting into heavy music, and any music I guess, there was no fucking internet. I mean, it’s pretty pointless to do it now when there is, but back then you would get into a band by fucking listening to the one fucking heavy radio show that was on. You’d buy a fucking record of someone you liked, then you’d look at their thanks list and that would pretty much give you an idea of all other bands similar to that. So we just thought, ‘Fuck it, we’ll just put down every band that was good!’”
they’re doing something else, probably telling some other scene what they’re doing wrong.” It’s a simple observation but it rings so true, particularly when uttered by someone who has seen so many bands blow up and then vanish without a trace. Thankfully, Mindsnare show no signs of suffering such a fate, and readers will note that since this interview was conducted the boys have played yet another gig billed as their ‘last show for a while’. Whether this means we can expect them to pop up in another six months to a year, or that the duties of fatherhood have finally taken a proper hold on Gordy, will remain to be seen.
“The flip side to that is, without the internet, we would go out and buy stuff on those lists and end up with shit records! It goes both ways you know, at least now kids can listen to something first and check it out and go ‘Oh that’s shit, that band’s nuts,’” says Nigel. “In 2004, internet hype bands started blowing up, and all the steadfast bands like Sick of it All and all those other bands that owned the hardcore scene, you could see that they were starting to die. Their rooms all around the world were slowly getting smaller and that whole new breed came through. It was like a whole new wave of kids,” he says. And while it’s often said that a good band commands the listener’s
What you can be sure of is that as long as long as there are rooms to play, beers to drink, and people to party with, a Mindsnare reunion is always on the cards.
“It’s always the dudes that talk loudest, telling everyone they’re wrong and they shouldn’t be doing this and they shouldn’t be doing that, and then six months later they’re doing something else...”
BANDS YOU’VE NEVER HEARD OF FIXTURES MySpace: http://www.myspace.com/sparkisadiamond Label: Unsigned It’s not fair when you find a new band, you listen to their demo, you love it and then find out that all the members are under the age of 20. This is extreme, technical, metallic hardcore played with a skill and maturity that belies the youth of this Sydney band that comprises of four members and an ogre. If you’re into Converge, A Secret Death or Botch then this is for you! With riffs that melt your brain, vocals that are as tough as the vocalist is burly and a live show that’s energetic and frenetic, I’m expecting big things from these guys in 2010. Sarah Petchell DEVIL SOLD HIS SOUL MySpace: http://www.myspace.com/devilsoldhissoul Label: Century Media The minute you hear “progressive metal” the epic songs of Between The Buried And Me or Opeth start floating through your brain. However, all of these ideas get thrown out the door by England’s Devil Sold His Soul. Drawing on ambient influences and throwing it into the mix of progressive metal and post-hardcore, you start to get a band that sound more like Isis than they do Opeth. With their debut full-length, 2007’s A Fragile Hope, already under their belts, and a recent signing to Century Media, I’m stoked for their follow up which they’re currently in the process of recording. Sarah Petchell BLACK MATH HORSEMAN MySpace: http://www.myspace.com/blackmathhorseman Label: Tee Pee Records Here is some dark, atmospheric doom that is sure to captivate you through repetitive riffs that are deep and brooding, while having a distinctive psychedelic, melodic sound. The smooth and calming voice of Sera Timms helps give Black Math Horseman a different vibe and is one area which I will be curious to see develop over time. This doesn’t get heavy and crushing like most contemporary doom, and I would call this more doom rock than metal. Quite an interesting band to take on board and repetition is not an easy thing to win over a listener in music. These guys do it fine and with that, I look forward to catching them at Roadburn. Michael Anderson THE MOTEL LIFE MySpace: http://www.myspace.com/themotellife Label: Unsigned What started out as small ideas exchanged through IM, emails and basic human interaction has become The Motel Life. This is pop punk, with a mature edge – intelligent lyrics, clever song-writing and with a healthy dose of an indie sensibility tossed in for good measure this is definitely a band to wrap your ears around. With their EP, We All Left Something Behind available now, and the positive feedback that it has received, The Motel Life has begun work on their debut full-length album and will continue to run off their successful DIY methods. We can only hope that someone books them a tour out this was sometime soon! Sarah Petchell ROBERT POLSEN MySpace: http://www.myspace.com/robertpolsenmetal Label: Unsigned It worries me when bands say that they’re creating “unique” music as it’s usually anything but. Yet in the case of Robert Polsen, this is definitely one band that is trying to push the envelope. Originally called As Venice Sinks, the band added a new guitarist and changed their name to signal a definitive change in sound – one that is much more progressive and technical. Citing influences as varied as Misery Signals, The Dillinger Escape Plan and The Black Dahlia murder, this is a band intent on always keeping people guessing. With plenty of local shows and tours planned for 2010, this is definitely a band to keep an eye on in the coming year! Sarah Petchell MISERERE LUMINIS MySpace: http://www.myspace.com/miserereluminis Label: Sepulchre Productions I don’t hide my praise for the black metal coming out of Quebec, and now two of my favourite bands from there, Gris and Sombres Forets, have formed a collaborative project in Miserere Luminis that is sure to turn many heads as it has the potential to be black metal’s answer to Isis. This is post-metal with a definite black vibe. With raw, distorted riffs with heaps of gain, ice-cold melodies and blackened vocals that writhe in agony, this is definitely for those that couldn’t escape the snowstorm seething outside. The debut album is out now and hopefully this project will not be a one off. Do not overlook this! Michael Anderson
NEW MUSIC Is there anything these guys cannot do? Give Between The Buried And Me any small piece of music and tell them to turn it into something progressively amazing and they will do it better than anyone else out there. The album title could be perfect for what this album conveys. Epic melodic riffs that become twirling solos, which develops into progressive anthems that vary between soft acoustic ballads to carnival-esque musical pieces to jazzy moments and even shades of brutality. Don’t forget the voice of Tommy Rogers that continues to amaze us all with his brutal growls and clean singing ability. The Great Misdirect takes you to a hundred different destinations in about an hour. But it is so worth it! Michael Anderson Sounds like: Protest The Hero, The Human Abstract, Born Of Osiris.
The Great Misdirect – Between The Buried & Me Victory/STOMP If you haven’t heard Travels, last year’s debut full-length from Defeater then you need to crawl out from that rock and listen because this EP betters it. It continues the ambitious, poignant and incredibly well produced hardcore that marked the debut and proves that the album was not just a flash in the pan. The idea of having a chronological story that flows throughout the record is repeated here, with the protagonist this time being a black man in the US Army in World War Two. Musically, the dissonant guitar harmonies, sharp bass and tight drumming perfectly accentuate Archambault’s snarling vocals. All I can say is that with the demise of Have Heart and Verse, this is the new wave of Boston hardcore. Sarah Petchell Sounds like: Verse, Modern Life Is War, Have Heart.
Lost Ground EP – Defeater Bridge 9/STOMP Firstly, this album is only available through the Deathwish E-Store and is only available in 12” vinyl, and ignoring the haters, I think this is a rad idea. All that aside, No One Deserves to Be Here More Than Me marks a new period in Blacklisted’s history as a band. This is really a case of an album that will illicit a love it or hate it approach. The lyrical performance isn’t perfect, the interludes are forgettable and it’s definitely not the Blacklisted that you expected. But that being said, I LOVE it! This is a band that has found a new energy and desperation to get their point across. It’s full of emotion and atmosphere that marks a maturity previously unseen on this level from the band. Then there are those lyrics! Sarah Petchell Sounds like: Bitter End, Cruel Hand, Pulling Teeth.
No One Deserves To Be Here More Than Me – Blacklisted DEATHWISH It seemed like Pelican took a different approach on City Of Echoes with shorter songs and considerably less sludge. But with What We All Come To Need, the band is back to doing what I enjoy most about them. Sludgy patterns blend with catchy melodic touches that would make the perfect soundtrack for gazing over an ocean that turns red at sunset – just epic! The distortion drones and is hazy but because of the balanced pace of the tempos, the sand banks at the beach would erode away in a pleasant manner rather than arguing their case to remain. I feel better now that Pelican has got me back to thinking about oceans and beaches again! Michael Anderson Sounds like: Russian Circles, Mogwai, Mono.
What We All Come To Need – Pelican Southern Lord/STOMP Four years on from their groundbreaking Into Oblivion, it’s only natural that Rise & fall are back heavier and harder than ever with their newest release, Our Circle Is Vicious. From the opening barrage of ‘Soul Slayer’ to the dynamic ‘In Circles’ and epic album closer ‘Knowing’ it’s clear that in every aspect their musicianship has grown immensely. Guitarist Cedric Goetgebuer balances bone-shattering heaviness and unorthodox melodies, while Dossche Bjorn’s emotional vocal outpouring provides the perfect counterpoint. While being utterly haunting, moving and unpredictable, it is undeniable that Rise & Fall have written the musical equivalent of assault and battery! Sarah Petchell Sounds like: Pulling Teeth, Cursed, Lewd Acts.
Our Circle Is Vicious – Rise & Fall Deathwish/STOMP Following it’s demise, half of Jungle Fever headed back to Adelaide and not content to stay quiet, they formed Thrush, which quickly turned to Choc Chip and evolved into Sex Wizard! Throw in members of Robotosaurus and A Secret Death, and this is as close to a supergroup as it gets! And did I mention that there’s two drummers? Much like everyone’s previous band, Sex Wizard is definitely bringing something a different to the table. One minute it sounds like what would be the bastard son of Gorilla Biscuits and Pulling Teeth (‘No Blood’). Then there is the almost six-minute long ‘Demon Eyes’ which sounds like the guys have been listening to Pulling Teeth. Mission accomplished, as Sex Wizard definitely stand out from the crowd. Sarah Petchell Sounds like: Trash Talk, Jungle Fever, I Exist.
Sex Wizard – Sex Wizard Trial & Error/STOMP
NEW MUSIC Here is some ambient distortion that doesn’t simply drain. Instead of droning riffs, it is notes that ring out. It is the sound of decaying. Perhaps final breaths and a soft soothing voice that begins to echo as you slowly drift out of concentration. Just as you think you are descending away, drum fills, deeper tones and a bellowing voice lifts you. Now you are sleeping walking and the deep tones that spread out are your footsteps following the voice around the room. You are hypnotized by it all. Now, sit down and gaze into nothingness and listen. If you want an experience, then come into the Secret House. It’s also worth mentioning that this is the most recent project by Isis’ Aaron Turner and Khanate’s James Plotkin. Michael Anderson Sounds like: Sunn O))), Isis, Pyramids With Nadja.
Secret House – Jodis Hydra Head/STOMP Adventurous and innovative have always been words that have been associated with The Fall Of Troy. But they’ve taken both these words and turned them on their heads by completely reinventing themselves on their fourth album In The Unlikely Event. This time around the band have combined elements of punk, rock and metal and in doing so have fully realized their sound and proven how versatile they actually are. Produced by Terry Date (Deftones, Smashing Pumpkins), this album sees the band tackle everything from double-timed ragers like ‘Straight-Jacked Keelhauled’ to heartfelt ballds like ‘Nobody’s Perfect’ with equal confidence. The Fall Of Troy have well and truly raised the bar for progressive music in general! Sarah Petchell Sounds like: Protest The Hero, Portugal The Man, Circa Survive.
The Unlikely Event – The Fall Of Troy Equal Vision/STOMP A Wilhelm Scream’s self-titled EP is promising in a lot of ways. The riffs differentiate themselves from the generic punk-rock motifs we’re so used to hearing on the radio, with odd accents, and licks that truly set the song aside from the genre. Unfortunately, there is something lack lustre about the production, the vocals seem sidelined, multi-tracked and flat and at times the rhythm guitar suffers the same fate, with too much distortion detracting from the quality of the song writing. The songs are pop for people who hate pop purely on principle. AWS is (earlyera) Offspring-derived punk for the sake of punk; it needs just a little more time to really find its strength. Sam Webster Sounds like: Strung Out, The Lawrence Arms, Strike Anywhere.
A Wilhelm Scream EP – A Wilhelm Scream Paper & Plastick/SHOCK With a new drummer, Moneen have taken the opportunity to do things a little differently on The World I Want To Leave Behind, however don’t be mistaken as this isn’t a reinvention. It’s still the trademark Moneen sound of a pop-sensibility mixed with ambient rock and delicate punk. Oxymorons? Probably, but that’s the best way to describe the complex sound these Canadians have achieved with full-length number three. Perfectly complex pop can be found in tracks like ‘Hold That Sound’ and ‘Great Escape’ while ballads like ‘The Way’ and ‘Waterfalls’ balance emotion against an effective infusion of strings. Then there is album closer, ‘The Glasshouse’ which gives the best idea of which new territory the band will be striking into next. Sarah Petchell Sounds like: Boys Night Out, The Get Up Kids, Brand New.
The World I Want To Leave Behind – Moneen Dine Alone/SHOCK Tighter, smarter and more pissed off than ever. Outbreak has rounded off the decade with their best effort yet. The self-titled and self-released hardcore album will turn heads worldwide. A fresh dimension was added to the band with the introduction of new guitarist, Billy Bean (No Trigger) who also shares vocal duties with O’Connor. The sing-a-longs of ‘Digital World’ and ‘Too Paranoid For Politics’ will be crowd pleasers with raw guitars and large gang vocal insertions, while the diversity and intensity of ‘Warning Signs’ will leave listeners in awe. This is the hottest thing since Paris Hilton’s sex tape and just like it, you will need to give it a few spins to fully digest and appreciate it. Brett Muskett Sounds like: Betrayed, Paint It Black, No Apologies.
Outbreak – Outbreak Think Fast!/STOMP With the myriad of projects Jello has involved himself in since the demise of his brainchild, The Dead Kennedys, it was actually The Stooges’ gig on Iggy’s 60th birthday that inspired him to form his own band in preparation for his own 50th birthday party. Following a two-night sold-out stand, the band added a second guitarist, named themselves Jello Biafra & The Guantanamo School Of Medicine and entered into the studio to record The Audacity Of Hype. The twin guitar attack still sounds reminiscent of The Dead Kennedys, but add some industrial style metal percussion courtesy of drummer Jon Weiss (Sharkbait) and contemporary, politically aware lyrics and this is definitely one album that will certainly make you glad Jello won’t be shutting up anytime soon! Sarah Petchell Sounds like: The Dead Kennedys with a modern twist.
The Audacity Of Hype – Jello Biafra & The Guantanamo School Of Medicine Alternative Tentacles/STOMP
NEW MUSIC If you don’t already know, The Almost is the side-project of Underoath’s Aaron Gillespie and with their sophomore effort, Monster, Monster, the band have developed their brand of surprisingly radio friendly pop-rock into an entire album’s worth of deliciously hooky three-minute songs that owe more to the likes of Tom Petty and the Foo Fighters than to Thrice or Thursday. This time around the band have evolved into more of a musically complex entity with keyboards adding depth and acoustic guitars adding extra another layer to ballads like ‘Hand Grenade’ to the double-duties Gillespie plays on his native drumkit and behind the microphone. However it’s the tracks like title track ‘Monster Monster’ and ‘Want To’ that show where The Almost really shine. Sarah Petchell Sounds like: … The Classic Crime, The Starting Line, Ivoryline.
Monster Monster – The Almost Tooth & Nail/EMI Nile is back with their best effort since In Their Darkened Shrines. An album that is full of dark and chaotic atmosphere but with usual ingredients that makes Nile a household name in metal. The drum patterns are as mesmerizing as they are blistering and technical, while brutal riffs run at high speeds, but change shift at times to more slower and doom-like tempos that are absolutely crushing. Add to that soaring solos with the distinct Nile edge and the dual vocal assault and this is the perfect Nile recipe. To make things more interesting, there is the heavier use of the Egyptian influence, which blends perfectly throughout the album. A great album, and a return to form! Michael Anderson Sounds like: Hate Eternal, Suffocation, Necrophagist
Those Whom The Gods Detest – Nile Nuclear Blast/RIOT! Taking their name from a slang term for cocaine addicts, The Snowdroppers are delivering a new face of the blues to another generation of fresh-faced potential fans, and along the way they’re mixing it up with some rock, some roll, a little bit of Americana alt-country, some theatrics and enough of a DIY punk ethic to keep things interesting. All about fornication and intoxication, their debut album Too Late To Pray, delivers everything from the banjosoaked ‘Fucked Up Blues’, to the warning to lock up your daughters that is ‘Rosemary’ and the positively crass ‘Good Drugs, Bad Women’. Then there is opening track ‘Do The Stomp’ which you’ve already heard from those Channel [V] ads. Definitely one of my favourite albums and live acts of 2009! Sarah Petchell Sounds like: Nici Blue Eyes, Seasick Steve.
Too Late To Pray – The Snowdroppers Difrnt Music/UNIVERSAL This is the sort of album that I love to hear while I’m getting ready for a big night out! It rocks and rambles with an uplifted and energetic sound, reminiscent of The Hives with a little Black Flag and The Clash thrown in for good measure. What sets it apart from it’s obvious influences is the touch more edge and frantic pace, which make Cloak/Dagger seem like they’re rushing headlong into some unseen destination – out of the 13 tracks, 11 are under three minutes long. This is garage rock but with a good dose of punk sensibility, making for one easy to listen to album. It’s punchy and relentless, so grab this album and jump on a guaranteed fun ride! Craig Lukic Sounds like: The Hives, Black Flag, Fucked Up.
Lost Art – Cloak/Dagger JADE TREE This is The Red Chord stamping their dominance over a genre they have led for almost a decade. The loss of a guitarist from their previous effort has lead to a more streamlined sound and they come out sounding the better for it. Guttural growls and screams get layered over some blisteringly fast drummed and complimented by some intense guitar work. Multiple tempo changes keep things fresh with the occasional short guitar solo harking to the metallic roots of the band’s distant past. Fed Through The Teeth Machine is a relentless album, with the pace never letting up – a track is barely over before you’re bombarded by the next. For your deathcore fix, this is a solid album from a band that has constantly proved why they are at the top of the game. Craig Lukic Sounds like: Despised Icon, Ion Dissonance, The Faceless.
Fed Through The Teeth Machine – The Red Chord METAL BLADE/RIOT!
This five piece hardcore outfit all the way from Cagliari, Italy, recently graced Australian shores with a headlining tour and now their new album. The Sound Of Breaking Up is filled with 11 tracks, which boast fast drums, distorted power chords and emotionally fuelled vocals. With this album, Gold Kids have blossomed and defined their own unique sound. Highlights include songs like ‘Winter, 365 Days A Year’ and ‘All Roads Lead To The Wrong Place’ but for a full understanding of the diversity this band can achieve the eight minute epic ‘When Leaving Is The Cure’ is a must hear. This is a truly imperative album from a band who have defined themselves as unique in a scene flooded by music without such integrity. Brett Muskett Sounds like: Life Long Tragedy, The Carrier, Ghost Town.
The Sound Of Breaking Up – The Gold Kids Dead Nation Records
R.I.P. 2009
Bands who didn’t survive the year... HAVE HEART (2002-2009) For us here at No Heroes, this was probably the most upsetting of band break-ups for 2009. Have Heart had just released their second album, the brilliant Songs To Scream At The Sun, they seemed at the top of their game and had a tour for most parts of the world booked, including Australia. So seeing them play their final shows back in May was a bittersweet experience. Across an EP and two albums, Have Heart espoused their positive, straight-edge message and earned themselves a legion of fans around the world. The band played their last show in Boston on October 17, which (fittingly) is National Edge Day in the US. Necessary listening: Songs To Scream At The Sun (2008)
THE NUMBER 12 LOOKS LIKE YOU (20002009) It was sad to see that weeks after their last album, Worse Than Alone, was released that one of the vocalists had left the band due to personal issues, with the band subsequently breaking up after a final tour. Always inventive, with dual vocals, plenty of tempo changes, brilliant drumming, technical guitars and a refusal to be pigeon-holed, The Number 12 Looks Like You were always an exciting band to listen to. You never knew where a song would go, fusing mathcore with jazz, screamo and a myriad of other influences. This was a band that always tried something different and it’s a blow for originality that they’re gone. Necessary listening: Nuclear. Sad. Nuclear (2005)
VERSE (2003-2009) Early last year we had the opportunity to talk to the guys from Verse about their recent album, Aggression, and their up-coming Australian tour. They came, they toured and they conquered. Then a month or so later the band announced that they would not make it past album number three. This is a band that brought a lot of soul and political consciousness back to hardcore. They did it with earnestness, intelligence and a single-minded determination that these were the messages that they wanted to get across. There is definitely a gap in the Bridge 9 roster and the hardcore community where this brand of melodic hardcore with a social conscience where Verse used to lie. Necessary listening: Aggression (2008)
THE GETAWAY PLAN (2004-2009) 2008 was a huge year for The Getaway Plan. They released their debut album, Other Voices, Other Rooms and surprised critics and fans alike with a new mature, catchy direction that was a massive step up from the screamo roots laid with their EP Hold Conversation. One year, two hit singles and three nationally sold-out, headline tours later and the band announce that “We have come to a decision that The Getaway Plan will no longer continue to make music together”. The four members have vowed to continue to create music through their own new projects and we look forward to see what they might be. Necessary listening: Other Voices, Other Rooms (2008)
R.I.P. 2009 BODYJAR (2004-2009) Bodyjar are one of those bands that remind me of a specific period in my life, so I was super sad (but unsurprised) when it was announced that these Melbournebased punk legends would be “calling it a day for real” with one last jaunt about the country in late 2009. I can remember being 16 and dancing around my room to “Not The Same” and then giggling my head off at the video for “One In A Million” (all you young ones should head to You Tube if you haven’t seen it!). So it’s with much sentimentality and nostalgia that in 2009 we said our final farewell to Bodyjar. Necessary listening: How It Works (2001)
HE IS LEGEND (2003-2009???) OK, this is one of those examples where a band is on “indefinite hiatus” but it is more than likely that they won’t be doing anything new anytime soon. I mean, frontman Schylar Croom has formed a new project and was filling in as lead singer for Maylene & The Sons Of Disaster. And their most recent album, It Hates You, was released so under the radar that it completely passed me by. BUT this cannot detract from the fact that seeing these guys live was one of the most fun live experiences of my life and that their first full-length, I Am Hollywood, is one of the greatest albums I have ever heard! Necessary listening: I Am Hollywood (2004)
AS CITIES BURN (2002-2009) The As Cities Burn story is one plagued with issues. Frequent member changes and a whole make up/break up thing going on doesn’t really seem like the perfect recipe for band harmony. That being said, what the band did accomplish is to produce three excellent albums all different from one another. The stand out is definitely their first, Son, I Loved You At Your Darkest and their final album Hell Or High Water took the band’s sound in a completely different direction – they sounded more like Bright Eyes rather than the Underoath-tinged screamo of their early work. But I guess when “our lives and our wives have called us in different directions” it’s time to move on… Necessary listening: Son, I Loved You At Your Darkest (2004)
ANIMOSITY (2000-2009) Frontman, Leo Miller, described what Animosity accomplished in the eight years of their existence best: “Eight years later, I look back to being 14 years old playing Animosity shows in garages and backyards and I can honestly say that our musical and experiential goals have been exceeded in ways that once seemed impossible to me.” With three albums of their brand of fast and brutal deathcore under their belts, including a remix album with the brilliant, Drumcorps, the band called it a day at the point where they had been on hiatus for so long that it was clear they weren’t coming back. With numerous new projects in the works, there is still much musical life left in these guys… Necessary listening: Animal (2007)
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