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PALAYE ROYALE WATERPARKS GOOD CHARLOTTE STAND ATLANTIC THE USED DEAF HAVANA WE CAME AS ROMANS EVANESCENCE CHASE ATLANTIC ISSUE 233 Â£3.99 december 2017 USA $9.50 / Can $10.99 / Aus $9.99

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Rock Sound, Unit 2.38, East London Works 75 Whitechapel Road, London E1 1DU Tel: + 44 (0)20 7877 8770 Fax: + 44 (0)20 7377 0455 THIS MONTH’S BIG QUESTION: What would be your dream musical collaboration? PUBLISHER: Patrick Napier (Halsey and Twenty One Pilots) Tel: 0207 877 8779 patrick.napier@rocksound.tv Editorial Director: Ryan Bird (Ryan Bird and Tom Morgan) ryan.bird@rocksound.tv PRINT ART EDITOR: Tom Morgan (Migos and Grayscale) tom.morgan@rocksound.tv

GOOD THINGS COME TO THOSE WHO WAIT. If ever a band personified that saying, it’s undoubtedly Don Broco. For more than five years, since the release of their debut album ‘Priorities’, they’ve steadily grown into one of the biggest UK rock bands going. They’ve risen where others have fallen, climbed higher while others have slipped, and through nothing more than some genuinely brilliant rock songs have reached a level that few of their peers have, or probably ever will. It’s taken a bloody long time – longer than it should have – but we are stoked to be the first magazine anywhere in the world to have them on the cover. We hope it was worth the wait.

It’s an exciting occasion, but next month things get even bigger on just about every level. We’ll be announcing details in the coming weeks, but trust us when we say that our next issue might just be the biggest we have ever produced in so many ways. Trust us, you’d have to be living on the moon not to know about it. Keep those eyes and ears peeled – it’s going to be truly spectacular. Stay patient…

ART INTERN: Kelly Challis (Lights and Paramore) kelly.challis@rocksound.tv ASSOCIATE EDITOR: Rob Sayce (The Tool, Twenty One Pilots and Refused Big Damn Band) rob.sayce@rocksound.tv JUNIOR EDITOR: Will Cross (Seaway and ’80s Madonna) will.cross@rocksound.tv DIGITAL DIGITAL EDITOR: Andy Biddulph (State Champs 2013 + State Champs 2015 + State Champs 2018) andy.biddulph@rocksound.tv ACTING SOCIAL MEDIA EXECUTIVE: Jack Rogers (Four Year Strong and Westlife) jack.rogers@rocksound.tv DIGITAL INTERN: Koen van Meijel (Lorde and Northlane) koen@rocksound.tv COMMERCIAL ADVERTISING DIRECTOR: Ben Crudgington (Bruno Mars and Stray From The Path) Tel: 0207 877 8776 ben.crudgington@rocksound.tv CONTRIBUTORS WRITERS: Matt Ayres, Alex Deller, Jennifer Geddes, Candice Haridimou, Chris Hidden, Josh Hummerston, Andrew Kelham, Emma Matthews, Niamh Moore, Heather McDaid, Mischa Pearlman, Gareth Pierce, Alex Reeves, Will Scott PHOTOGRAPHERS: Corinne Cumming, Adam Elmakias, Kevin Estrada, Tom Falcone, Mark Forrer, Steve Gerrard, Ben Gibson, Kane Hibberd, Elliott Ingham, Carla Mundy, Ashley Osborn, Nathaniel Shannon, Giles Smith, Justine Trickett, Mitchell Wojcik Newstrade distribution by Marketforce. If you have any trouble getting hold of Rock Sound in the shops please call: 020 3148 3333. Subscription rates are as follows: UK £37.99, Europe / US / Canada £49.00, Rest of world £69.00. To subscribe or if you have a problem with your subscription please call: 01293 312091 or email: rocksound@subscriptionhelpline.co.uk. All calls are charged at local rates. Rock Sound cannot accept responsibility for any unsolicited manuscripts and photographs or for material lost or damaged in the post. All material remains the copyright of Rock Sound Ltd. No part of Rock Sound may be reproduced in whole or part without the prior permission of the publisher (that includes uploading it online, kids). Our lawyers will be round (and they’re dead scary).

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NEWS AND REGULARS 6 THE BIG PICTURE: WATERPARKS

Awsten reveals his cardboard sidekick, ’Lil Awst... 8 THE BIG PICTURE: NECK DEEP

Here's how the band’s huge Manchester show looked. 10 FALL OUT BOY

We find out the latest on ‘M A N I A’ from Mr Pete Wentz. 14 TELLING IT AS IT IS

Patty swoops in to offer some more excellent advice. A bit like superman, but with less capes and more pop-punk. 16 TALK, TALK, TALK

Chrissy shares another insightful edition of her column. 18 TAKE MY MONEY

Because sick new merch makes winter 100 per cent better. 24 THE SECRET ROCKSTAR

Our band insider talks the pros and pitfalls of signing to labels.

BREAKOUT 30 CHASE ATLANTIC

Drawing on everything from R&B to ’00s rock, this trio are out to transform music. Here’s why you should join them. 32 THE WRECKS

From recording hit-and-run style to collaborating with Alex Gaskarth, it’s been quite a ride for these guys. 34 SHORELINES

Another month, another Australian pop-punk band nobody can afford to sleep on. 36 OH, WEATHERLY

Turning misfortune into gorgeous pop-rock, these Texans will melt your heart. 38 HOLD CLOSE

Bittersweet pop-punk, straight outta Missouri.

FEATURES 26 LIFE LESSONS: JUSTIN SANE

Anti-Flag’s frontman shares what he’s learned from three decades in punk. 28 7 OF 30: JAMES VECK-GILODI

Ever wondered what the Deaf Havana man’s last meal on earth would be, or what gets him all teary? Step this way. 48 DON BROCO

In their first ever full band cover feature, Bedford’s finest recall their long, winding road to the spotlight. May contain cowboys, aliens and ‘meaty riffs’. 58 THE USED

Vocalist Bert McCracken opens up about loss, reinvention, and his band’s bold new album. 60 AS IT IS

Patty returns to tell us all about his 2017 – and life after ‘Okay.’ 62 KNUCKLE PUCK

We take an inside look at ‘Shapeshifter’, one of the best pop-punk albums of the year. 64 WE CAME AS ROMANS

From fighting against the tide to returning stronger than ever, find out what the metalcore crew have been up to. 76 5 THINGS YOU NEVER KNEW ABOUT: ‘THE CHRONICLES OF LIFE AND DEATH’

Discover the story of Good Charlotte’s dark, groundbreaking third album – and the struggles that shaped it. 78 IN THE STUDIO: MOOSE BLOOD

Here’s how album three is shaping up. 80 MY TUNES: ALEX BABINSKI

PVRIS’ enigmatic guitarist shares his love of John Mayer, Iron Maiden and UK hardcore bands. 82 WOULD YOU RATHER: BONNIE FRASER

You know her as the voice of Stand Atlantic… but did you know that Bonnie’s also a time-travelling unicorn legend?

REVIEWS 66 PALAYE ROYALE 68 POLARIS 70 EVANESCENCE 72 QUICKSAND 74 LIKE MOTHS TO FLAMES 4 rock sound

IN ROCK SOUND

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6 rock sound

WATERPARKS CAMDEN UNDERWORLD, LONDON SEPTEMBER 28, 2017 PHOTO: Ben Gibson What do you do when you’re in the middle of headlining your biggest ever London show, in front of a packed and sweaty audience? Take a break, have a little drink, and pretend you’re making a miniature cardboard cutout of yourself sing into a microphone. As usual, Awsten truly does know best...

rock sound 7

8 rock sound

NECK DEEP APOLLO, MANCHESTER OCTOBER 14, 2017 PHOTO: Mark Forrer As their huge Manchester headline show draws to a close, Neck Deep frontman Ben Barlow climbs the barricade to get a closer look at the 3,500 people in attendance. If only there wasn’t all that bloody confetti in the way, he wouldn’t have had to go to such lengths…

rock sound 9

INSANIA

After breaking the internet with ‘Young And Menace’, FALL OUT BOY did it again when news emerged that new album ‘M A N I A’ was being pushed back to January. As the mystery continues, Pete Wentz dishes the dirt on what caused them to pump the brakes, and what we can expect from what’s already LOOKING LIKE 2018’s most insane album. INTERVIEW: Will Cross

10 rock sound

YOU MOVED THE RELEASE DATE OF ‘M A N I A’ TO JANUARY A COUPLE OF MONTHS AGO. WHERE ARE YOU GUYS AT WITH THE ALBUM ? “It’s a work in progress, but we’re much further along [than we were when we moved the date back]. It’s not necessarily that we weren’t far along before, it’s just that the songs weren’t the right songs. We totally altered the course, which was hugely important. Honestly, we could go around the world and play arenas and I could be like, ‘I’m going to go around the world and promote this record that I think is mediocre’. But we don’t ever want to do that – I don’t ever want to do that – so we just pivoted.”

WHY DIDN’T THE ORIGINAL SONGS FEEL RIGHT? “I don’t know – I think we got ourselves into a strange situation when we put out ‘Young And Menace’. We were like, ‘Well, what’s the rest of the body of work going to be?’ We really didn’t know what the rest of it was going to sound like. I think we just kind of let each other do our own thing, and rather than serving the art, we ended up serving each other. The songs Pete W just weren’t compelling to me. I was like, ‘Do you like this?’ and Patrick [Stump, vocals / guitar] was like, ‘Well, I thought you liked it?’ It turned out that neither one of us really liked anything!”

at a love song, but it’s still kinda twisted… so that means it’s still pretty Fall Out Boy!”

IS ‘YOUNG AND MENACE’ AS LEFT-FIELD AS THIS ALBUM IS GOING TO GET SONICALLY? “When me and Patrick talk about it... I think he would disagree with me! He thinks we should go further than ‘Young And Menace’, but I think that’s because he’s at the inception of the song, so it all sounds different to him. I think that ‘Young And Menace’ is about as far left as we’re going to go on this record, but I think there are other ones that are also experimental. It’s definitely more world-influenced – I’m so fascinated by a lot of what’s happening in Latin and African music right now and, although we have the constraints of being a band, I think those influences are coming through more.”

WAS IT A DIFFICULT CALL TO MOVE THE ALBUM RELEASE BACK? “It wasn’t in the sense that, what’s worse? Putting something out that you’re not proud of, or that you think is mediocre, or taking your time and fixing the situation? The latter has to be better than the former, especially with the culture we live in right now with entz the internet – there’s no room for mediocrity. You either put out something really good or something really bad and that’ll make noise, you can polarise people like ‘Young And Menace’ did, but there’s no room for mediocrity because there’s too much stuff out there – you’ll get no reaction.”

“There’s no room for mediocrity”

IS RECENT SINGLE ‘THE LAST OF THE REAL ONES’ FROM THOSE EARLY SESSIONS, OR DID IT COME MUCH MORE RECENTLY? “Much more recently – I don’t think people will hear anything else from the original ‘M A N I A’ sessions, at least in their current incarnation. Maybe you’ll get a melody or a couple lyrics or something, but for the most part it’s all scrapped. For ‘The Last Of The Real Ones’ we went in with this guy Illangelo, he’s a producer I’m really into. He lives not far away and we just played around with a bunch of stuff, and he had this idea for this crazy super-simple piano line, and we built the song around that. I think it’s different – it’s very different to both ‘Champion’ and ‘Young And Menace’ and I think it’s kind of different to anything Fall Out Boy’s done before; less so sonically and more so [in] the lyrical perspective. It’s maybe our third ever attempt

DO YOU THINK OTHER BANDS MIGHT FEEL THEY CAN’T MAKE THOSE SORTS OF CALLS BECAUSE OF THE CULTURE WE LIVE IN NOW? “Yes and no. When we put out ‘American Beauty / American Psycho’ it was an experiment to see if we could operate at the speed that DJs and rappers do, as far as recording and creating albums goes, and it almost killed us. At the same time, I think there are a lot of bands that think you can operate in the way you could 10 years ago. That lane exists, but it doesn’t exist if you want to be a band that’s mentioned in the same sentence as Drake. You can say that it’s not rock music, but all the kids moshing at his concert will disagree with you. We live in a hip-hop world – everybody wants to be A$AP Rocky or Kanye West. People thought that marching band music would be big forever, but time moves on. If you adapt, you can still be a part of it.” ‘M A N I A’ will be released January 19 via Island/DCD2. rock sound 11

ISSUE 233

RYAN BIRD

Knuckle puck ‘Shapeshifter’ scarlxrd ‘Lxrdszn’ PALAYE ROYALE ‘Boom Boom Room (Side A)’ neck deep ‘The Peace And The Panic’ marmozets ‘Knowing What You Know Now’

ANDY BIDDULPH

WE CAME AS ROMANS ‘Cold Like War’ PALAYE ROYALE ‘Boom Boom Room (Side A)’ SLEEP ON IT ‘Overexposed’ CHASE ATLANTIC ‘Chase Atlantic’ MOVEMENTS ‘Feel Something’

ROB SAYCE

WILL CROSS

COUNTERPARTS ‘You’re Not You Anymore’ PVRIS ‘White Noise’ DON BROCO ‘Priorities’ TOM PETTY AND THE HEARTBREAKERS ‘Damn The Torpedoes’ THE USED ‘The Canyon’ SCARLXRD ‘Lxrdszn’ HOLD CLOSE ‘I’ll Never Go Back’ FALL OUT BOY ‘Infinity On High’ SHARPTOOTH ‘Clever Girl’ CHARLI XCX ‘Number 1 Angel’

TOM MORGAN

DON BROCO ‘Pretty’ SCARLXRD ‘Lxrdszn SEAWAY ‘Vacation’ COUNTERPARTS ‘You’re Not You Anymore’ CHASE ATLANTIC ‘Chase Atlantic’

KELLY CHALLIS

LIGHTS ‘Skin&Earth’ TROPHY EYES ‘Chemical Miracle’ KNUCKLE PUCK ‘Shapeshifter’ PARAMORE ‘After Laughter’ THE STORY SO FAR ‘Out Of It’

BEN CRUDGINGTON

MASTODON ‘Cold Dark Place’ PALAYE ROYALE ‘Boom Boom Room (Side A)’ MILK TEETH ‘Go Away’ SECT ‘No Cure For Death’ FALL OUT BOY ‘From Under The Cork Tree’

JACK ROGERS

BILMURI ‘Frame’ THE XCERTS ‘Hold On To Your Heart’ AFTER THE BURIAL ‘Dig Deep’ SCARLXRD ‘Lxrdszn’ JULIEN BAKER ‘Turn Out The Lights’

KOEN VAN MEIJEL

STRAY FROM THE PATH ‘Only Death Is Real’ DEAF HAVANA ‘It’s Called The Easy Life’ TONIGHT ALIVE ‘Temple’ Lorde ‘Melodrama’ Milk teeth ‘Go Away’

12 rock sound

Times our jaws dropped watching Pierce The Veil’s bright, bizarre video for ‘Today I Saw The Whole World’. Still not over it.

Members of the Rock Sound team who were gutted when hints of a D.R.U.G.S. reunion turned out to be fake. Shout out to a supergroup who didn’t suck.

Book that Andy Biersack has finished writing (so far) as we found out recently. This makes him a musician, lyricist, actor, fashion designer and wordsmith.

400 + (ish) Head bobs in Don Broco’s ‘Stay Ignorant’ video. It’s a thing now.

10/10 If we had to grade With Confidence’s ‘Waterfall’ video in , this is what we’d give it. So many feels.

“I should be in charge of prison” Ryan Bird stares down the criminal justice system. There can only be one winner. “Last I heard, Jesus was smashing it” Rob Sayce probably shouldn’t have fallen asleep in religious studies. “I like a bit of cathedral action” After a Twitter banter-off broke out between UK cathedrals, Andy Biddulph expressed his admiration. “I love a cathedral” Jack Rogers there. Also a fan.

“Apparently they’re smoking pubes in prison now” So, that thing we just said? That, but even more so.

Songs on Marmozets’ new album ‘Knowing What You Know Now’, coming in January.

Length of Of Mice & Men’s on the road documentary ‘Unbreakable’, following them around the world and back.

“Fresh packets of ham are the worst offenders” As Tom Morgan explained, sometimes food just smells.

“I might smoke the noodles” You know the saying ‘Smoke ‘em if you got ‘em’? It doesn’t really apply to instant noodles.

26:10

“My head’s big… hats don’t fit me” Andy Biddulph had a Ron Burgundy moment one afternoon. “I’ve married two people” Jack Rogers: a dude who sometimes conducts weddings, not a bigamist.

137

Tracks on ‘Vegas Strong’, a benefit album released to aid a medical centre in Las Vegas. It features music from ROAM, Taking Back Sunday and loads more.

OVERHEARD

IN THE OFFICE

Awesome covers by Story Untold frontman Janick Thibault we showcased over on our website. His ‘King For A Day’ is pretty special.

“Come on lads, fuck me up” We can’t even remember why Jack Rogers said this. “Less banter, please” The most offensive thing anyone said in the Rock Sound office all month, courtesy of Andy Biddulph.

T I S I S A WITH

PATTY WALTERS

WHY DID YOU CALL YOUR SONG ‘SOAP’ BY THAT NAME WHEN YOU DON’T EVEN SAY THE WORD IN THE SONG? MARIANNA “The song is a confrontation between our flawed, messy, complicated selves and the more confident alter egos we advertise to the world. I sing as a weak protagonist, and Ben as a sinister antagonist, but they’re two perspectives of a single character. The dynamic didn’t feel dissimilar to the relationship between the two main characters in Fight Club, so we called the song ‘Soap’ as a reference.” MY FRIEND FOUND OUT ABOUT YOUR HAMSTER AND NOW SHE KEEPS WRITING FANFICTION ABOUT IT BEING IN A

METALCORE BAND. JUST THOUGHT YOU’D LIKE TO KNOW. NEL “Personally I think that’s pretty cool, but I don’t think Kirk would appreciate your friend’s trivial, somewhat disturbing fantasies (those would be his words, not mine, of course). Kirk only enjoys the finest pleasures of this world, like Mozart and Shakespeare, and gracelessly bowling around in his sand bath.” I’M THINKING ABOUT GETTING MY FIRST TATTOO BUT I’M WORRIED IT’LL BE SUPER PAINFUL. AM I RIGHT TO BE WORRIED? DEB “I won’t lie, I’m a giant baby and I hate getting tattoos. People have vastly different pain thresholds, and the placement of your tattoo will influence how painful it’ll be. As long as you’re positive about your design and having it on your body for the rest of forever, the end result will probably be worth the painful, painful pain.”

HOW MUCH DO BOOTLEGGERS HARM YOUR BAND, AND WHY IS MERCH GOT A SO EXPENSIVE INSIDE THE VENUE QUESTION THESE DAYS? FOR PATTY? CALLUM EMAIL: PATTY@ “That’s a really great question! ROCKSOUND. It probably won’t shock you to TV hear that bands don’t make much money selling their albums these days; selling merch is really the only sustainable income for a band at our level. To oversimplify it, getting a shirt designed, printed, and delivered all add to its cost, then a percentage of that profit will go to management and sometimes to the venue. All of those people, ourselves included, love what we do and want to support our community. Given the choice between supporting your scene and giving some lazy, selfish asshole bootlegger a few quid for the worst quality hoodie you’ve ever seen, I’d sincerely hope you’d choose the former.” 14 rock sound

MY MATE’S PARENTS JUST MADE HIM HAVE ‘THE TALK’ AND I’M TERRIFIED MINE WILL FOLLOW SUIT. HOW CAN I AVOID THIS TOTAL CRINGEFEST? JOSH “I’m very sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but there is no known way to avoid ‘the talk’. It will be painfully awkward and beyond embarrassing, but ‘the talk’ is a universal rite of passage that we all must suffer through eventually. If it’s any consolation, your parents will probably be even more uncomfortable than you.” DO YOU THINK POLITICS HAS A PLACE IN MUSIC? I KEEP HEARING EVERYBODY I LIKE IN BANDS BANGING ON ABOUT IT AND I’M GETTING KINDA SICK OF IT. SHELL “Yes, I believe that politics has a place in music. I think most of us are somewhat livid and exhausted, if not slightly desensitised, by this current worldwide political shitstorm. I can appreciate that music can offer an invaluable escape from such a bleak and disappointing reality, however it can also offer a profoundly positive catalyst for social change. Music is one of the most personal and pure mediums of self-expression, and the moment anyone attempts to dictate or censor creativity is the very moment and reason that art exists at all.”

If PATTY couldn’t answer your question THIS TIME, but you’re still in need of help, advice or SIMPLY someone to talk to, help is at hand. Samaritans are here to talk 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. All queries are strictly confidential and there is no religious affiliation whatsoever. If you need guidance, call the Samaritans on 08457 90 90 90 (UK) or contact them on email via jo@samaritans.org.

AIRING NOW ON SCUZZ - SKY CHANNEL 367

TAL

ALK

L K, T A T , K

Chrissy Costanza Being in a band I get to travel a hell of a lot, and it’s incredible. I get to meet amazing people, see awe-inspiring places and eat delicious food. But I have also met my fair share of horrible, terrible, obnoxious people, mostly in airports and on planes. I don’t know what it is, but something about airports and planes either attracts the lowest forms of human life or brings out the absolute worst in people. Seriously, these people suck. Most of the time, it’s actually pretty funny within a couple hours of the ordeal being over – I’ve always joked that I’m going to write a book about the worst people on planes. However, since I barely even have time to take a shower every day, this article will be a good starting point for me. So here are a few of my favourite, comically shitty plane people. Let’s start with the gentleman (it makes me laugh to even call him that, but hey, I’m not the worst kind of person so I’ll try to be nice) sitting next to me right now. Seriously – I’m writing this on a plane and the dude sitting next to me is awful. The worst part is that I wasn’t even supposed to be sitting next to him – a woman switched so she could sit next to her husband. Which I guess is understandable, but still. Anyways, I digress. I’m a small person, and small people have small organs. Small organs means small bladders, so your girl here usually has to use the restroom on a flight. This guy was unbelievably annoyed at me for asking to scooch by so I could use the restroom. SO. ANNOYED. I wonder how he would have liked it if I just peed my pants next to him instead? But that’s not even the worst thing – the flight attendant comes around the with the little snack basket and oh no! There are no peanuts! She very politely explains that someone on the plane is deathly – let me repeat, deathly – allergic to peanuts. This guy gets so mad that he’s huffing and puffing, rolling his eyes and breathing heavily, looking through the other snacks with his jaw clenched before pushing the basket away and going, “Whatever – forget it.” Sorry that someone has a life-threatening allergy,

dude. Seems like you’re used to not having any nuts though, so maybe get over it. The next terrible person was from last year. I was on a flight and sitting in an exit row. The guy next to me apparently had a problem with the size of his seat, which mind you, is the same size as everyone else’s seat but with more legroom. So he decides that I’m going to be cool with it if he lifts up the armrest between us and sits, no exaggeration, halfway on my fucking seat on an eight-hour flight. Thankfully, he actually had to switch seats because he couldn’t sit in an exit row, or perhaps just didn’t want to. My next shout out is actually for a flight attendant on one of our flights from this last tour. There were a couple of open rows in the back of the plane and I wasn’t feeling well, so I asked one of the flight attendants if I could move to one of the empty rows, and she said yes. This male flight attendant came over and asked me if there was a problem. I very nicely explained that I just wasn’t feeling well, so I moved to the back to not disturb the strangers sitting next to me. He told me that they didn’t allow moving seats on the flight in a very, very fake, nice but secretly nasty voice. I said that I was sorry but that I had cleared it with another flight attendant before switching. He then switched to this completely different voice that was straight up venomous, and started explaining to me how sitting next to strangers was part of flying, before calling me “sweetie”. I stayed super-kind the entire time, thinking he’d leave me alone eventually. I just said, “Look, I fly a lot…” and was about the explain how I was unaware of the seat policy because no other airline had ever had an issue with it, when he cut me off and snapped at me. “If you fly so much then you should have known better.” Mind you, again, that I had already asked for permission to move. He was just an asshole. I could go on for a year, but for now these are my top three.

I have met my fair share of horrible, terrible, obnoxious people in airports and on planes.

16 rock sound

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THAT WAS FUN! THANKS TO ALL THOSE WHO ATTENDED THE FIREBALL

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rock sound 23

They’ve sold countless records, toured the world and appeared on the cover of just about every rock magazine YOU CAN THINK OF. Meet Rock Sound’s top secret band insider…

this month

The Secret Rock Star On...

SIGNING TO A LABEL

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What does it really mean to sign to a big label in 2017? Is it even something bands should aim for these days? The Secret Rock Star has some opinions on that!

he term ‘being signed’ used to be a major thing for bands. Now? You can put out music yourself and I don’t think being signed really matters unless somebody offers you ridiculous money and can hold up the promises that every record label makes. The main promise? ‘This could be the record that makes you a superstar!’ I’ve never played a song for a record label and had somebody say, ‘This song is shit!’ They can’t do it, because they have to be nice. It’s horrible in a sense because a lot of young bands meet them, hear the bullshit that people say and think, ‘We’re going to be huge!’ I remember it happening to a young band who only had a few songs out at the time. They signed to a big, big label and all they did was brag that they were signed to this major label and that they were going to be stars... all kinds of shit. Fast forward a few months and they’d been dropped and they’re all broke because they spent all of their money on drugs and hugely expensive instruments. They thought there’d be an endless supply of money coming in, but it doesn’t work like that. They were told they were going to be the next big thing and it didn’t happen. I feel sorry for them, but they were stupid with it. Until you actually find out what it’s like – that signing to a huge label may not do that much for you and you don’t really get that much money – people think, ‘Oh, you’re signed to a label and you’re instantly rich.’ Your life doesn’t change overnight. One night, we supported at a huge, world-famous venue in New York. If you’d have been there that night watching us – and watching the thousands and thousands of people who liked our band – you’d have thought we were rich and huge. I slept in our van that night. As with almost everything else in life, you have to work for it and hope you get a tiny bit of luck. If a label sees you play a show and decides they want you to sign with them, they’ll try to schmooze you. Some will take you out for dinner and put you up in a nice hotel. Some will promise big recording budgets and lots of cash to shoot fancy music videos. Some will drop thousands of dollars just taking you out to dinner and offer to take you to bars, strip clubs... all of the clichés. I can see how young, naïve bands have their heads turned. They must think, ‘This is how we’re going to live now’. Except they don’t live like that. The only money you’ll really get is to record an album, and after that a label might pay for a tourbus on a tour or two, but they’ll always need to recoup that cost. No matter how much money they give you, they want that back. That’s how business works I guess, but a lot of bands also quickly realise that nobody is as invested in their

“A band signed to a big, big label and all they did was brag that they were signed to this major label and that they were going to be stars... all kinds of sh*t.” band as them. Bigger labels have hundreds of other bands, and you only get priority when you start making them money. The head of one of my band’s past labels decided he had something better to do the day we were supposed to meet for the first time. We never did meet, I don’t even know if he saw us play. In a way, being signed to a big label is the greatest, most stressful thing in the world. A label turning around, planning an album and saying, ‘We want 12 songs in the next two months’ pushes you to see just how good a band you are. Some bands manage to push through, some don’t. It depends on what kind of people you are. But there’s no guarantee it’ll work. I know bands whose labels have paid hundreds and hundreds of thousands of dollars to work with huge producers, and at the end of all of it they’ve ended up with bad albums that don’t sell. As soon as a label’s interest in you dies you’re going to have to do something miraculous to get back on their good side. You can even go past their expectations of what you’re going to sell, but if they’re not sure your band fits into the particular scene they’re targeting at that point, it could spell the end of your relationship. Much like fans, labels’ heads can get turned. It can be disheartening, I’ve become quite desensitized to it all, but if you were a less strong band it could ruin you. It doesn’t even necessarily need to be a bad relationship, it’s just often a faceless one. Then again, I know people who have signed to a label and had to pay to have 1,000 CDs printed just to use the name of the label, so it’s not all bad!

When albums don’t sell and songs don’t get played on the radio, bands get dropped or – more often than that – bands and labels agree to part ways amicably. People think, ‘Oh, you’re not signed to a big label any more, you must suck’. But most of the time it’s in their interest not to be on a big label any more. People think being on a label is the be-all-and-end-all, but really it can mean almost nothing. I’m not saying it’s always like that, but now, you can put music out there on YouTube and Spotify. I think people are going to start bands and not even want to get signed. They’re just going to build themselves up from the ground. My band, for example, were much better off financially when we took a more DIY outlook for a while. Every single one of us has got the power to put music out there to people. I couldn’t get a CD out to everyone I can think of, but if I put a song online I could link them to it and people can find it. It’s getting easier now. Not necessarily to earn money, but to build your band and connect with people. It feels like labels are becoming more irrelevant by the day.

CATCH MORE FROM THE SECRET ROCK STAR EVERY MONTH AT WWW.ROCKSOUND.TV rock sound 25

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JUSTIN SANE anti-flag INTERVIEW: Rob Sayce

THE PITTSBURGH PUNK LIFER TACKLES TRUMP, TRAVEL AND WHY THERE’S ALWAYS LIGHT IN THE DARKNESS. LESSON #1 IF YOU DON’T GIVE IT A SHOT, YOU’LL NEVER SUCCEED

“Here’s my number one lesson from almost 30 years in Anti-Flag: if you don’t show up, it will not happen for you. Every so often just playing a Monday night show in a small town, for not a lot of people, ends up leading to something incredible. Maybe you meet somebody who asks you to work with them on a project that changes your life, or you see something that transforms your outlook. Every experience is important.”

LESSON #2 YOU DON’T HAVE TO BE DEFINED BY YOUR BACKGROUND

“Both of my mother’s parents were from Ireland, and when they came to the U.S. they were discriminated against. My grandfather didn’t like Protestants because he saw them as people who kept him away from opportunities for work. My mom got to know a lot of different people growing up, and realised that kind of thinking wasn’t going to work for her. I grew up around my parents’ progressive way of seeing the world. The people who, instead of collapsing themselves into a bubble, decide they are going to grow beyond that – they’re the ones who inspire me.”

LESSON #3 MUSIC CAN CHANGE THE WORLD

“I naively started this band thinking, ‘If we just say something, the world will change!’ We found out quickly that you don’t just write a song, people hear it and everything’s fixed. But if you

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keep saying things, and you’re passionate about what you’re doing, you will eventually connect. You music changes people, and then they go out and change the world. Every day on tour, I meet somebody who says, ‘I found your band, it made me care about the world, now I’m a human rights lawyer’. Maybe they’re a judge, or an environmentalist. We’ve been around long enough that the people who heard us when they were young have gone into the world with a mission – influenced by the ideas in our music.”

LESSON #4 PEOPLE ARE MORE SIMILAR THAN THEY ARE DIFFERENT

“Travelling and performing beats the shit out of you: it can be hard. But experiencing all of these different places around the world has proven to me what I always suspected. No matter where they come from, most people are pretty much the same. They have the same hopes and aspirations. It’s amazing when you’re in Japan, you can’t speak the language and someone you meet can’t understand yours, but you still find a way to have a laugh. After growing up in a steel town like Pittsburgh, where McDonald’s was considered a classy restaurant, it’s been an incredible ride.”

LESSON #5 BACK WHAT YOU BELIEVE IN

“I’m more of an activist now than I’ve ever been. When we started out I’d have killed to partner with organisations like Amnesty International and Greenpeace, but you have to establish yourself first. If I didn’t have this band, I’d probably hold

a much darker viewpoint, and that’s one reason I’ve persevered so long. Playing punk rock is in my DNA, and so is being socially engaged.”

LESSON #6 NOT EVERYTHING IS FUCKED…

“When people go, ‘Things are so fucked, now we have President Trump and Brexit’, I say, ‘Even with those things, it’s still better today than it used to be’. I remember when guys would regularly find out someone was gay and beat the shit out of them for it, when even punk rock was full of nationalism and sexism. Together the scene made a decision to reject those things, to try and build a space free from bigotry, and it’s eventually filtered into general society. Progress is a series of battles, and you’ll lose many of them. Eventually you win a few too. That’s one reason gigs are so important – letting you know you’re not alone.”

LESSON #7 …BUT NEVER GET COMPLACENT

“People need to know there’s a solidarity out there, people standing against what Donald Trump represents. When groups are faced with a situation where their backs are up against the wall, that’s when they’re most desperate. That’s why all these racists and fascists are crawling out of the gutter. Being apathetic about that isn’t going to cut it, because the end result is Trump. Now is the time for us to be truly brave.” ‘American Fall’ is out now via Spinefarm.

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JAMES VECK-GILODI D E A F H A V A N A INTERVIEW: Jack Rogers

30 QUESTIONS. PICK 7. ANSWER ’EM. SIMPLE. JAMES’ PICKS:

#1: What is the BEST piece of advice you’ve ever had?

“In regards to music, do it for the sake of music and no other reason. If you want to play music, do it because you want to play music. Don’t do it because you want to get famous or you want to make money. Neither of those things necessarily happens – then you end up miserable and compromising everything. Just try to do it because you love it. It’s the only piece of advice that I will ever give to other people. Outside of music, probably Bill and Ted when they said, ‘Be excellent to each other’.”

#7: When was the last time you cried?

“The last time I shed a tear was on a plane back from Australia the other month. I can’t remember exactly what I was watching, but it was only vaguely emotional. I hate flying anyway – I’m already unstable on a flight because I always think that I’m going to die – but I was definitely feeling emotional. I think it must have something to do with the altitude, it always happens. Why do they put sad stuff on flights anyway? I was on a flight once and they had the film Flight playing, which is about a plane crash. That’s a terrible choice.”

#11: What ARE YOU ADDICTED TO?

“Alcohol, definitely. I wouldn’t say I’m really badly addicted, though. Like, I don’t wake up in the morning and find myself unable to function without a drink, but I struggle going out somewhere without having one. It’s impossible; it’s so annoying. I wish I was comfortable enough in myself that I didn’t have to have a drink every time I went out. It’s never just one, either, even if you say it is.”

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#13: What would you want your last meal on Earth to be? “I’d say probably some sort of Italian food. I would have vegetarian ragu with some sort of pasta, I reckon. Actually, if it was my last meal on Earth, of course I would eat meat! There was this restaurant that we went to in Mexico a while ago, and I would basically eat all of the food on their menu. That would be how I would die – I would just eat myself to death.”

#14: What do you think the world will be like in 100 years?

“I think everything will be completely run by computers. You see kids in schools now who can use an iPad more than they can use a pen and paper – I see babies playing on iPads. It’s just going to be an extension of that, but much worse. No one can write anymore; no one can do anything anymore. There won’t be anybody working in shops – they are all going to be run by computers. I think there will be a lot of unemployment because there are a lot of jobs where a person doesn’t actually have to be there. Either that or we’ll have all destroyed each other. I have no idea which is more likely these days.”

#19: What’s the worst present you’ve ever given somebody?

“Chlamydia – joking! I’m actually pretty terrible at giving gifts, so probably everything I’ve ever given. I always seem to buy people stuff that I just want to use myself. Actually, to be fair, I probably haven’t given many bad ones because I’ll have either given someone nothing at all, or something that’s actually pretty decent. When I was a kid I probably gave my parents a

shitty little model made of clay that I had to make at school and thought was so amazing. That’s a pretty terrible gift, now I think about it.”

#27: What would you ask if you met the Devil? “I’d ask if I could be his mate, obviously. If I could be mates with him and get a free pass from getting burnt forever then brilliant. I could be his wingman and go with him to recruit people for the Underworld – I reckon that would be fucking awesome. I’ve probably met the Devil somewhere before anyway and just not realised it. He would be much better to hang out with than fucking God. God would be such a loser, being nice to everyone. At least the Devil hates everyone, and wears proper shoes.” Deaf Havana’s new album ‘All These Countless Nights: Reworked’ is out now via SO Recordings.

WANT MORE 7 OF 30 ACTION? You can find a whole host of 7 Of 30 interviews on our YouTube channel, featuring the likes of All Time Low, Twenty One Pilots and many more. Simply head over to www.youtube. com/rocksound to check them out in all their glory.

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CHASE ATLANTIC

world-blending trio on the cusp of BECOMING a phenomenon

FROM: Brisbane, Australia RELEASE: ‘Chase Atlantic’

(Album, Warner Bros. Out now)

chaseatlantic

hase Atlantic are CHANGING THINGS.

Discovered and mentored by Good Charlotte’s Joel and Benji Madden (not unlike a certain other rule-bending trio by the name of Waterparks…) – brothers Mitchel and Clinton Cave and their friend Christian Anthony formed a band with the idea of bringing all the musical genres they’ve grown up loving together into one sound – no rules, no labels, no limitations. Following the release of their groundbreaking debut album, meet a band you’re going to be hearing a whole lot more about…

HOW DID YOU GUYS COME TOGETHER?

Mitchel Cave (Vocals): “So basically Clinton and I have been making music together since were about 12 years old. We met Christian, clicked straight away and started taking it a little more seriously. We had this

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collaboration going on between the three of us that we really liked so we made the conscious decision to do music as a career and become a band.”

YOU FOCUSED ON MUSIC RATHER THAN DOING GAP YEARS OR UNIVERSITY. WHAT WAS THE AUSTRALIAN MUSIC SCENE LIKE TO GROW UP IN?

Mitchel: “I feel the Australian music scene is fantastic but all the best music comes from the underground or the not-so-popular music. Commercial music in Australia is very…” Clinton Cave (Guitar / Saxophone): “…The Australian pop scene is garbage! No disrespect to them…” Mitchel: “No disrespect to them… but they’re trash! So we wanted to change that and try and make cool commercial music that was considered actually respectable.”

Clinton: “Yeah, when we were younger that was always the dream but looking back we weren’t really pulling it off that well and kinda making shit music ourselves! But now we’re finally at a stage where the music isn’t shit, so I guess it’s going well!”

THAT SHOWS IN HOW MUSICALLY UNIQUE YOU GUYS ARE – IS THAT A RESULT OF GROWING UP LOVING ALL KINDS OF MUSIC?

Christian Anthony (Guitar / Vocals): “For sure, definitely a result of growing up listening to people from Skrillex to The Beatles. When we go to create music we’re not thinking, ‘Oh we want to grab a little bit of this or this,’ but subconsciously the vibe we’re going for is something completely different. It’s completely natural to us to create more of a fusion rather than relying on a specific or singular genre.” Mitchel: “We came to the realization that in order for

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us to be successful we had to break away from being a specific sound or genre, we had to make our own style of music.”

DO YOU THINK IT’S CRUCIAL THAT NEW BANDS FIND A UNIQUE SOUND WITH SO MUCH MUSIC INSTANTLY AVAILABLE?

Mitchel: “I feel like in this day and age that’s the only key factor, the music industry is so flooded.” Clinton: “You have lots of bands out there but obviously you have cycles – bands aren’t as popular at the moment. Hip-hop is like the rock ‘n’ roll genre right now, so for us having that production element where we produce our own music, we’re able to create a hybrid of genres which becomes more timeless – we’re not trying to make a specific genre, we want to be able to be flexible and work to what people want to hear and we want to hear. We don’t want to be full-on rappers… yet (laughs).”

Mitchel: “Yeah that’s absolutely it. The more the merrier when it comes to what you can do within the limits of music, if you can do the most then you should do the most. Explore what you can and never be afraid to try out new ideas.”

YOU WERE ON A VERY DIVERSE BILL RECENTLY WITH SLEEPING WITH SIRENS, PALAYE ROYALE AND THE WHITE NOISE – DO YOU THINK BILLS LIKE THAT ARE THE WAY FORWARD? Mitchel: “Absolutely, when talking to fans and people who come to the shows, they say their favourite thing is that it’s such a diverse bill, they’re not hearing the exact same sound over and over again, it’s very refreshing. I think to hear four different sounds at a concert, it becomes more interesting and enjoyable and it keeps you on your toes as well.”

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DO YOU FEEL THERE’S A BRIDGING HAPPENING RIGHT NOW BETWEEN MUSICAL WORLDS?

Mitchel: “Yeah I think it’s rapidly becoming a very common theme in music. Even rap right now is bringing in guitars. I think it’s a great thing to see people starting to fuse genres together. It’s definitely happened previously, but now more than ever. Because of how saturated the music industry is, people are trying to come up with new music and unique genres... we don’t want to restrict ourselves in any way whatsoever.”

NOW THE ALBUM’S WITH US, WHAT ARE YOUR PLANS GOING INTO 2018?

Mitchel: “We’re really hoping to visit other countries and see what other markets we can tap into and really just get involved as much as possible... we would be more than happy to tour with any artist from any genre as long as we respect them.” WORDS: Will Cross rock sound 31

FROM: Los Angeles, USA RELEASE: ‘We Are The Wrecks’ (EP, Another Century. Out now)

wearethewrecks

When great songs and good fortune collide, anything can happen. The Wrecks’ debut EP – particularly

their breakthrough single, ‘Favorite Liar’ – is a perfect example. “Just a few weeks after we all met for the first time, a friend of ours was housesitting for someone with a home studio,” laughs vocalist / guitarist Nick Anderson. “We went in, recorded our debut EP in three days, and got out of there without the owner even knowing!”

WEEZER

An invitation to open All Time Low’s Young Renegades U.S. tour quickly followed, allowing the five-piece to show off their brand of spiky, ridiculously catchy songwriting to huge audiences every night. “We went into every show with something to prove,” Nick recalls. “My favourite thing to hear was, ‘I usually hate the opening band, but you guys are amazing!’ We want to make sure we’re remembered.” They certainly left an impression on Alex Gaskarth. So much so, he’s even co-written a track on the band’s

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upcoming second EP. “I went in thinking I was writing for a future All Time Low album, and Alex came in thinking he was writing for our next record,” chuckles the frontman. “So we thought, ‘Screw it, let’s just make a song!’” “There’s no ceiling on this band, no constraints,” he continues. “If you think you know what we’ll sound like next, you’re probably wrong! I can’t wait for people to hear our next EP.” Well, same. WORDS: Rob Sayce

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PRESENTS

From: Brisbane, Australia Release: ‘New Heights’ (EP, self-release. Out now)

STATE CHAMPS

shorelinesAU

Sometimes, it takes a little time to find the perfect mix in a band.

For Shorelines vocalist / guitarist Dylan Thompson, something just didn’t feel right with his and fellow vocalist / bassist Harry White’s previous venture Call The Shots. “Maturity was definitely missing from that band,” Dylan explains. “We all have equal input within Shorelines now. It’s all four of us coming together and making the music we want to make.” The band may have only been together for just under a

year, but it’s already clear how in tune these lads are with what direction they want their music to head in. Though it seems that a lot of where they are now has come about naturally, rather than through any form of design. “It kind of just happened really,” Dylan explains. “We all come from different musical backgrounds. So we have rock tones, punk rhythms and then poppy lyrics. We don’t really know how it all came together, but it keeps working so we’re just going with it.” Four of those happy accidents make up the band’s debut EP ‘New Heights’, which demonstrates both their

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knack for penning an ear-twitching chorus and a deeper emotional connection that Dylan and Harry share with their impassioned dual-vocal delivery. It’s a doozy of a statement. “The title says it all,” Dylan concludes. “We’re all heading for new heights and bigger things with this band. It’s us showing that we’re really confident with what we’ve got.” If they carry on at this pace, the quintet will be hitting the stratosphere sharpish. With their debut album finished and coming very soon, there’s only one thing left to say... Watch this space. WORDS: Jack Rogers

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SHARPTOOTH

A STORY TOLD

SPEAK LOW IF YOU SPEAK LOVE

HEAD NORTH

For Fans Of: Knocked Loose,

Every Time I Die, The Fever

For Fans Of: State Champs,

7 Minutes In Heaven, Waterparks

For Fans Of: This Wild Life, Taylor Swift, Dashboard Confessional

For Fans Of: Trophy Eyes, A Will Away, Brand New

Baltimore’s Sharptooth spin a brutal brand of heaviness, that also happens to be irresistibly accessible. Brilliant frontwoman Lauren Kashan deals in killer and unforgettable fuck-you hooks with debut album ‘Clever Girl’ sounding genuinely unique – see the barbed melodies of ‘Left 4 Dead’ or ‘Pushing Forward’. Seriously, you’ve got to hear this band.

Want a bit more edge to those pop bangers? Having just toured across the U.S. with recent Breakout stars 7 Minutes In Heaven, West Virginia’s A Story Told are the one. Armed with new album ‘Good Looks’, –‘Good As Gold’ and ‘Teenage Horror’ sound like a dancefloor State Champs. Into that new Hoodie Allen / Derek DiScanio collab? Get on this.

Speaking of State Champs… bassist Ryan Scott Graham is stepping out on his own (on the side of course) in this lovely solo guise, blending chill acoustic vibes with modern pop hooks and more than a tinge of country. Supporting Neck Deep from the start of next year across the States, throw on tunes like ‘Knots’ or ‘A List Of Things’ and get blissful.

Kicking off a huge tour supporting Trophy Eyes in America later this month, New York’s Head North bring in everything from tearjerking emo to hooky alt.rock and enveloping walls of noise. Brand New’s Jesse Lacey would be proud of the unusual melodies in songs like ‘Head North Is A Business’ and ‘Pulse’. Emotional, varied and bloody lovely.

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EMOTIONAL TEXANS READY TO FLUTTER (AND BREAK) YOUR HEART

‘MAISKTEN TO BRIGE you HT ’ O playlist

FROM: Dallas, USA RELEASE: ‘Make You Bright’ (EP, Hopeless. Out now)

MAYDAY PARADE

ohweatherly

For Oh, Weatherly vocalist Blake Roses, music is therapy.

Whether he’s feeling down or reflecting on a dramatic event in his life, he deals with it by writing a song. And complicated relationship in particular has fuelled his songwriting for the Texan five-piece thus far. Just don’t mention the H-word… “Everyone’s always asking, ‘When are you going to write a happy song?’ and I’m like, ‘I don’t know! When it comes to me,’” laughs the singer before explaining the origin of

his glumness. “Each time, before I’ve written a record, the same girl and I have broken up and then gotten engaged… So that’s why these songs keep happening.” And that heartache translated into a contagious debut EP last year called ‘Long Nights And Heavy Hearts’, boasting both aching emo sentiments and a snappy pop-punk delivery – think Mayday Parade and The Gospel Youth colliding and you’re almost there. But they should have something to be happy about now

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that they’re signed to Hopeless Records and recently announced their new EP ‘Make You Bright’, right? “Getting signed to Hopeless is just out of this world for us. We would have died if we knew that was going to happen four years ago.” And the new music? “It’s almost happy! I think it’s the closest we could get,” chuckles Blake. “The single ‘Make You Bright’ has a happier indie-like vibe. Although I think it’s the rawest record that we’re ever going to write.” You can take the boy out of the emo… WORDS: Candice Haridimou

SLEEP ON IT

ALAZKA

Bearings

“First off, they have the classic pop-punk sound I love. There’s not a song I’ve heard that I can’t sing and dance around to. Secondly, I absolutely love their lyrics. They’re so beautiful and are great for laughing, crying, just relaxing – pretty much any feeling. Finally, they’re super humble and down-to-earth people. I’ve met them twice and they’re absolutely awesome. All in all, they’re amazing and I highly recommend them to people looking for new music to listen to.”

“ALAZKA are one of my favourites in the metalcore genre because of how they’ve changed the way I look at the melodic side of it. The melodic side of the genre hasn’t been catching on for me recently, but ALAZKA are an exception in the best way. They crafted debut album ‘Phoenix’ with an effort that shines through – songs like ‘Everglow’ and ‘Everything’ are amazing in the way they have a wonderfully unique guitar sound but mixed with calming vocals and classic screaming.”

“Bearings are making waves in the scene not simply because of their pop-punk sensibilities, but because of hard work. A willingness to play anywhere and everywhere over the last three years is being noticed and they’re now on Pure Noise Records. The sky is the limit for them – pop-punk hooks reminiscent of early New Found Glory and lyrics unafraid to be vulnerable define their latest EP ‘Nothing Here is Permanent’. Be sure to add it to your playlist!”

Check Out: ‘Window’ sleeponitband

Check Out: ‘Phoenix’ alazkaofficial

Check Out: : ‘North Hansen’ bearingsisaband

Naomi S. James

THE NEW STARS

OF YOUR STEREO

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Nicc Wright

Dan Bowyer

FROM: Springfield, USA RELEASE: ‘I’ll Never Go Back’ (EP, Hopeless. Out now)

KNUCKLE PUCK

holdcloseofficial

“We alL went to THE SAME High School and played in different bands together,” smiles Hold Close vocalist

Braxton Smiley with a spark of enthusiasm in his voice. “We decided to take it a little more serious I guess and here we are today.” The American pop-punk scene is overflowing right now with hundreds of bands across the country pouring their hearts out in dive bars and sweaty venues. But the key to Hold Close’s success so far could be that

unpretentious, grounded ethos to keep it individual within the burgeoning larger scene. “We don’t just sit down and try to write a pop-punk song. We just throw some shit together and if we think it sounds cool we write a song off of it.” Now freshly signed to Hopeless, that attitude is clearly working wonders and Braxton is keen to point out that it’s translating on a local level too. “Our scene here in Springfield has definitely got better over the last year and a half. I can say with confidence that we’ve helped that a lot here in town too. People are starting to come

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to shows more, have fun with it and care a lot more than they used to.” It’s an attitude to help build and create something new – step by step – and that isn’t lost on the frontman. New EP ‘I’ll Never Go Back’ energetically reflects their influences, be it The Story So Far or Trophy Eyes, but it carries its own stamp. “We write things that we think we would like to listen to,” he says. “I think we’ve figured out the way to write our songs.” And if this is only the beginning, who knows what could come next. WORDS: Will Scott

YOUR FAVOURITE bands’ new FAVOURITE bands

GARDENSIDE

GRAYSCALE

homesafe

FIL THORPE-EVANS, NECK DEEP

RYAN LOCKE, SEAWAY

DAN LAMBTON, REAL FRIENDS

“My favourite new band have to be Gardenside – their debut EP is one of my favourite new releases. They combine a bunch of my favourite genres to create something that I think is really unique. I’m a big Jimmy Eat World fan and I get a lot of those vibes, but with a more pop-punk edge. I might be biased as I’m working with the band but that came as a product of me loving them first, so it’s for real. The song ‘Blind’ is a hit for sure.”

Check Out: ‘Blind’ gardensideband 38 rock sound

“Grayscale are my favourite new band going right now. They put out an amazing record called ‘Adornment’ earlier this year and we’ve just toured with them on the Four Year Strong tour in the States – they’ve been a pleasure to watch live every night. One thing I like about them is that they have their own sound and vibe; they don’t try and fit into a specific mold – check out a song like ‘Atlantic’!”

Check Out: ‘Forever Yours’ grayscalepa

“Throughout the last few years a whole hell of a lot of great bands and talent has been coming out of Chicago. With the release of their latest EP ‘Evermore’, Homesafe seem able to back me up on this one. These songs are unpredictable and show promise for a band that will be able to come out of left-field and make it work. Check out songs like ‘Relapse’ and ‘Hourglass’ for proof. Stop reading this already and check them out!”

Check Out: ‘Hourglass’ homesafeIL

bury tomorrow

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ÂŠ Ben Gibson

don broco

ÂŠ Ben Gibson

i prevail

enter shikari

ÂŠ Ben Gibson

the maine

tonight alive

ÂŠ Ben Gibson

Â© Ben Gibson

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48 rock sound

DON BROCO

IN THEIR FIRST EVER MAGAZINE COVER FEATURE, don br oco RELIVE THEIR INCREDIBLE, UNLIKELY JOURNEY. FROM HITTING ROCK BOTTOM TO DEFYING THE CRITICS AND REINVENTING THEMSELVES, THIS IS THE INSIDE STORY OF ONE OF THE MOST UNIQUE BANDS ON THE PLANET. INTERVIEW: Rob Sayce PHOTOS: Ben Gibson

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“‘Hey man, I know you! You’re Don, right, Don Broco?’”

ob Damiani rocks back in his chair, laughing. “It’s hilarious how often that’s happened to me since we started this band,” explains the frontman. “But I’ve always made a point of going, ‘Nah, that’s not me mate!’ No one’s pulling the strings and telling everyone else what to play. It’s all about the four of us, all four of us, playing shows and doing what we’ve dreamed of since we were 14 years old. But I do get why we confuse people sometimes.” “Probably now more than ever,” chimes in drummer / vocalist Matt Donnelly, with a mischievous grin. “We take a bit of pleasure in messing with people’s perceptions, because there are few things more boring than just going through the motions. We’re all about doing things differently, taking risks. Sometimes they pay off… and sometimes they haven’t.” It’s a fair point. Over the past nine years, Don Broco have emerged as one of the most surprising, unconventional, and seemingly contradictory bands on the planet. As a result, plenty of people – especially within the music industry itself – have struggled to get their heads around them. They’re deadly serious when it comes to creating and performing their own music, but serious about virtually nothing else. In a rock community more accustomed to misfits, they started out looking so normal it seemed almost… well, weird. And they’re definitely the only band to ever appear on glossy reality show Made In Chelsea and make a video where they slice each other’s faces off, Texas Chainsaw Massacre-style. Yet as they build up towards the January 2018 release of their third album, ‘Technology’, everything seems to be falling into place for the Bedford lads. Rock Sound checks in with them at a photo studio in East London – where they’re hanging out with aliens and pulling their best cowboy faces, in their first ever full-band cover shoot – and they’re visibly stoked about what comes next. It’s starting to look like all those years of tearing up the rulebook could pay off, and then some. But in typical style, there’s far more to Don Broco in 2017 than meets the eye.

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DON BROCO

o understand where they’re at now, you have to go back to one song, from a very different time: last year’s dark, despairing single, ‘Everybody’. “We wrote ‘Everybody’ in a pretty disillusioned place,” nods guitarist Si Delaney. “Coming off the back of [2015 album] ‘Automatic’, straight after headlining at Brixton Academy, we reached a weird point. We’d been on a major label for that cycle, and the entire campaign was based around radio success. All our hopes were pinned on the final single being picked up, but when it didn’t happen for us… from the label’s perspective there was no plan B, nothing else mattered. None of us had any idea where to go next. We were there, just after the biggest show we’d ever played, feeling very rudderless and having to pass up all these opportunities, basically through lack of support.” “It’s funny looking back. I’d bumped into Josh from You Me At Six at Slam Dunk around the time we announced ‘Automatic’, and he was like, ‘Mate, fair play, super brave.’ And I didn’t think it was brave at all… it was just, ‘nah, we’re doing a vibe.’ Now I understand way more what he meant. People in the media especially weren’t going to accept something like that as being straight-up, even though it really was what we wanted to do at the time. The styling we adopted got some people’s backs up.” “We had three months of sitting on our arses really, working out what we were going to do to try and fix the situation,” adds bassist Tom Doyle. “The frustration was all building up.” Things came to a head when an uninsured driver swerved into the band’s van one day, and promptly drove off, leaving it wrecked. It was the same van they’d written much of their debut album ‘Priorities’ in – with an amp set up under a seat, so they could play and exchange song ideas while touring – and had effectively been their home away from home for years. The timing was, it’s fair to say, very shitty indeed.

“We take pleasure in messing with people’s perceptions” M at t D o n n e l ly rock sound 51

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DON BROCO

“Sometimes there’s no one who can help you out, and you’ve got to find your own way…” ROB damiani “Afterwards we started writing again, just to see what would happen,” recalls Rob. “One of the first lyrics that came out was ‘No one’s ever seen me like this’, and it felt like it was almost, without us meaning to [make one], a new starting point. No one had ever seen us in that darker light, or talking about such personal experiences before. We were struggling with this feeling of, ‘What the hell do you do when you hit rock bottom, and no one’s there to pick you up?’ Sometimes there’s no one who can help you out, and you’ve somehow got to find your own way to the other side. All of those feelings came out in ‘Everybody’.” lenty of bands have found themselves in similar predicaments, and not all of them did make it out. For Broco, as tough as it was, that enforced break from the road was a chance to reflect on what had worked - and what hadn’t – about ‘Automatic’. ‘Everybody’ was a direct response to that. After parting ways amicably with Sony, they quickly found a new home on SharpTone Records. And when the single emerged last July, jaws dropped. Where ‘Automatic’ had been sleek, accessible and easy on the ear (set to a backdrop of neon and sharp suits, a whole year before The 1975 conquered the world with a similar aesthetic) this was noisy, angular and even a little disturbing, albeit with a massive chorus. Throw in a video built around a cowboy with eerie supernatural powers and bad intentions, and you’ve got something very different to visions of palm trees, ’80s glamour and glimmering pools in the Hollywood Hills. “‘Automatic’ helped us tick a lot of things off our bucket list,” considers Rob. “It took us from a band who had previously only done a few tours in the UK, and opened us up to the whole world. But it was a very polished, studio-focused album, and even when we played those songs live, they got a whole lot heavier. ‘Automatic’ sounded like our parents’ record collections, but really now we just want

songs that are fun to perform.” “It’s a natural human reaction to go back to what made you love something in the first place,” continues Matt. “When we left the major label, rather than having a sense of what couldn’t be done, suddenly there were endless possibilities. We were masters of our own destinies again. It was important to dive headfirst right back into writing music, because that would have told us either way. If it just didn’t feel right anymore, we’d have known it was time to do something different, try our hand at other things. But it felt so fun… we just ran with it.” “Going forward nothing could be safe, we had to make things that would get people going and that they would either love or hate,” Si adds. “Anything middle of the road just didn’t get considered. With the videos we’ve done recently, for ‘Everybody’, ‘Pretty’ and ‘Technology’… we’d have never, ever been allowed to make them on a major. It was a reaction against that overly safe, mollycoddling experience, where you’re not allowed to do anything that has even a hint of offense about it. We thought, ‘People are probably going to hate this, let’s do it!’” hat willingness to rile people up and take a different path has been there since the beginning. In their very first Rock Sound feature, back in 2012, they spoke about refusing to wear black or get tattoos just to fit the image of a modern rock band. They’ve never been able to spit out soundbites about taking over the world and ‘just doing it for the fans, man’ while keeping a straight face. And for the most part, they’ve written songs about real, everyday experiences and observations that some snobbier songwriters would consider beneath them: from parties (‘Fancy Dress’) and being broke (‘Yeah Man’) to relationships going bad (take your pick, really). In the long run, it’s helped them build a fanbase who turn up for the songs, not just for a face or a scene. Where some of their peers rock sound 53

SI DELANEY have stagnated and fallen away, they’ve grown steadily but surely. But at times, there have been downsides. “It’s been nice not to be typecast as a certain kind of band,” Tom relates. “People crave something genuine with a bit of personality, and I think we’ve given them that.” “People often haven’t really known what to do with us, though,” says Matt. “Being so different has been a long term strength, but also a short term hindrance. We’ve missed out on magazine features because we didn’t quite fit the mould of other bands being included, and been passed over for radio play because we weren’t the kind of guitar band they wanted to push. Standing alone makes you more memorable, but you have to carve your own path: and that takes slightly longer. There have definitely been times where we’ve gone, ‘Ah, this sucks’, we’ve had to take some knocks because of it.” n many respects, they’ve actually done things the old school way. They toured relentlessly off the back of both albums (so much so on ‘Priorities’, it took almost three years to finish the follow-up), supported every band going, and became a fixture at festivals like Slam Dunk and Reading & Leeds. It’s telling that after massive European tours supporting Bring Me The Horizon and 5 Seconds Of Summer,

they returned to the UK and played a series of intimate shows, performing both records in full – and packed out every date. “We’ve become the world’s least punk cult band!” Si laughs. “And we still don’t have any tattoos between the four of us. A lot of the bands who we came through with, they’ve either fallen by the wayside or stopped growing. Because we never really tied ourselves to anything in the first place, we can change our vibe, change our style, change whatever, and people are like, ‘Oh fair play, it’s Broco’. There are very few people who like our band, but only know a couple of songs. Most fans are more invested.” “You can’t look back,” adds Rob. “If something doesn’t quite work out, at least we gave it a shot. You think of My Chemical Romance and ‘The Black Parade’… that was a massive risk for them. Look at what they looked like and how they dressed before, coming back with such a specific aesthetic – some people would have been like, ‘What the hell are you doing?’ When you look at legendary acts like Panic! At The Disco, David Bowie and Prince, they mixed things up all the time. It’s nice to have that freedom, to know that people aren’t going to turn our backs on us if we do something even weirder next time. Just look at how quickly ‘Everybody’ and ‘Pretty’ have become the highlights of our sets. I can only thank people for being so open to that.”

Rob explains what’s been going on with those dance routines…

“The Walk started as, ‘This is kind of weird, and no one else is doing it, so we should.’ Once people knew us for it, that’s when we didn’t want to do it anymore! When the director of the ‘Everybody’ video came up with the cowboy dance, it was the same feeling: it’s kind of like The Macarena, but more fucked up. Luckily we can’t recreate it onstage, because you need both hands free. The most satisfying thing is if someone’s gone to a club night and they send us a video of their mates doing it, 40 people all in sync. If you’re going to invent a dance, get other people to do it instead.”

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DON BROCO

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he band’s sense of humour has played an interesting role in how far they’ve come, but also in why certain doors have been slammed in their faces. After debut album ‘Priorities’ came out in 2012, their willingness to take the piss out of themselves became a big part of how they were perceived. Hell, ‘Thug Workout’ is still a fixture in their sets, (sample lyric: “Sexy girls come up to me / And they always come if you know what I mean”). Then there were the mid song push-up contests and The Walk, the synchronised dance that became synonymous with the band… at least until McBusted decided to ‘borrow’ it. It’s one of the things that’s made them unique, but occasionally has led to them being perceived as a joke, rather than jokers – and obscured just what a seasoned, wellhoned live band, and original songwriters, they’ve been the whole time. “Everyone has different aspects of themselves that they show at different points,” muses Rob. “You have all these different versions of you, but you can’t put it all out at once. Sometimes it’s been a daily battle to find a balance, but then lots of our heroes made us laugh at the same time as creating incredible 56 rock sound

albums. Look at the Foo Fighters: Dave Grohl is just the man, but his band have some of the most hilarious videos I’ve ever seen. They’ll dress up as old people or ladies on a plane, and the next single might be this totally heartfelt, serious song… but you don’t think twice. Or Blink-182, with the ‘First Date’ video on one hand and ‘Adam’s Song’ on the other. If you can back it all up with your tunes, you can have fun and not feel guilty about it.” “It’s been tough to find the balance,” adds Matt. “There were times when we should probably have thought more about it. We’ve always had fun with everything, and not been afraid to show it. That’s a bit confusing coming from a genre that’s typically quite serious. It looked like maybe we were joking around all the time, but that doesn’t mean we didn’t sit in our bedrooms listening to Rage Against The Machine, feeling what everyone

else felt. Growing up we were attracted to the anarchy and the anger of rock music, as an outlet for what we felt. But we also thought it was fun, and wanted to show that part of our personalities too.” Where that has occasionally been a problem, especially early on, was in their dealings with the press. “Sometimes, you maybe have to pander to get where you want to go,” considers Tom. “You don’t want to be a joke band, but you don’t want to take yourselves too seriously either,” adds Si. “You always want it to be on your own terms. We can take the mickey out of ourselves, but if other people start taking the mickey, that’s not cool! But because you need people’s assistance to grow the band,

“People crave something genuine, and I think we’ve given them that.” TO M D OY L E

DON BROCO

you sometimes end up playing ball. There was definitely an element of that on ‘Priorities’, where we’d do photoshoots we weren’t all that comfortable with.” “I remember when I was a little kid, I used to read rock magazines and see these bands looking like the coolest people in the world,” he continues. “I’d look at the guitarist and think, ‘I’d love to be that guy, that’s all I want to do’. And then I think about some of the ways we were pushed… You don’t look at the guy dressed as a hot dog pizza and think ‘Wow, I wish I was him!’ We’ve got a lot more confidence in ourselves now, so that if we don’t want to do something, we’ll say, ‘Sorry, that’s not for us.’ We’re not young and naïve anymore.” You can understand their confidence. What people have often missed about Don Broco – but that it’s impossible not to see when you spend some time with them – is how much they are like the rock bands we grow up wanting to be in. They’re four friends from a small town who learned their instruments together as teenagers, who are genuinely comfortable in each others’ company and have lived out their dreams together. They formed on the main stage of Reading Festival

while volunteering there, with the goal of playing it someday – and a few years later, they did just that. In an era where so many bands are manufactured and micromanaged, there’s something inspiring about it all. “A lot of people just want to be ‘in’ music, whether that’s as a band or a solo artist or whatever,” Rob says. “For us, a big part of the attraction is just getting to hang out with each other. It’s an incredibly special thing, going on tour with your mates. There might be the occasional argument, but the reason you’re friends is that you can get past that. And I think the fact it’s a real team effort, people get that. We never take any of this for granted.” ow, they’re getting ready for what may well be the busiest 12 months of their lives. With a hugely successful debut U.S. tour with State Champs, Against The Current and With Confidence under their belts (“We had fun being the heaviest band on the bill for once,” grins Si) and their biggest ever headline show at London’s Alexandra Palace rolling in, things are about to get even more interesting. Oh, and ‘Technology’ isn’t far away… “Being on a new, independent label has given

us freedom over how and when we release music,” notes Si. “We're just going to keep releasing songs, because bands can’t afford to disappear for ages anymore. This is the way we’ve always wanted to do things.” “Making this album, we were definitely reflecting the bands we grew up listening to, like Reuben and Biffy Clyro,” explains Rob. “It’s a lot about those meaty, downtuned guitars this time. Some of it’s really brutal, but mashed up with our melodic side and our influence from pop, R&B, hip-hop, even dance music. We’ve joked about calling it ‘future rock’. We’re all about that high risk, high reward, no matter what happens.” “The momentum seems to be with us, so who knows what this record could do.” concludes Matt. “And if not… it’ll be album four that’s the big one, for sure!” For all the setbacks they’ve faced, you really wouldn’t want to bet against them now. As 2018 approaches, Don Broco stand as one of the most exciting, unique rock bands on the planet: and they’re being recognised for it, too. That’s quite a punchline. ‘Technology’ is out January 26 via Sharptone. They play London's Alexandra Palace on November 11.

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At 17 songs and almost 80 minutes in length, new album ‘The Canyon’ REWRITES the rules for THE USED. As frontman Bert McCracken tells us, anarchy has never felt so sweet. INTERVIEW: Andy Biddulph PHOTO: Anthony Duty

TELL US A LITTLE BIT ABOUT ‘THE CANYON’…

Says Bert McCracken [vocals]: “It’s a celebration of real rock ‘n’ roll music. This is a record we recorded as close to the heart of the way music should be recorded, with everything done on tape and in a more live environment than we’ve ever experienced before. It became about a lot of serious, important, ontological questions about existence and mortality and the spaces between. We’ve had quite a lot of time to work on the writing, about three years, so it’s very eclectic and each song shines on its own, but it’s a beautiful story told in its entirety, something people can really look forward to. It’s a moment of silence for something real in this world that’s so full of things that are not real.”

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SO IT’S ABOUT MORTALITY? “I lost a good friend about a year ago – it triggered a lot of feelings. I think my thoughts in the past about lyrics directed towards a generality, to involve more people, and I took the opposite approach this time. I made it much more specific [about] me. The canyon in my mind is a pretty brutally heavy concept, because what it takes to create a canyon is endless time that humans can barely fathom, of water cutting rock like a knife. Like the canyon I grew up near, there’s both sides of pain and pure childlike freedom which I associate with joy. Making this record, I found the closest I’ve been to peace and joy is when I’m willing to go through the suffering.”

WITHOUT SOUNDING CLICHÉ, THIS IS A VERY PERSONAL ALBUM, THEN?

“We’ve struggled with that word specifically – cliché – and we’ve found that even a platitude as cliché as ‘be yourself’ can be so much more derived and contrived of the most brutally honest art. Everything in my life has led up to this record. It’s the most important thing I could have possibly done – the hardest work I’ve ever had to do metaphysically, spiritually or mentally. The reward for me is being able to share that with anyone who’s ever lost someone in their life. In this world we live in where everything is so surface level, I feel like a moment of silence for anything we feel is what we need.”

YOU RECORDED WITH ROSS ROBINSON. HOW WAS THAT? “He understands music in a completely different way than most people are willing to confront. It’s like sitting down in front of a painting and staring at it – you think and feel something whether it takes an hour or weeks. Ross Robinson’s approach to creating songs is exactly that. ‘Why are you here? Why are you making this song? Why do you think people need to hear what you’re saying, or are you trying to say something to yourself?’ It’s a huge process, and he kind of takes this psychic surgery or therapeutic approach to lyrics and vocals that is really touching. It allows overwhelming honesty to come through.”

THE USED

“Everything in my life has led up to this record” HOW LONG DID THIS ONE TAKE TO RECORD? “We did pre-production for about three weeks and then we recorded drums at Dave Grohl’s studio for about a month. Then we did another month and a spare week or two at Valentine Studio, which is kind of this time capsule studio from the sixties where the Bugs Bunny stuff was recorded, as well as a bunch of the Rat Pack gross, coke addict, wife-beating singers I don’t like. It was an all-around rock ‘n’ roll experience. Dave Grohl’s place was really nice and professional. The tape machine was Richard Marx’s tape machine which I thought was awesome, and then Valentine felt like what I imagine it would feel like if we were making a real rock ‘n’ roll

record, which is what we were doing.”

YOU’RE SPEAKING ABOUT ROCK ‘N’ ROLL AN AWFUL LOT… “I think there’s more of an element of rock ‘n’ roll to this record, for sure. It’s a big record. It’s almost an hour and a half so it’s a lot to take in, and in a way we’re kind of asking for a bit of attention and a bit of respect. It’s The Used at our finest, and with Justin Shekoski [guitar] coming into the band three years ago, we’ve really learned how to use the language of music to push deeper into the emotion. A lot of these songs are exactly the way we wanted them to come out, which is raw and real, and yet they sound just like us.”

WHAT ELSE HAS JUSTIN BROUGHT TO THE TABLE? “We had a lot of time to really get to know each other, and we’ve become so tight in the last three years. He’s a very different human being, the type of person who inspires the whole room. He’s got this lust for living. Since I’ve known him he’s become a pilot and like 30 other things. It’s pretty awe-inspiring to be around him, and his attention to detail and his knowledge of the actualities of music is refreshing. It’s nice to be around that kind of passion – it inspired all of us on a whole other level.”

IF YOU PUT THIS MUCH INTO THE RECORD, ARE YOU SCARED ABOUT WHAT HAPPENS NOW? “No, because what I understand about art is this: the more you ingest, the deeper and more convoluted and messy it gets, but I think that’s also where it gets strong. I love to take on a piece of art that’s a challenge for me, that I know is going to inspire me or push me to my limit. I like to get tired from entertainment, so I’m not scared. I think the future is really bright. We have about 30 unused songs that have serious potential. I think that’s why there are so many songs on the record – the process of elimination was impossible at times.”

IT MUST BE HARD TO CUT THINGS FROM AN ALBUM WITH SUCH A PERSONAL STORY… “Exactly. We’re really lucky to have people on our side at Hopeless [Records] who are willing to hear me out. You don’t want to miss any parts of the sequence because you get the most out of it if you start from the beginning and you listen through to the end. It’s a really precious story about a good friend of mine who killed himself, and a really serious moment for me when I got to learn how to maybe stay alive until I’m old. That kind of thing is heavy, but it’s worth it.” ‘The Canyon’ is out now via Hopeless Records. rock sound 59

ii know know WE'LL WE'LL

With second album ‘Okay.’ AS IT IS have laid the blueprint for an exciting future. Vocalist Patty Walters reflects on the biggest year of their lives, and reveals what exactly comes next. INTERVIEW: Will Cross PHOTO: Felix Russell-Saw

‘OKAY.’ WAS RELEASED RIGHT AT THE START OF 2017. HOW HAS THE YEAR BEEN OVERALL? “That’s the thing that’s so baffling to me – this record came out in January of this year and it already feels like it’s been out forever, like it’s just always existed. We recorded it and finished tracking just over a year ago now – we’re already deep into planning the next record and talking about the future of the band. It almost feels like we achieved and wrote a record we were so proud of, and instead of relishing how great it felt we were like, ‘We want to do that again!’ There 60 rock sound

were certain things that we got right, there were certain things that we got wrong, so now we want to take everything we’ve learned and make an even better record, and write an even greater chapter in the band. I think a lot of our heads are living in the near future.”

ARE THE NEW IDEAS BLOSSOMING ALREADY, THEN? “A little bit! It’s mostly conversational for the time being, but we’ve always said that we never want to write the same record twice. Whatever that

AS IT IS

means for the lyrics and the music and anything else in the future, we’re always going to try something different; something that’s really representative of us as people at the time. We all have very eclectic music tastes – it’s not strictly pop-punk and it’s not even strictly alternative music – so I think it’s going to be relatively eclectic and relatively ambitious. We’ll kind of play around and see what happens.”

JUST HOW PROUD ARE YOU OF ‘OKAY.’ LOOKING BACK? “I think the thing I’m most proud of was that we liberated ourselves musically. It would’ve made sense to a lot of bands to go, ‘How can we take what was right about ‘Never Happy, Ever After’ and make it more accessible? How can we dilute it and make it more what people expect to hear?’ As It Is doesn’t have to sound like any one thing – we can write darker or we can even write poppier – and I think you can see both of those elements present on ‘Okay.’. Those darker moments are ones that I’m particularly proud of because instead of going, ‘How can we make this more mainstream?’ it was kind of like, ‘How can we really, possibly fuck up the incredible opportunity that we have right in front of us? How can we truly alienate everybody that’s gotten on board with this band and is really taking an interest in us?’ It was really exciting to see that people resonated with that darker side of our music.”

WE SAW YOU GO DOWN VERY WELL IN HEAVIER ENVIRONMENTS THIS YEAR, LIKE DOWNLOAD FESTIVAL. DO YOU THINK THAT DARKNESS RESONATED WITH A NEW AUDIENCE? “I think we’ve just become more confident as musicians, primarily. We played Download, we played a couple of metal festivals across Germany and Belgium… things we really wouldn’t have been suited to. It was kinda like, ‘Let’s just get up there, do what we always do, and have a lot of fun’. Playing as many shows as we have, we’ve certainly

gotten better than we were in 2014 or 2015, and we’re just kind of enjoying that. There’s a level of confidence that there wasn’t before. I’m not a particularly confident person outside of music – it’s the only thing I feel like I’ve even been slightly good at – so it’s nice to not be crippled with fear.”

THAT CONFIDENCE REALLY SHOWED ON YOUR HEADLINE TOURS THIS YEAR. ESPECIALLY YOUR AMERICAN TOUR WITH ROAM, GRAYSCALE AND SLEEP ON IT… “It was cool! We’ve learned so much from being taken out by bands that we really look up to and a lot of those bands have been fantastic people who treated us really well. I think the two most notable bands for that were Set It Off and Mayday Parade, who really looked after us and really made us feel welcome – we could be in their dressing room any time and we didn’t feel like we were intruding. Everybody on that tour was fantastic, so it was nice to be the band looking out for everybody else for a change and it was nice to be surrounded by such good people.”

DO YOU THINK THAT TOUR WAS REPRESENTATIVE OF WHAT GOOD HEALTH THE ALTERNATIVE WORLD IS IN RIGHT NOW? “I certainly think so, and I think that’s cool, because anyone who’s in this industry discovered alternative music at a younger age and grew up with it, so it’s nice to see younger people still resonating with aggressive or angsty music like we did all those years ago. And it’s nice to see UK festivals really embrace everything – there’s always been UK pop-punk bands as long as pop-punk’s been a genre, but it’s really only been in the last three or four years that eyes have been on it. I think we have a really incredible scene right now, not only in the UK but worldwide, and I think that’s really exciting for alternative music as a whole.”

DO YOU THINK ECLECTICISM AND BLURRING OF GENRE LINES IS SOMETHING THAT’S GOING TO CONTINUE TO GROW IN THE ALTERNATIVE SCENE? “I think that generally, there’s a pretty decent amount of open-mindedness amongst people who listen to alternative music. When we did our headline tour in 2016 we brought over With Confidence, who sound a lot like us, and Jule Vera who don’t necessarily sound a lot like us. We got to know them on Warped Tour and thought they put on an amazing show, and it was cool to see people falling in love with that band like we did, just as they would with a band that sounded similar to us. In the future we’re going to bring out bands that might be from outside of the rock world, and to me that’s a really exciting possibility.”

THAT SOUNDS VERY INTRIGUING. WITH THAT SAID, WHAT’S THE PLAN GOING INTO 2018? “That’s a good question – it’s still pretty up in the air. All we know that’s locked in as far as tours go is what’s in place for the end of this year. The last Waterparks show in the U.S. is the last thing that we know for certain that we’re doing, but we know that we want to get new songs recorded sometime early next year, and then just do what we do, and tour relentlessly until the record inevitably comes out. We’ll just kind of see when it all happens, but the future is definitely an exciting prospect.”

‘Okay.’ is out now via Fearless.

WANT TO HEAR MORE?

Check out the full interview on The Rock Sound Podcast, available via iTunes or at www.soundcloud.com/ rocksound

“We’re always going to try something different” P at t y Wa lt e r s rock sound 61

home

Uncertainty forced KNUCKLE PUCK to scrap most of their second album and start from scratch. But after reconnecting with their roots, they’ve produced one of the pop-punk RECORDS of the year… INTERVIEW: Will Cross

It looked like we were going to get an album way before now. What caused you TO push things back?

Says guitarist Kevin Maida: “We didn’t scrap the record entirely, but we definitely ran out of time in the studio. We went on tour with Mayday Parade and had a lot of stuff done from our early sessions recording in California, but there was also a lot of stuff missing. It just didn’t make sense to rush it, so we had a whole two-month tour to mull over what we needed to do. During that time we decided to finish recording with our friend Seth Henderson, who’d recorded everything we’d ever done until that point. He’s based an hour’s drive from us back home in Chicago, so it made sense to finish it at home, both financially and in terms of time.”

Did more familiar surroundings instantly pay dividends?

“This record is about making an active and positive change within yourself” • K e vin Maida •

“Once we got into Seth’s studio we quickly had ideas flying around. It was like, ‘Well, we have time now, so let’s change this and let’s change that’. It became a bigger project than I thought it was going to be. It was nice to have that experience [in California] though, because we got to record a lot of stuff and then have two months to think about what needed changing. We’ve never had that freedom before, but we’re super-grateful because now we all love the album.”

was going to be rightly compared to that album. When you do your first album, you can compare it to your EPs and your splits, but it’s kind of a standalone release, whereas we knew this next album was going to be compared more thoroughly. I think that thought crept into our heads more often than we would have liked it to. We didn’t keep a lot of stuff from the first sessions, we definitely changed and re-recorded a lot, but we felt more confident about it.”

computer, but then you go and record them and it’s the real deal. You just get this exciting feeling and it’s great, but for some reason it wasn’t there at first. The songs were really good, but it just didn’t measure up somehow. We had these cool songs, we were pumped, we recorded them and then… we weren’t pumped anymore. It was like, ‘Why rush when we have to play these songs for the next two years?’ It just doesn’t make sense to do that. Now we’re pumped!”

SO, It was a VERY different experience to recording [debut album] ‘Copacetic’?

How did the songs and the elements of those early songs differ?

Lead single ’Gone’ was a fantastic introduction to the album. Was that a song that sparked things into life even in the studio?

“‘I’d say so. With ‘Copacetic’, at least from my perspective, I didn’t feel any pressure. It felt like we were still in high school and nothing really mattered, but writing for ‘Shapeshifter’ I think we all felt that pressure, that this 62 rock sound

“None of us were really psyched on [the songs]. Usually when we record it’s one of my favourite parts of being in this band, because we spend so much time writing the songs and they’re just a file in a Dropbox file on my

“We felt [excited about it] even when that song was just a demo! We were like, ‘Oh man, this is great!’ Even with fake drums and

h e a ri t s where the

KNUCKLE PUCK

on THERE’, especially ‘Plastic Brains’...

scratchy guitars, we knew we had to put it out first. When we actually finished that song in the second recording session, it felt like everything was right and in its place.”

Would you say that song is the perfect bridge between ‘Copacetic’ and ‘Shapeshifter’?

“I think so. With ‘Shapeshifter’ I feel like we cut a lot of the fat on our songs – we didn’t have parts just to have them. I think we have better songs on ‘Shapeshifter’, songs that are in our eyes a step-up from ‘Copacetic’. We still love ‘Copacetic’ and the songs on it, but this time it feels like everything’s much more of a unit in terms of songwriting, which is a good feeling. Especially with ‘Gone’ – we all feel like that’s how this band should sound.”

There are a few curveballs

“That song was another that was a favourite of mine even from the demos. It was like, ‘This sounds like our band… but it also doesn’t!’ If that song was on ‘Copacetic’ it wouldn’t have made sense, but now with the virtue of time it sounds much more like us. I’d like to expand on that area of our band more in the future.”

What do you want people to take away from ‘Shapeshifter’? And where do you hope it’ll take you?

“We want people to listen to it and have some kind of hope. This record is about making an active and positive change within yourself, and the process of working towards that, and I think that’s something we definitely want people to pick up on. If people can take away something positive from it then that’s the ultimate goal. I wouldn’t say it’s always a positive record, but at the same time it’s about changing who you are for the better, and for the benefit of other people around you. Hopefully that will resonate with people.”

WANT TO HEAR MORE?

Check out the full interview on The Rock Sound Podcast, available via iTunes or at www.soundcloud.com/ rocksound

‘Shapeshifter’ is out now via Rise Records. rock sound 63

After surviving their most turbulent period ever, WE CAME AS ROMANS are back to prove they have what it takes with their new album, ‘Cold Like War’. INTERVIEW: Will Scott

THE NEW ALBUM HAS A FEELING OF FRUSTRATION TO IT. DID YOU FEEL LIKE YOU HAD SOMETHING TO PROVE THIS TIME AROUND? Says Dave Stephens (vocals): “In all honesty this was a really frustrating record to make, especially as it seemed that the majority of the music industry turned their backs on us during our last record cycle. A lot of people had written us off – we were at the point where our backs were against the wall. Not just to ourselves and the industry, but to our fans. A lot of them were doubting us as well. It was a scary time – we had to fight for our careers.” 64 rock sound

THE SONGS ARE BIGGER AND MORE ANGRY, TOO... “It’s just how we were feeling at the time. I think all of our records are pretty good at doing that, portraying exactly how we’re feeling. Our last couple of records were definitely more melodic, and I think uplifting because that’s just kind of how we felt in our lives. This time, with our backs against the wall and so much on the line, it definitely made us angry and frustrated. We’ve put 12 years into this band and [were] seeing it starting to crumble around us.”

THE LYRICS TO THE TITLE TRACK HINT AT INTER-BAND CONFLICT. WHAT HAPPENED THERE? “When we started writing this record Josh [Moore, guitar], Andy [Glass, bass] and I took about a week to journal different situations that had happened to us in the last few years. Things that were really upsetting, really dramatic, and that had stuck with us for a number of years. We wrote down exactly where we were, what we were feeling and what the situation was. That song in particular, ‘Cold Like War’, was written about a situation in London. The band were divided on whether we should go to Russia or not, because at the time Ukraine had just been invaded and there were some political uncertainties going on. Half of the band wanted to go and half the band didn’t – we were very divided. We came to find out that it was the wrong decision down the line and it’s something that still tore at us for years after. We’ve beat ourselves up about so many

“The Majority Of try s u d n I c i s u M Th e Turned Their ” s U n O S k Bac

WE CAME AS ROMANS

DO YOU THINK YOUR FANS WILL EMBRACE ‘COLD LIKE WAR’? “Every record we’ve done, I’ve been so nervous about the reaction. Sometimes our fans embrace our records with open arms and sometimes they hate them. That’s what always makes me so nervous about releasing something – I don’t know which way it is going to go. We’re the type of band to take chances, we’ve never been the band that makes the same record repeatedly, and I think because of that we’ve experienced a lot of ups and downs. Our fans at times aren’t really sure what to expect of us, but I can honestly say that on this record I’ve never felt more confident – I’m not nervous on this one! I’m not saying that to be cocky or to say that we’re the best band ever, I just have a good feeling about it. I know what our fans are looking for and I think we’ve fully delivered it on this record. I think we stay true to our metalcore roots, and we did some electronics programming that is above and beyond anything we’ve done before. I think that our fans definitely wanted us to do more of that on this record.”

TRACKS LIKE ‘ENCODER’ DEFINITELY HAVE A STRONG EDM INFLUENCE. WHAT DROVE YOU TO MOVE IN THAT DIRECTION?

decisions that we’ve made over the last few years, but in reality we should have just learned from them and moved on and tried to be better in the future.”

YOUR DRUMMER, ERIC CHOI, LEFT LAST YEAR. HOW DID DAVE PUCKETT (EX-FOR TODAY) END UP REPLACING HIM? “It all happened a little quicker than we expected it to, and that was fine. When Eric left we all had the feeling of, ‘We’re never going to replace him. We’re just going to keep hiring drummers, and that’s not going to change’. For Today broke up and we were like, ‘David is a great drummer – we should see what he’s doing!’ Some of us were worried, with For Today being a Christian band and us not being a Christian band. We were wondering how that would work, but we decided to bring him out for some rehearsals and to kind of just test out his personality. It turns out he’s a very open-minded guy – he’s such a solid person and drummer.”

“Kyle [Pavone, vocals], that’s his favourite type of music, and his side-project. He’s very into that scene and that’s his life outside of the band. We were all thinking, ‘Why don’t we find a way to bring these two things together?’ I always hate when bands drop trap music and all that stuff in their setlist. I’m not a fan of that but I was like, ‘If we can do it tastefully and in a way that isn’t cheesy, let’s give it a shot’. We let Kyle take the reins on the programming for all the songs and it just started working. ‘Encoder’ was the last song to get written for the record. The song was originally a dance track and he was like, ‘I was going to use this for my solo project, but I have a sick idea to make it the heaviest song ever’. We all looked at him like he was insane, but we listened to it a couple more times and we ran with it.”

IS THIS THE ALBUM THAT’LL PUT YOU GUYS BACK ON COURSE? “We are all feeling really confident about it. When I’m in the studio and I hear a song and I get chills from it, that usually hits with our fans too. I feel that every song that we’ve done that has given me chills winds up being successful with our fans, and I’ve felt that more on this record then I ever have before.” ‘Cold Like War’ is out now via Sharptone. rock sound 65

REVIEWS

PALAYE ROYALE

‘BOOM BOOM ROOM (SIDE A)’ (SUMERIAN)

Rock ‘n’ roll is not dead.

It’s not even close, and never will be. But there is an argument to be made that the genre has lost a little of its edge recently. Enter Palaye Royale, the Las Vegas lads who are part relic from the past – all big hair, makeup and riffs – and part very modern phenomenon. What’s more, they’re coming for you with the UK release of their debut album ‘Boom Boom Room (Side A)’. The Southern-tinged rock of opening track ‘Don’t Feel Quite Right’ is a prime example of what they’re about. All keys, pounding drums and beguiling guitars, they spit their way through the first three and a half minutes of the album, and only get more rowdy from there. Breakout track ‘Mr. Doctor Man’ combines sunbaked, old-school rock with mid-2000s emo to devastating effect, while ‘My Youth Generation’ is a rollicking, fun call to arms that pulls more from The Rolling Stones than My Chemical Romance and displays the band’s huge range. None of this would work as well, of course, without Remington Leith’s voice. You might recognize him 66 rock sound

as the voice of fictional band The Relentless in Andy Biersack and Ben Bruce’s new movie American Satan, but it’s on Palaye Royale’s material that he really shines. The slender frontman’s powerful bark lends menace and bite to the “I say what I want to / I live how I want to / Baby, I die when I want to” of the aural middle finger that is ‘Warhol’, and his surprisingly versatile croon means the sombre ‘Clockwork’ manages to be dramatic, mournful and sweet all at once. A swinging, loved-up ‘Ma Cherie’ is bolstered by king of awesome guest spots Kellin Quinn, and the Sleeping With Sirens man provides a calming yin to Remington’s coarse, sexually-charged yang, providing some extra star quality where there’s clearly some developing already between the three band members. The epic ‘Too Many People’ is a standout track, too. Clocking in at almost five minutes, it really should get boring, but it rarely does – instead sounding like a less clinical but no less impactful riff on Thirty Seconds To Mars’ more recent work, before

8 charging into another hip-shaking, ’70s-tinged chorus. It showcases the full talents of a trio who seem to have listened to as much Oasis as Panic! At The Disco growing up. There’s something charming about a band who would fit in just as well on Jools Holland as Warped Tour, and there are almost two different voices on show here. The likes of ‘Rag Doll’ rumble and tumble along with the roguish, scruffy rock ‘n’ roll of yesteryear, while ‘All My Friends’ is a much more modern, frenzied, razor-throated party anthem that matches their party-ready aesthetic. This is hedonistic and full of great songs, but most of all, Palaye Royale don’t give a fuck what you think about who they are or where they belong. And that’s what makes this band and ‘Boom Boom Room (Side A)’ intriguing, exciting and – at times – absolutely enthralling. FOR FANS OF: Fall Out Boy, The Hives, The Rolling Stones

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10+

Choruses that’ll hook themselves to your brain before the album is over.

Guest spot on the record, from the one and only Kellin Quinn.

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ATTITUDE

Seconds of music on the deluxe edition of ‘Boom Boom Room (Side A)’. It’s long, but it doesn’t feel too long. And that’s telling.

Other bands in the world quite like Palaye Royale.

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...WAIT, JUST MORE ATTITUDE rock sound 67

POLARIS

‘THE MORTAL COIL’ (SHARPTONE)

know what? Australian music is on a hot streak at the minute. Youproper

From pop-punk to hardcore, it feels as though the most exciting bands in many scenes are coming from the land Down Under. That certainly applies to Sydney’s own Polaris – who with this, their debut album, turn the cogs of innovation forward once more. They shine most vividly in the sheer breadth of brutal styles they manage to fit onto the record. From launching an array of fret-mangling riffs one minute (‘The Remedy’) to adding bubbling atmospherics and heart-tugging sincerity the next (‘Crooked Path’) – all the way through to just dealing out some of that good old

BACKTRACK ‘BAD TO MY WORLD’

(BRIDGE NINE)

fashioned metalcore desolation (‘Casualty’) – the band dip their feet into as many sounds as they possibly can, while also making some serious waves along the way. What makes ‘The Mortal Coil’ even sweeter is that at no point does that fusion of styles and moods sound sloppy or forced. Instead, it makes for a tour de force of the senses – and ultimately, an injection of fresh air into a corner of the scene that sometimes feels more like a bland smog.

FOR FANS OF: Blood Youth, Architects, Northlane

DIVIDES ‘EMBERS’

JACK ROGERS

(SELF-RELEASE)

Returning with their third album, Backtrack continue to serve up pure, unadulterated hardcore carnage. Songs like ‘Cold-Blooded’ and ‘Dead At The Core’ are bursting with anarchic energy, and pack the kind of fist-pumping ferocity that will leave you longing for a circle pit or five. Although ‘Bad To My World’ is short and sharp, with most songs not running far over the two minute mark, it’s a strong effort nevertheless: showing just why they’ve been able to share stages with scene royalty like Terror and Comeback Kid. The New York Hardcore flame remains in safe hands.

Scotland is producing some great bands at the moment, and this EP from Divides suggests that they could be amongst them. Sure, their brand of bright, melodic rock is a little middle-ofthe-road at times, but that can be forgiven for all of the flawless moments that make these five tracks so compelling. ‘Embers’ is surely a future staple in the band’s setlists with its catchy, life-affirming chorus, while ‘Sink This City’ features a powerhouse vocal performance from Nicole Mason – one of many. Put the occasional moments of déjà vu aside, and there’s no mistaking Divides’ potential.

FOR FANS OF: Madball, Every Time I Die, Down To Nothing

FOR FANS OF: Young Guns, Saosin, Mallory Knox EMMA MATTHEWS

68 rock sound

WILL SCOTT

EVANESCENCE

‘SYNTHESIS’ (RCA) (RCA)

vanescence’s music has always been built around Amy Lee’s Evoice,

and ‘Synthesis’ is the ultimate celebration of that. These new, orchestral arrangements of classics like ‘Bring Me To Life’ and ‘My Immortal’ bring forth deeper emotions and leave plenty of space for the frontwoman’s powerful performances, but some of the original drama is still lost. New single ‘Imperfection’ abruptly steers in a

MILK TEETH

[7] LIFETIGHT

‘GO AWAY’

FOR FANS OF: Lacuna Coil, Epica, Within Temptation. LIZZIE COOPER-SMITH

[7] LIONHEART

‘SELF-TIGHTLED’ (ROADRUNNER)

different direction, throwing the guitars aside in favour of staccato rhythms and electronic sounds – which works, but feels out of place here. ‘Synthesis’ is an ambitious effort, but if you were hoping for the band’s big, grand comeback, this maybe isn’t it.

[6] OF ALLIES

‘WELCOME TO THE WEST COAST II’ (CROOKED NOISE)

(FAST BREAK!)

[7]

‘night sky’ (SELF-RELEASE)

With their sequel to this summer’s ‘Be Nice’, Milk Teeth offer us another look at their evolution – bringing plenty of bangers along too, of course. Again, the poppier moments shine brightest here. ‘Nearby Catfight’ is pure pop-punk genius and directly exposes where the band’s greatest strengths lie. It's not the only talking point though. Closer ‘Big Sky’ sounds like a more refined and interesting spin on its sister EP’s (still great) ‘Hibernate’, reinforcing the breadth of their talents. Milk Teeth could still go anywhere from here, but their incredible ability to blend abrasiveness with fun is what makes this release so successful.

Built from the remnants of some of the UK’s most beloved underground bands, LIFETIGHT are injecting a new degree of optimism into hardcore with a short, sharp and enjoyably sentimental EP. And yeah, it’s worth backing for that title alone. Where ‘Dreams’ feels like a supportive hand gripping your shoulder as you windmill into oblivion, the chorus of the brilliantly vibrant ‘Energy’ should be ringing out in venues across the country soon enough. ‘SELF-TIGHTLED’ is a statement of intent from a band that look set to become a dominant force over the coming months. Best start doing your stretches now.

You can’t keep a good band down for long. After taking some time away from the game, Lionheart are back in the driver’s seat and doing what they do best: inciting absolute chaos. Built on a rock-hard foundation of passion, drive and heart, ‘Welcome To The West Coast II’ represents hardcore at its most metallic, unrestrained and raucous. The wheel isn’t exactly being reinvented here, but that doesn’t make the intense battery of ‘Cursed’, old-school swagger of ‘Still Bitter Still Cold’ and bile-soaked attitude of ‘Vultures’ any less of a riot. Even if they’re short of new tricks, it’s great to have them back and adding to their enviable legacy.

Flitting between emotive melodies and crushing riffs, Of Allies establish themselves as a potential band to watch with this debut album. Whether it’s the otherworldly undertones and interludes of ‘Apparition’, ‘Solace’ and ‘Stranded’ or the quiet confidence and solid hooks shining through on ‘Collapse’ and ‘Lost Not Found’, the Yorkshire band’s crowdfunded full-length shows off their creative diversity and varied influences. The soaring choruses recall the best of recent British rock, but with a complexity and heaviness thrown in that just about sets them apart. It’s still early days for them, but this is definitely a promising step.

FOR FANS OF: Green Day, Marmozets,

FOR FANS OF: Your Demise, Polar,

FOR FANS OF: Terror, Nasty,

FOR FANS OF: Mallory Knox, Twin Atlantic,

Frank Iero And The Patience

Blood Youth

WILL

70 rock sound

JACK ROGERS

Obey The Brave

Arcane Roots

JACK

OLIVIA DYTOR

QUICKSAND

‘INTERIORS’ (EPITAPH)

Life isn’t always kind to pioneers.

That’s certainly been the case with Quicksand, who helped launch the post-hardcore movement back in the ’90s, but imploded just as their second album ‘Manic Compression’ was winning them broader recognition. Following an abortive reunion a few years later, frontman Walter Schreifels’ work with Rival Schools (among others) and bassist Sergio Vega’s ongoing stint in Deftones, they’ve regrouped for this long, long awaited third full-length. At first listen, it feels a little anticlimactic. Brooding and gritty, songs like ‘Illuminant’ and ‘Hyperion’ don’t so much grab a listener by the neck as slink steadily towards the exit. But like so much of this record, they reveal their true value over repeat listens: from insistent, inspired bass grooves and

PHOENIX CALLING ‘OUR LOST HEARTS’

(THE FORT)

unconventional guitar work to Walter’s genuinely unique, careworn vocals. True, it’s short on big, showy moments. But that’s never been what this band are about, and as the venomous ‘Fire This Time’ and claustrophobic ‘Under The Screw’ show, they still do a great line in understated intensity. The central riff of ‘Warm And Low’, in particular, has an eerie knack for taking up residence in your head. ‘Interiors’ ultimately feels like a solid next step for Quicksand; and after waiting for so many years, that’ll be a relief to fans everywhere.

FOR FANS OF: Rival Schools, Helmet, Deftones ROB SAYCE

SECT ‘NO CURE FOR DEATH’

(Southern Lord)

Two years on from their solid debut album, Cambridgeshire’s Phoenix Calling are back. Sadly though, ‘Our Lost Hearts’ fails to launch them beyond a pleasant but unchallenging alt.rock formula. Opener ‘Atlas’ makes for a promising start with heavy, fiery riffs and an earworm hook, with ‘Rescue Me’ and ‘Lose This’ not far behind. But though vocalist Steven Chapman’s passion shines through, the lyrics leave plenty to be desired and things get overfamiliar very quickly. It’s perfectly agreeable stuff, but without much variation this all adds up to a disappointing follow-up. If the five-piece can add some freshness to their arsenal, they’ll fare better in future.

If you’ve ever wanted to hear Fall Out Boy’s Andy Hurley smashing the shit out of a drumkit while embracing his caustic, straight edge hardcore roots, step on up. Also featuring members of renowned bands like Cursed, Burning Love and Earth Crisis, SECT channel the genre at its most vicious and raw – driven by Andy’s pummelling beats and some of the grimiest guitar tones you’ll ever hear. With only one song breaking the three-minute mark, the likes of ‘Open Grave’, ‘Born Razed’ and ‘Stripes’ are so fast and furious, they might leave you with whiplash – but there are loads of compelling, engaging moments amongst all the frenzy. Brace yourself.

FOR FANS OF: Mallory Knox, Breaking Benjamin, Young Guns

FOR FANS OF: Black Breath, Cursed, Converge CANDICE HARIDIMOU

72 rock sound

ROB SAYCE

LIKE MOTHS TO FLAMES

‘DARK DIVINE’ (RISE)

Moths To Flames have made a name for themselves Like

totally savage riffs? ‘Mischief Managed’ will straight-up sort you out. None of it is new or radical by any means – and this may not prove to be their breakthrough record – but if you’re after some decent quality mosh, look no further.

banging out solid, breakdown-fuelled metalcore, straight from the Warped Tour playbook. The band’s fourth album (mixed by Beartooth’s Caleb Shomo no less) is another worthy addition to their catalogue. Looking for mighty choruses? ‘Nowhere Left To Sink’ is your tune. Breakneck circle pit anthems? ‘Instinctive Intuition’ has you covered. Or just

SEVEN STORIES HIGH [7] STATUES ‘DEADWEIGHT’

WILL CROSS

[7] TOOTHGRINDER

‘NO GRAVE, NO BURIAL’ (SELF-RELEASE)

FOR FANS OF: Wage War, Blessthefall, The Word Alive

(DOGSWAMP)

[8] VARIOUS ARTISTS

‘PHANTOM AMOUR’

[6]

‘SPAWN (AGAIN) – A TRIBUTE TO SILVERCHAIR’

(SPINEFARM)

(UNFD)

Though the UK scene is bursting at the seams with pop-punk up-andcomers, Swansea’s Seven Stories High still deserve your attention. These four songs see the quintet combining almost everything there is to love about the genre, albeit without much in the way of innovation. ‘Apathy’ is lashed with feel-good attitude, choppy snares and spiralling riffs, ‘Midas’ tones things down for a moment with soft vocals that gradually soar and ‘Alchemy Part 1’ benefits from a weighty chorus that will stay with you well after the record ends. All in all, ‘Deadweight’ is a welcome release, and will get you excited about what’s in store for these intriguing prospects.

“I have lost myself and I’m unsure if I will last…” confesses Statues’ Alex Shom on ‘Unrest’. It’s that kind of relatable insight that elevates the Perth bruisers’ menacing hardcore, turning it into something more poignant than you might expect. Combining relentless, ear-numbing aggression with lyrical soul-searching and progressive metal makes for a record that’s as scorching and unbearable as the desert sun… but in a good way. All kinds of complex rhythms (‘Defiance’), and riffs (‘Sirens’) follow, slowly building towards the title track’s beautiful, sprawling overture. Chaotic, but not without purpose, this truly rips.

On the heels of last year’s ‘Nocturnal Masquerade’, Toothgrinder showcase progression at its absolute finest throughout ‘Phantom Amour’. The experimentation underpinning this album proves just why the New Jersey crew have made a stir recently. They’ve blended elements of countless styles and created something fascinating – from rap to metalcore and prog, it’s all in there to keep listeners on their toes. The softer ‘Jubilee’ serves as a breather, meanwhile, revealing yet another side to the five-piece’s songwriting. Raw, ferocious and diverse, this album is quite unlike anything else you’ll hear this month.

As one of the biggest, most unpredictable Australian rock bands of the ’90s and early ’00s, Silverchair inspired a generation. This covers record is testament to that, featuring everyone from Tonight Alive to In Hearts Wake. Expect a mixed bag – but whether it’s Ocean Grove’s slamming take on the title track, Northlane’s brilliantly reworked ‘Anthem For The Year 2000’ or Columbus’ uplifting ‘Straight Lines’, there are more hits than misses. Jenna McDougall is at her soaring best on ‘Without You’, while Hands Like Houses’ ‘Ana’s Song (Open Fire)’ is just as sad as the original, but a fair bit noisier. Now, about that reunion…

FOR FANS OF: State Champs, Neck Deep,

FOR FANS OF: Norma Jean, Counterparts,

FOR FANS OF: Bury Tomorrow, Periphery,

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Four Year Strong

EMMA MATTHEWS

74 rock sound

letlive.

CANDICE HARIDIMOU

The Contortionist

JESSICA HOWKINS

Tonight Alive

ROB SAYCE

5 THINGS YOU NEVER KNEW ABOUT…

‘THE CHRONICLES OF LIFE AND DEATH’

GOOD CHARLOTTE

RELEASED: October 5, 2004 LABEL: Daylight

FACED WITH FOLLOWING UP ONE OF THE BIGGEST POP-PUNK RECORDS OF ALL TIME, GOOD CHARLOTTE TOOK A LEAP INTO THE DARK. FRONTMAN JOEL MADDEN TELLS ALL... #1 THE PRESSURE WAS ON

“‘The Young And The Hopeless’ did something like five million [sales] around the world. Suddenly people were saying, ‘Go do it again.’ I stayed in Japan for a week, and then ‘they’ [the label] said, ‘in two weeks you’re going in [to record]’. I remember thinking that I didn’t even know what we were going to write about! You’re touring and playing shows but you’re also in this bubble. Then you have these die-hard fans, which is a completely new energy and validation that you weren’t really ready for. We should have been in therapy to prepare ourselves for that stuff!” 76 rock sound

#2 THEY DIDN'T BELONG ANYWHERE…

“We were facing a lot of criticism from all sides. We didn’t quite fit in with pop music. We didn’t fit in with the genre that we came from. It was such a strange place to be, and we internalised it a lot. Our travels helped us grow a bit. I think it all came out on the actual record. We were ready to move on and make a statement… something grand. I’m not sure if we were ready for it or not, but we still went in trying to [deal] with our own feelings and ideas about our own mortality in an emotional, physical and musical sense.”

#3 …BUT LEARNED HOW TO SURVIVE

“It was about us surviving a world that we had previously come into bright-eyed. For kids who had experienced everything in their childhoods, from trauma to poverty, [it] was was a whole other mindfuck. There was so much pressure to deliver another hit, that we were like, ‘We’re going as dark as we can’. Then there are moments where we tried to deliver some hope. We always feel connected to the people who listen to our music and find they’re in need of something to keep fighting for.”

#4 THEY REJECTED THE EASY ROUTE

“There was just so much music business rhetoric flying around that we rebelled against. ‘Oh you want us to go that way? Fuck you’. We just dug in and started to make this different record. They wanted the big, bright, marketable caricature of what they were selling. This safe punk thing. We were like, ‘No’. We pushed against it in a way. There were moments on the record that I also thought were sarcastic. Like, ‘I Just Wanna Live’ sums it up perfectly. Even the video is dark in a weird way, a bit cynical.”

#5 IT SET THE TONE FOR EVERYTHING THAT FOLLOWED

‘Chronicles…’ was where we had to decide to be Good Charlotte and not just a product. We could have pushed out another ‘Lifestyles Of The Rich And Famous’ or ‘Girls & Boys’. But it ended up being a pretty great success story in its own right. If we had made another ‘The Young And The Hopeless’, we would have... gone away. We wouldn’t have had anything to fight for. This was us putting something above the success, and it cemented us as the band who always go left when you want us to go right.”

MOOSE BLOOD This

Month

AS THEY MOVE TOWARDS THEIR THIRD ALBUM WITH A NEW DRUMMER AND A NEW OUTLOOK, GUITARIST MARK OSBORNE GIVES US THE LOWDOWN ON EVERYTHING GOING ON IN MOOSE BLOOD’S CAMP… INTERVIEW: Andy Biddulph

7 18 6 rock sound

HOW’S THIS RECORD GOING?

“We demoed it all at home with our friend Rich in his studio and then we came out [to Los Angeles] with Beau Burchell, our producer, and worked through the songs again from scratch to have his input in things – on the way we write and structure songs and everything like that. But even before coming out here we felt really happy and really excited about doing this record, because they were the strongest demos that we’d ever written before going into the studio properly. So we feel like we’re in a really good place – which is really nice, because we haven’t felt like that for a while.”

SO YOU’RE FEELING PRETTY GOOD ABOUT ALBUM THREE?

“We were really happy that we were in a place where we felt like we could make another record and wanted to make another record – and that we can get over the stuff that’s happened and move past that and be ourselves again. [To] try to lose all the worry and anxiety that came off the back of the whole situation that we went through. This process right now – making this record – is hopefully just another part of the healing process that’s going to get us back to normal and feeling 100 per cent happy and confident in what we’re doing again.”

ARE YOU ON THE WAY TO BEING 100 PER CENT AGAIN THEN?

“I hope so. It feels like that. I’m sure there are going to be people who are going to want to say stuff and always try to knock you back in whatever way they can, because things get said on the internet and fabricated and made up – all of that – and because it’s on the internet, it’s believed and becomes almost gospel regardless of people actually knowing the ins and outs of the truth. [Or] how it affects you and the repercussions it has on your life outside of just being in a band and playing music. It’s impacted all of us to the point where we didn’t want to carry on. We didn’t want to be in a band. We didn’t sign up for people talking nonsense about us on the internet, we didn’t want that. We didn’t ever do anything in this band to think we’ll get to a point where kids can say what they like about us and that’s going to impact our family lives and our relationships and this, that and the other. People will say stuff, people will troll you and do this that and the other but they have no idea of those repercussions and the consequences of saying stuff on the internet that is false or whatever.”

WE DIDN’T want

TO be IN a

band Mark Osborne

YOU SOUND VERY POSITIVE… “Once we started writing again, that really helped. [So did] talking a lot with our management and our label and people being so supportive of us, even in our home lives and our families. It’s almost like we needed convincing to carry on and do the band. As much as we love it and we feel so lucky to do it, sometimes everyone has a breaking point and it’s how much you feel like you want to carry on in regards to all of the bad stuff; if you can deal with it and take it in your stride and get past it. Once we started writing and getting Lee [Munday, drums] involved it felt like we could almost start again, start afresh. That’s where all the positivity came from I think, especially getting Lee in. I think he saved this band really. I think if he wasn’t the guy who came in and has done what he’s done and been the way he has been, I think that could have been something that put us over the edge, but he has literally saved us as individuals and as a collective, a band.”

WHERE DID YOU FIND LEE?

“He’s been around in our local scene for years... It seemed almost the obvious choice to ask him if he wanted to come and try out and play a couple of songs and if it was something he was interested in doing. Thankfully he said, ‘Yes’, and was so excited about it that I think seeing his excitement about maybe being in this band restored a little bit of our faith in what we were doing and how we felt. So he’s been a massive help.”

WHAT’S THE GENERAL VIBE OF THE ALBUM SO FAR?

“[There’s] a bit of a reflective sound, especially lyrically. There have been things that have gone on in my life recently, like a breakup from a serious, long-term

relationship, so there are songs about that and how that has impacted me. How that’s made me feel on top of dealing with other things that go on in life. It’s pretty much the same with Eddy [Brewerton, vocals / guitar], apart from that his relationship is healthy and solid. There are things surrounding his family that he’s felt like he’s needed to reflect on and talk about, and that has made the overall sound of the record at the minute sort of moody and reflective, but with a slightly poppier element to the music as well. We’ve also got some darker-sounding parts of songs that almost came out of nowhere.” Moose Blood’s third album is expected in 2018 via Hopeless Records.

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This

Month

ALEX BABINSKI PVRIS

JOHN MAYER, GREEN DAY AND… DOG SHELTERS? PVRIS’ GUITARIST TAKES US ON A GUIDED TOUR THROUGH HIS MUSIC COLLECTION! INTERVIEW: Andy Biddulph

THE SONG THAT… …HAS MY FAVOURITE LYRICS EVER ‘BRAVE ENOUGH TO FAIL’

MORE THAN LIFE

“I have this tattooed on me! More Than Life are a UK-based hardcore band, and I have their lyrics “Brave enough to fail” on my arm. They were one of my favourite bands four or five years ago and these are the only lyrics I have tattooed on me. I was really into the hardcore scene and underground punk. They were super melodic and also very hardcore so I instantly got attracted to that. The lyrics in particular stuck out and helped me figure out how to get through things. And that saying – every day I have to have that mentality. I have to give this my all, I have to take chances. You have to be brave enough to fail.”

…I’LL NEVER GET BORED OF ‘22 (OVER SOON)’

BON IVER

“I don’t think I could ever get bored of it, I’ve listened to it probably every day since it came out. The first time I listened to it I was touring the UK and it was the strangest thing I had ever heard. That record made me absolutely love him and made me go back and appreciate the other records even more. This whole year I’ve been on the biggest Bon Iver kick.”

…REMINDS ME OF HOME

‘I FORGET WHERE WE WERE’

BEN HOWARD

“We were coming home one time and we had maybe a month at home – a little break. I was so excited to be home and see family and relax and unwind, and this record was all I listened to. Now every time I hear it I just picture myself in my room 80 rock sound

with my cat.”

…IT ISN’T COOL TO LIKE, BUT I KIND OF DO

guitarists whose songs I played, growing up. I’ve seen Iron Maiden four or five times now and they’re still one of my favourite bands.”

‘PHOTOGRAPH’

…I FIRST REMEMBER LOVING

“The one that comes to mind is Nickelback because everyone loves to dislike them, but I don’t dislike them. I don’t love them, but I definitely don’t dislike them! I used to listen to them all the time when I was younger. ‘Photograph’ is a jam. They’ve got some bangers! It’s actually not cool to hate on them anymore!”

GREEN DAY

NICKELBACK

‘BOULEVARD OF BROKEN DREAMS’

…I’D USE FOR A MONTAGE OF MY LIFE

“This was the first record I ever bought with my own money. I remember saving up lunch money, not eating some days to get enough, and then I went to Target and bought ‘American Idiot’. I had to own a record. I remember listening to it on my bed on my CD player. ‘Boulevard Of Broken Dreams’ was the banger! I had to go buy the tremolo pedal effect that song starts with.”

JOHN MAYER

…THAT BREAKS MY HEART

‘ASSASSIN’

“I would love for John Mayer to score my life, just make a soundtrack to my life that plays in my head all the time and out loud too – so other people I’m around can hear it like a theme song! He’s so good at guitar. He’s definitely not as appreciated because he’s so good at vocals too, but he can play any different style and so many different songs. You can literally shuffle John Mayer songs and it’s like you’re listening to a bunch of different bands!”

…MADE ME WANT TO START PLAYING GUITAR ‘HALLOWED BE THY NAME’

IRON MAIDEN

“The first band I was into were Iron Maiden. They were the first band I ever saw live. I went with my aunt and my brother and a bunch of my family. I have such a heavy metal family, it’s so cool. I love the ’80s. That was my favourite era. I was into Angus Young, Eddie Van Halen… all those dudes, so many

‘ANGEL’

SARAH MCLACHLAN

“There’s this commercial back home that plays for an adopt a dog foundation, and features this song. It makes me tear up every time. I hate watching TV at home because I know I’m going to see it and I feel so guilty. Even thinking about it I’m getting sad.”

…THAT’S MY FAVOURITE TO PLAY LIVE ‘HALF’

PVRIS

“It was the first one we started playing off the new record, and my favourite! The intro riff is this super clean guitar with chorus and reverb and delay and everything. I’m a huge fan of that sound and the whole song is that, and that’s why I love it.” PVRIS’ ‘All We Know Of Heaven, All We Need Of Hell’ is out now via Rise.

I WOULD LOVE FOR JOHN MAYER TO SCORE MY LIFE... rock sound 81

d l u Woo u Y

…Mermaids or Unicorns were real? “Unicorns! Unicorns frolicking around everywhere would be awesome. Aren’t they supposed to be magical as well? Who wouldn’t love that?! I don’t go to the beach very much, so I wouldn’t really be near mermaids that often anyway. I have a pool, so a mermaid in my pool could be pretty cool. Just like a little pet. I definitely want to be a unicorn legend, though.”

…Be caught in an alien invasion or a zombie outbreak?

STAND ATLANTIC

BONNIE FRASER INTERVIEW: Jack Rogers

Being scared of space, travelling back in time and trying to live her best life. All in a day’s work for our Bon…

would change. I’d end up in a shitty future. I think if you went back and changed things only a number of small things would change, nothing massive. I love to think that I would try to change something big, but I would definitely be too worried that I would fuck it up. I’d stick to that one time I couldn’t wear a shirt cause it was dirty, so I could go back in time and wash it.”

…Visit every country in the world or go to space?

“I’d visit every country, because space is fucking terrifying. Have you ever seen Gravity? That film is too scary. The chick in it gets thrown into space and is “If the aliens were chill, I would definitely prefer an invasion. Zombies have been done so many times – I just spinning and spinning. Not for me. Even if I could know I would just die straight away. For zombies there afford it, it’s not happening. You know how much debris there is in space as well, just flying around? I’ll would be so much preparation, but with aliens they would just take over everything and it would be easy. stick to visiting Cambodia.” Only if they were really chill, though. I mean, why are aliens even jealous of us? All we’ve done is fuck our …Be the opposite gender or be a planet up. They should feel sorry for us.” kid again for a day? “I’m going to go for gender, because then you can still do all the shit that you …Be a dog with human thoughts do now. I want to be able to go out or a human with dog thoughts? “I mean, I’m already a human with dog thoughts as it properly and stuff. Like, as a kid you just watched cartoons and ate is, so I’ll go with that. If you can get on with your life chicken nuggets. I do that now; but with mild inconveniences along the way, then there’s nothing I could do as a that’s absolutely fine. Get on with things, but get kid that I can’t do now. I’d like to distracted by a couple of squirrels every now know how men think, too. Guys and then.” seem to be able to think about …Have summer forever or winter absolutely nothing. I think about so much dumb shit. Let me think forever? about nothing for just once in “I like winter more than summer – you can always my life!” fix the cold. If you’re hot, you are destined to be hot forever. I can’t deal with that much heat. In Australia it’s only just spring and I am already over it. Just give …Always have to me winter again already, please. A warm day every speak the truth now and then is absolutely fine, but as a whole I need or have everyone that cold.” always tell you

the truth? …Be a miserable genius or a happy “Fuck, that’s really deep! I moron? really don’t know… I think

“I’m already a happy moron! I would always rather be a happy moron – ignorance is bliss. If you knew everything there would be nothing you could do to make things better. Nothing would improve what you do because you would already know everything. I really don’t want to know everything.”

…Change the past or see into the future?

“Change the past, because I don’t want to know what happens in the future. If I saw that a good thing was going to happen I would think, ‘Oh well, I don’t have to try because I know it’s going to be fine,’ and everything 82 rock sound

I would rather get told the truth all the time. Then I can still lie and I would have all of the facts – I will always want to be selfish. I just want to be able to live my best life.”

Stand Atlantic’s new EP ‘Sidewinder’ is out now via Rude.

I’M ALRE

HUMAN WADY a ITH

dog

thoughts

as it is