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EDITOR’S NOTE upsetmagazine.com Editor: Stephen Ackroyd (stephen@upsetmagazine.com) Deputy Editor: Victoria Sinden (viki@upsetmagazine.com) Assistant Editor: Ali Shutler (ali@upsetmagazine.com) Contributors: Corinne Cumming, Danny Randon, Emma Swann, Heather McDaid, Jack Glasscock, Jasleen Dhindsa, Kristy Diaz, Martyn Young, Phil Smithies, Sam Taylor, Sammy Maine, Sarah Louise Bennett, Steven Loftin All material copyright (c). All rights reserved. This publication may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form, in whole or in part, without the express written permission of The Bunker Publishing Ltd. The opinions of the contributors do not necessarily bear a relation to those of Upset or its staff and we disclaim liability for those impressions. Distributed nationally. P U B L I S H E D F RO M
THE BUNKER W E LCO M E TOT H E B U N K E R.CO M
IN THIS ISSUE... RIOT! 4 E N T E R S H I K A RI 8 K EV I N D EV I N E
26 ALBUMS OF THE YEAR 28 SWMRS 30 MOOSE BLOOD
ABOUT TO
22 MILK TEETH
BREAK
34 TRACK OF THE
12 FANGCLUB
YEAR 36 B L AC K FOX X ES
FEATURES
38 TO N I G H T A L I V E
14 AGAINST THE
40 B L I N K -182
CURRENT
42 READERS’ POLL
22 PANIC! AT THE
44 BRING ME THE
DISCO
HORIZON
24 MUNCIE G IRLS
45 PIERCE THE VEIL
And so, the end is near. Of the year, obviously - though to be fair, it’d be typical of 2016 to spring a December apocalypse on us. If it did, at least the last twelve months will have had some kind of silver lining before it all comes to a halt. This month we’re blasting through the very best of it, with interviews with a plethora of megastars and Upset faves. From cover stars Against The Current and their neon pop-rock buzz fest, through to Panic! At The Disco, Blink-182, Moose Blood, SWMRS and loads more - all the stars are out. There’s also our Albums of the Year run through (statistically proven to be correct, so no arguing), and a multitude of other goodies. 2017, we’re ready for you. x
S
RIOT ING IN ROCK E V E RY T H I N G H A P P E N
TAKE TO THE STAGE SL A M DU N K 2017 - A N D IT’S N OT J UST A N Y E N T E R S H I K A R I A R E T O P P I N G T H E B I L L AT ... WORDS: STEVEN LOFTIN. G N I AY L P E R ’ Y E H T T E S D OL
A
s the 2017 festival announcements come in thick and fast, Slam Dunk has revealed its first headliner: Enter Shikari. This bill-topping slot not only stands as their first ever full band set at the festival, but it also falls on the tenth anniversary of debut album ‘Take To The Skies’. “The first year we went we DJ’d, and this was… you know what, I don’t even know what year it was!” says Rou Reynolds, embarking on a hazy trip down memory lane. “It was way back, it must’ve been one of the first years. We just DJ’d one of the little side bars, there weren’t half as many stages as they have now.” Slam Dunk certainly has grown, starting out as a one-stage affair in Leeds’ Millennium Square, it now takes over three different venues across the North (Leeds), Midlands (Birmingham) and South (Hatfield). It was this year the band’s DJ alter ego, Shikari Sound System headlined the Uprawr DJ Stage and now they’re returning to bring the full Shikari party. “It’ll be very much a celebration,” Rou continues. “I’m really looking forward to playing the tracks again. ‘Today Won’t Go Down In History’, we’ve actually never played that live so we’re definitely going to bust that out!” On those tracks, he also offers some personal insight: “It’s crazy. Some of those songs we’d been playing for a couple of years even before we went into a studio, so some of them were written when I was 16/17. It brings back floods of memories; be it touring or just more personal life around that time. It’s crazy how much music has the power to do that.”
SLAM DUNK 2017 On the bill: Enter Shikari, Don Broco (UK festival exclusive), Bowling For Soup, Less Than Jake, Reel Big Fish, We The Kings, Cute Is What We Aim For. Dates: Slam Dunk Midlands, Birmingham (27th May) / Slam Dunk North, Leeds (28th May) / Slam Dunk South, Hatfield (29th May).
“It’s mad,” he continues. “I never thought we’d still be doing this. I actually haven’t really revisited it since we brought it out. It was a bit of a rushed album. At the time I had problems with my vocal nodules, which was pretty scary, so I actually hate my voice on it. I can’t stand it so I don’t really listen to it, but musically I love it.” With this anniversary approaching, it’s given both Rou and the band a chance to take stock of what they’ve done and what it’s given them. Some would assume that due to their longevity, Enter Shikari have always had their sights set on being in this for the long
RIOT would be a different beast altogether. It’s important for us to have this original line-up and mindset and everything that we started out to do in the beginning. Things haven’t really changed.”
“THE BAND’S haul - not so, it seems. “We never really had any ambition when we set out. We didn’t have a final destination so to speak, it was always just a hobby. It’s just a hobby that got out of hand. It got bigger and bigger, so now we’re just happy to be where we are and we just want to keep pushing. It’s only the last few years where we’ve had real confidence and ambition. There’s never any point where you feel finished or safe or just comfortable.” “We were very inspired by the local scene in the early days, we were very involved in it,” Rou reminisces. “[We] started promoting and getting a lot of bigger touring bands in, we had a thriving, I’m not sure what to call it, technical-metal rock scene, but then we had loads of pop punk bands back in those days, like Lags from Gallows - his first band was a really great pop punk band.” Over ten years, the Shikari sound is what truly set them apart from the rest of the herd. When ‘Take To The Skies’ was first released in 2007, it didn’t really fit into any one genre. Like a battle between dance and metal, they were a fresh sound. “I think it was never going to be sort of metal-core or straight up heavy music, we never really fitted into that scene. We didn’t fit in anywhere because we love melody, we love harmonies, and I’ve been brought up on The Beatles as well. It’s just all this stuff related and came out through 6 upsetmagazine.com
JUST A H O B B Y T H AT G OT OUT O F H A N D.” the music. “Going back to 2004, when some of the first tracks on ‘Take To The Skies’ would’ve been written, we started going into London to raves and listening to electronica, house and drum & bass. Rory’s brother was a drum & bass DJ back then, he’d be on the decks playing the latest vinyl he bought and that was a bit of education. So we had all of these influences coming from all over the place. “I think my parents were kind of a big influence melodically because my dad was a Motown and northern soul DJ, and that’s one of the most relentless and positive uplifting types of music.” They’re grateful to have been able to stay the course for so long; life as a musician is often precarious. “Most of the bands that we’ve toured with in those early days are either gone or have had fifteen member changes. We’re a bit of an anomaly really. It’s weird, for me a band was always The Beatles - four or five people. Any change from that and it
they do.
2016 hasn’t exactly been a quiet year for the band either, what with a worldwide tour that included a headline date at London’s Alexandra Palace, a show that was released as their second official live album (not including the bootleg series) and the immortalisation of the hard work Enter Shikari put into what
Rou remembers: “That was an absolutely surreal night, that whole tour by far was the most enjoyable tour we’ve ever done and by far the most work we’ve put in on tour. It’s almost a bit of a contradiction the fact that it’s our first arena headlining tour, but it’s probably our most DIY tour ever. I did all the visuals for the screens and our production, we all planned together with our lighting guy.” Along with this world tour, they also found the time to record and release two stand alone tracks to tide their fans over until 2017. ‘Red Shift’ and ‘Hoodwinker’ don’t quite allude to the form new material will take, however: “‘Hoodwinker’ is just this ruthless, ridiculous track that you can only appreciate by itself,” says Rou. “I think on an album it would be more of an outlier, and I think it would probably terrorise the other tracks.” Now that Enter Shikari have reached this point in their career, the future is a gift that will only keep on giving. They’ve a juggernaut of a fan base, and as they look towards the next ten years no words have been truer than those in ‘Take To The Skies’ track ‘Interlude’: “We’ve come this far / that bit was easy / now do you dare to continue?” P Slam Dunk will take place from 27th - 29th May in Birmingham, Leeds and Hatfield.
american football the long-awaited second self-titled album “captures the magic of their debut and will satiate those who’ve waited so patiently” kerrang
mothers when You walk a Long distance You are tired the debut album “raw, striking” Pitchfork
**** **** uPset **** dork
**** the guardian **** diY **** Q magazine
the debut album
the new album from the american football frontman
Loud and Quiet
features the singles ‘sometimes’ and ‘daffodil days’
**** **** **** the Line of Best fit nme
diY
“magnificent” Pitchfork
**** Pitchfork **** the skinnY **** the Line of Best fit
www.wichita-recordings.com
RIOT
“THE WORLD IS BOTH THINGS – IT’S BEAUTIFUL AND IT’S H A RD.”
“I’M STILL LEARNING.” K
FOLLOWING THE RELE A S E O F H I S L AT E S T A L B U M ‘ I N S T I G AT O R ’ , KEVIN DEVINE REFLEC TS ON LIFE, POLITICS A N D F A M I LY . WORDS: SAMMY MAIN E. PH OTOS: C O RI N N E CU MMING
evin Devine has just released his ninth album. He’s never been the next big thing; instead he focuses on his next big thing, refining his melodies, exploring structures, challenging himself and in turn, bettering his craft. When he’s not being impaled to death by his pals in their latest music video, or perfecting a dance routine for his mum’s birthday, he’s writing songs about the injustice of Chelsea Manning or the epidemic of institutional racism. Put simply, Kevin is an artist that is able to find balance between the light and the dark. ‘Instigator’ is a record that flourishes in its party, power-pop anthems but it’s also an album that has something to say. It’s both introspective and outwardlooking, as Kevin contemplates political issues with a personal stance. “I’m somewhat of a receiver and a thinker; a processor,” he explains. “I don’t think it’s anyone’s responsibility to be a political or social justice artist and I don’t think it’s mine. I tend to write those songs when I am moved beyond the point of ignorance; when I can’t ignore it and when I think there is reason to add my voice to a conversation.”
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The album deals with a range of socio-political issues, most notably on ‘Freddie Gray Blues’, which sees Kevin explore the injustice of Gray’s death at the hands of Baltimore police officers in 2015 while also “coming from” cops; Kevin’s father, grandfather, uncles and cousins were and are policemen. “Middleish-class white men need to be doing a lot more listening and adapting rather than directing, so I’m trying to get better at hearing people,” he says of the song. Kevin approached it with a very much ‘this story is horrifying and keeps happening’ approach, while still exploring the complications of his family stemming from the institutions that he feels “absolutely” need changing. “And, what does that mean? How does that feel as a person who’s got a foot in both experiences?” he questions. “I think that’s why you write a song like that; if you’re just writing a song to point a finger at someone and make yourself feel better, I don’t think that’s a very satisfying experience for anyone and I also think it’s a very easy one to defeat.”
Kevin’s father passed away 13 years ago; his Grandfather 17 years before that. As such big influences during his childhood, the recent tensions regarding the American police force have made him wonder what kind of conversation he would have with his Dad if he were still alive today. “I think there would be a poll within him to defend the fraternity and I understand that; you spend your life in a thing, y’know, it’s hard,” he begins. “My Dad spent a lot of time as an officer working in internal affairs – their job is basically policing the police and I wonder if that part of him might’ve seen the error in a lot of these practises and the institutional actionary; the racism at the core of it. It’s a complicated conversation. It’s not complicated in respects to Black Lives Matter – that is clear and true and right; it’s not complicated in respects to institutionalised racism, that is clear and real and present – I just mean it’s complicated like anything with people. Fucking cops are people too. Institutional racism affects everybody in
all directions and it means a lot of these guys and girls grew up with poisoned fruit; being fed nonsense about people and then what happens when you weaponise that sensibility and you throw it in the middle of like, fraught, fearful, high stakes context? It results in disaster.” Politics aside, Kevin says that his songs are simply about people – “they’re just broader character studies rather than writing a song about something that’s more specific like love or drugs” – causing these explorations to be bigger than his own personal scale. “I write it because it moves me to write it,” he explains. Take ‘No History’ for example – a song that directly follows ‘Freddie Gray Blues’, it addresses 9/11 but focuses on the happenings after. “My brother John was working in a building on Harrison Street; he got in early and was setting up for a conference at 8:45am. There was a huge skylight in the room and from that vantage point it was perfectly framing the towers. He finished setting up the table, looked up and watched the first plane hit the building. It was before and after; that was his life and then his life after that. It’s what came to me, some of that stuff when I was thinking about the song.”
Now he has a child of his own, Kevin says that fatherhood hasn’t really changed him as a person; it has simply ignited instincts he didn’t know he had. He spent every day with his daughter over the summer, with handful of festivals and shows tearing him away. “When I was driving I would be doing this phantom clutching thing, like I was holding or cradling her and I had to be like, ‘Oh yeah, she’s not here’,” he laughs. “Music is my livelihood and my career but she is my life now too and so there is a lot of learning how to balance those things,” he continues. “I’ve never had trouble investing my work with meaning but now it’s also for her. I do feel different but I don’t feel unrecognisable.” Reaching this point in his life, it’s almost as if Kevin’s fans have grown up alongside him. He describes his records as “documents of what it felt like to be a 22-year-old, a 28-year-old and now a 36-year-old and every point along the chain,” with the enormity of the scope of his career only seeping in once he has to come up with a setlist of “10 or 20 songs out of 130 or so”. One particular song on ‘Instigator’ – ‘No One Says You Have To’ – deals with Kevin’s blurred
lines of commercial success. He’s an artist that is appreciated; he gets to play shows around the world; people get his lyrics tattooed on their bodies and hello, this is his ninth album but as he puts it himself, he’s never had “that consensus moment”. “It’s always been a little bit like you’re trying to take down a cement wall with a slingshot,” he says. “I do feel successful and fortunate and grateful but I also feel like I work my ass off; someone said to me, ‘You work a 20 hour day so you don’t have to work a 40 hour week’, and I think that’s not just true of me and not just true of creative people, but it’s like a small business owner. No one’s going to mind the shop more attentively than you are.” With more momentum behind him than ever and a UK tour planned for the beginning of next year, Kevin is only looking to the future. “It’s exciting and you feel lucky that you haven’t died or been forced to quit yet,” he laughs. “It also feels like I’m still learning stuff and getting better; I know that is not how everyone feels this far in, so I think that’s awesome and I feel very grateful for that.” P Kevin Devine’s album ‘Instigator’ is out now. He tours the UK from 29th January.
RIOT SLAVES ARE GOING TO BE LIVE AT LEEDS Slaves are heading up the first bands for Live At Leeds, along with White Lies, Jagwar Ma, Black Honey, Wild Beasts and more. The festival takes place on 29th April.
MALLORY KNOX GET ‘WIRED’ WITH THEIR NEW ALBUM
K
nox knox. Who’s there? It’s a new album from Mallory Knox! [We’re really very, very sorry – Ed].
Yep, MK are back with a brand new record. Titled ‘Wired’, the album will be released on 10th March next year, and comes alongside a brand new track, ‘Giving It Up’, which you can hear on upsetmagazine.com now. Speaking about the track, bassist and songwriter Sam Douglas says: “‘Giving It Up’ is about the frustration of
MUSE ARE HEADLINING READING + LEEDS 2017
giving everything to something you’re passionate about and truly believe in, only to have other people step in who don’t share the same passion as you and hinder your progress. The song illustrates that when you keep all the frustrations and anger inside, it leads you to a breaking point of desperation where you feel like you might as well just “give it up”.” That’s not all though, the band are also heading out on tour – including two shows at London’s Koko next April. P
MORE BANDS REVEALED FOR DOWNLOAD 2017
Muse are the first headliner announced for Reading & Leeds. A bunch of bands have been confirmed for further down the bill too, including Against the Current, Architects, At The Drive In and While She Sleeps.
Download has announced over twenty new bands for its 2017 line up, including Sum 41, Good Charlotte, Pierce the Veil, Issues, Basement, Coheed and Cambria, God Damn, Greywind, Crown The Empire and Mastodon.
“We’re very excited to be playing Reading and Leeds again,” say Muse. “More news about our plans for 2017 coming in the new year.”
Also confirmed are: Alter Bridge, Airbourne, Opeth, Clutch, Ministry, DevilDriver, The Dead Daisies, Four Year Strong, Knuckle Puck, WAKRAT, The One Hundred, Astroid Boys, Exodus, Lost Society and Red Fang.
Also playing are: Major Lazer, Bastille, Tory Lanez, Glass Animals, Andy C and Danny Brown. Reading & Leeds will take place from 25th-27th August. P 10 upsetmagazine.com
The Donington Park festival will be held from 9th–11th June. P
WHILE SHE SLEEPS HAVE A NEW ALBUM While She Sleeps are set to release new album ‘You Are We’ on 21st April. To celebrate, they’ll hit the road from 20th April at York’s Fibbers.
YOU ME AT SIX’S ALBUM IS NEARER THAN YOU THOUGHT You Me At Six have brought forward the release of new album ‘Night People’: it’s now due a week earlier than planned, on 6th January.
HELLIONS PLOT UK HEADLINE TOUR Hellions have confirmed details of a headline tour for early next year: the run kicks off on 21st February, and is in support of latest album ‘Opera Oblivia’.
LOWER THAN ATLANTIS HAVE ‘HAD ENOUGH’ LTA have dropped another taster of their forthcoming new album ‘Safe In Sound’, set to arrive on 3rd February. Check out ‘Had Enough’ on upsetmagazine.com.
ABOUT
THE BEST
B R EAK
TH E H OT TEST
TO
NEW BANDS NEW MUSIC
Fangclub WE DROP IN ON FANGCLUB’S KEVIN KEANE TO FIND OUT WHAT THEY’RE ABOUT. WORDS: SAM TAYLOR.
Hey Kev, what are you up to? Hello! You’ve actually interrupted dinner at a video shoot! I’ll be dramatic and starve for this interview. How’s the music scene in Ireland at the moment? Is it a good place to be an up-and-coming band? The music scene in Ireland is really exciting right now. There’s a lot of great new bands out at the moment and we’re stoked to be a part of it. Have you had a good 2016 so far? Any particular highlights? Yeah 2016 has been an incredible year for us. Too many to mention. Between having our teenage dreams come true by getting our video on Kerrang! TV to playing Electric Picnic, to doing our first UK tour, its actually been insane. Still doesn’t feel real. What first drew you to making music, have you always wanted to be in a band? So my first gig ever was Ozzfest. That just blew my mind seeing System Of A Down live. After that was a Foo Fighters gig around the time when ‘One By One’ came out. I can still remember the curtain drop part of All my Life so vividly. I knew after those gigs I wanted to be in a band. I grew up when Kerrang!, MTV2, and P-Rock TV is all we ever watched. We were obsessed. I saved every bit of money I got, and then got this terrible summer job, so i could get a bass. Steven and I have known each other since school and we just bonded over punk rock bands and started jamming together. So since then, that first jam session, its went from “I want to be in a band” to “this is all I want to do.” What are your favourite topics to write/ sing about, and what are you inspired by? Well Steven writes the lyrics so you’d have to ask him, haha. Although he’s told me that he has no idea what the songs are about ‘til six months later. We’ll be playing and he’ll come running up to me after the gig going I just figured out what such and such song is about. I think the way Steven writes, a lot of it is open to interpretation. Your new EP ‘Coma Happy’ has just dropped - is it a comprehensive representation of the band, or do you have more sides you’d like to explore in future? I think the ‘Coma Happy’ EP is a great representation of who we are right now, but we’re constantly trying to
“2016 HAS BEEN AN INCREDIBLE YEAR FOR US.”
develop our noise. I think you’d grow stagnant and bored with yourself if you didn’t. Have you thought much about your debut album? Yeah, for sure! Our debut album is still a work in progress. We’re constantly trying to evolve as a band so if the ‘Bullethead’ EP kicked down the door for us, the ‘Coma Happy’ EP is a good indication of the direction we want to go. We just want to make this great, kick ass record. We’re hoping to have it out in the first half of next year and we’re really excited about the progress of it so far. What do you think are the key components of a ‘good’ album? Well a good album needs good songs, so I think if you stick to Dave Grohl’s “don’t bore us and get to the chorus” formula, you’re on to a winner. Basically all killer, no filler. What do you get up to while touring, when you’re not travelling up motorways or playing onstage? Oh God, eh, catch up on sleep mostly. We’ve learned that eating as well as you can on tour is essential or you’ll just crash and burn really fast so we’ll kinda go out of our way a bit to try to find at least one good meal a day. Steven will be constantly writing even on tour too, soundchecks can turn into testing a new song or riff together. I think we try to get as much of each new city in as we can although there’s never enough time. What’s been your favourite album this year? My favourite album this year is ‘The Golden Age of Bullshit’ by this band called PARTYBABY. I found them through that discover playlist on Spotify earlier in the year and just fell in love with their music. You know when something just clicks in your
GREYWIND MAKE LONDON PLANS Greywind have confirmed their first London headline show, at St Pancras Old Church on 27th Jan. The date coincides with the release of debut album ‘Afterthoughts’.
SLØTFACE ANNOUNCE UK RETURN Sløtface have a new batch of tour dates, with five shows planned between 13th-18th February. They’ve also a few fests: Eurosonic Noorderslag, SXSW and The Great Escape.
BRUTUS SIGN TO HASSLE Belgium trio Brutus have announced their debut album: titled ‘Burst’, it’s due on 24th February via Hassle Records. They’ve also shared a video for ‘All Along’ – check it out on upsetmagazine.com.
head when you hear something? I can hear a lot of influences of a few bands I love in them. It’s just one of those albums I had this huge smile on my face the whole way through, the first time i heard it. I absolutely love another band called Charly Bliss right now as well. They don’t have an album out yet but they’re gonna be huge. What’s top of your bucket list for 2017? Getting our debut record out, and touring it as much as possible. P Fangclub’s debut album is out early 2017. 13
THE BEST OF
2016 Running
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Wild
From digital sensations to real world heroes - in 2016, Against The Current arrived. WORDS: ALI SHUTLER. PHOTOS: SARAH LOUISE BENNETT.
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F
rom the outside looking in, Against The Current are such a confusing band,” admits Chrissy Costanza. “We started on YouTube, and we did all these covers, but we also did so many tours, and we played Download Festival, but then we also play in Asia all the time. ‘What is going on with this band?’” she asks, not entirely knowing the answer. “It must be very confusing for a lot of people. It’s confusing for me, but we just do it.” If you take the little things that make up Against The Current and look at them in isolation, they shouldn’t fit. Three kids from outside Poughkeepsie, New York building an online community around the idea of being your true self, a band who toured the world twice with nothing but a couple of self-released EPs, a group with a fiercely independent vision who have signed to Fueled By Ramen and are distinct individuals. They want to mean something to kids, and they want parents to like them. There are big songs and bigger dreams; milestones come thick and fast, but ATC aren’t following anyone else’s path. Maybe it’s a revolution, maybe it’s the new sound, maybe it’s just beginners luck. However intricately you want to look at the pieces, though, it’s impossible to ignore just how well it all comes together. There’s something about Dan Gow, Will Ferri and Chrissy that just works. Against The Current makes a weird sort of sense and that’s just fine. “We don’t spend a whole lot of time thinking about it,” continues Chrissy. “We didn’t sit around before Download saying, ‘Hey, is this going to be the wrong look for us? Are people going to all of a sudden think we’re something that we’re not? Are people going to think we’re more rock than we are?’ No, none of that matters. We got a cool offer to do something fun, so we took it.” It’s how Against The Current run. Heart first, excitement in sight. “It doesn’t matter if we describe ourselves as underwater-symphonicmetal-alternative-nu-wave,” laughs Chrissy, adding words one at a time. “Whatever you want to describe it as, it
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doesn’t matter. It should just matter if you listen to it and like it or you don’t. People get so hung up on genre, but we don’t care what you classify us as. We don’t care what our genre is. We don’t want to close ourselves in too hard. We just want to make our music, and we just want to play our music to other people.” It’s a simple dream for a band who are so comfortable wanting to be the biggest but it’s the motivation behind everything they do. Forming back in 2011 after Dan and Will, who had been friends since they were eight, were introduced to Chrissy and the band they’d been struggling to make sense, made sense. Still in school, the group played a couple of local Battle of the Bands contests, as you do, before using the internet instead of dive-bar support slots to get their music out. Weekends were spent round each other’s houses, building, practising and finding their path. Their ‘Infinity’ EP came in 2014, ‘Gravity’ in 2015 and this year saw the band’s debut album ‘In Our Bones’ released unto the world. There’s no rest for the wicked. There’s also no rest for those with dreams to chase. Years ago, a careers teacher told Dan that he and Will couldn’t do music. It wasn’t going to work out. They’d have to find something else. “That’s such a typical example,” admits Dan. Luckily, the band have always kept a very close circle of people around them, so the naysayers have become few and far between. However, “When we were having early discussions with other labels before we signed with FBR, there were people who would say things like, ‘We could do this with the band’ or ‘We could do that’.” The response was simple: “Why? Why can’t we just do what we’re doing with the band? I’ve also had people imply, ‘How long do you think you’re going to do this music thing for?’ What do you mean this music thing? What do you mean how long? It’s my job. It’s my career. This isn’t a hobby to me; this is my life. I don’t think people understand, especially when you’re looking at it and it’s not massive yet. People don’t understand it when it’s just starting out. People forget that they had to go to law school; they had to pass the Bar. We don’t just come out and get famous and be this big band. We have to start from the bottom and work our way up, but I plan on getting there.”
“It’s definitely an unpredictable life path, so it makes sense,” offers Will. “But we have a lot of reasons to take it.” Against The Current have been reaching for the stars since the start, but 2016 has seen them become brighter. There’s confidence to the band, a self-acceptance and a knowing that they’re going to make it and they’re going to make it their way. “I don’t know if we were always confident, but we definitely liked to give off that aura,” laughs Will. “You gotta own it,” grins Dan. “I was terrified of walking out at Download, but you have to own it. They’ll see right through you if you don’t.” “On stage, I’ve always felt comfortable with myself but the further we get into this and the more shows we play, I’m discovering who I am more and more,” admits Chrissy. “Just having that knowledge makes me even more comfortable with being myself. I think that’s something everyone can understand, that feeling of self-discovery and that feeling of confidence coming from understanding yourself a little bit better every day.” Ask any of Dan, Will or Chrissy to reflect on the past twelve months and they’ll struggle to find an answer. It’s been relentless. So much has happened, and they’ve not had a chance to sit down and process it all. “I know it’s been a big year for us, but I haven’t been able to look at it in hindsight because we’re still doing it.” There’s a feeling of pride. Of achievement. “You get lost in it when you’re on tour, but when you’re sitting at home in the bedroom that you grew up in, in your hometown and nobody is around ‘cos they’re still in school or working you step back and remember ‘Well, we did that,” reflects Will. “Walking out on stage at Shepherd’s Bush was amazing. It’s moments like that where we realise ‘Wow, this is actually happening’,” smiles Dan. It’s in those moments a light goes on. “This is more than we’ve ever done before.” The band’s debut album ‘In Our Bones’ is the very definition of more. Distinctly ATC but dialled up, stripped back and amplified in every way imaginable, it captures a band with a world before their feet and in their lungs. Pushing them out of their
comfort zone and pulling other people in, the days, weeks and months after its release saw everything got bigger. The band made a new sort of sense. “We expected a little more negative feedback than we got. I don’t want to say no I’m not surprised [by the reaction] because it sounds cocky and douchey, but at the same time…” starts Chrissy, before pausing. “I think what it is, I’m very grateful for the reaction. We are so thankful that it’s been so positive but at the same time, we worked so hard on this record, and we’re such perfectionists. It’s so hard for us to take our hands off of anything and put it out in the world unless we think it’s perfect, so for us to step back and put it out there... We’re our biggest critics, so if we like it, we hope that everyone else will too. If people didn’t like it, I think I’d be really upset. We never think something’s awesome just because it’s our song. We’re very realistic, sometimes almost pessimistic, with our sound. We want it to be better. We’re always trying so hard to make sure that we’re putting out the best reflection of something that we really put ourselves into, instead of just half-assing anything.” Mind, body and soul, Against The Current’s debut album takes it all in. Every track, from the knee-scraping bounce of ‘Running With The Wild Things’, to the solemn reflect of ‘Demons’, hits hard. ‘In Our Bones’ swings with a twelve-for-twelve banger average and those things don’t
THE BEST OF
2016 “People
get so
hung up on
genre, but
we don’t
care.” 17
THE BEST OF
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just happen by accident. “The thing with the album is, we didn’t want there to be any deep cuts. We wanted every song to have its own story.” There’s no concept beyond great songs that mean great things. ‘Outsiders’, despite being a stone-cold rager, isn’t present ‘cause ‘Running With The Wild Things’ does the same job, only better. “It wasn’t going to be a record where every song has the same overall feeling because it’s hard not to have deep cuts on a record like that, it’s hard to have twelve singles that are all about the same thing.” With singular ideas off the table, the band want “people to connect to it in their own way. We didn’t want to force something down their throats, ‘This is the point of the album, do you get it or no?’ We wanted everyone to find what it is that connects with them.” Their album might be without a singular focus, but the band have always stood wholly for being yourself. Single minded, Against The Current come fully-loaded with a contagious sense of freedom. “It’s about doing you and defying the idea of precedents and standardisation. We don’t do standardisation. We don’t do precedents.” It connects. “I think people respond to honesty, to being genuine, being open and being very upfront with them. If you’re showing who you are to them and revealing those vulnerable spots, that’s something people really appreciate, and it really connects you because it feels like now they can be vulnerable with you. I think a lot of people want to feel like it’s okay, that they can open up a little bit and show themselves a little more and not be so defensive and wear camouflage over their colours. We show all of our colours, and we want our fans to be able to do the same thing. We want them to feel that comfortable with us. Whatever it is that we’re doing, whether it’s at a show or with us online, we want them to feel like they can just be themselves with us.” It’s a lesson that goes way back. When Chrissy was twelve-years-old, she was on the soccer team and was driving down to a tournament with her friends and teammates. “They were all listening to a very popular radio station which only played the most popular pop and rap music, and I remember over the next few weeks, I would constantly put on that station in the car because it’s what they were listening to. It’s what everyone else my
age was listening to. I didn’t like it at all. I didn’t know the songs, and I was just listening to it because everyone else was - but then I realised, it doesn’t matter what everyone else likes. I’m going to go back to listening to Bon Jovi. I don’t care that I might be weird, I like listening to Bon Jovi, so I’m going to listen to Bon Jovi. You don’t have to like the same music that everyone else is listening to; you don’t have to wear what everyone else is wearing because it’s the cool thing right now.” Instead, ask questions and follow your own path. It’s what ATC do, and they’ve done it from the start. “That’s just really what we believe,” explains Will. “And that’s why we’re living the life we are now.” All three of them have grown up loving music and wanting it to be their life. Instead of compromising, they chased those dreams. Now, “we want to encourage people that if they have a passion, to chase it, to cultivate it. And if you don’t yet, everyone has something they’re meant to do. Maybe we can help them find that?” The band have proudly forged their own path. At their shows and during their workshops on Warped Tour, they “drive the point home. What we did works for us because we did what we felt worked for us. We want to emphasise that point to other kids. What we want you to take away from us is not what we did, but why we did what we did. We did this because it’s what felt right to us, it felt natural to us, it felt true to us. We didn’t do something because we were trying to follow another precedent or we were trying to emulate someone else. There are always things to take from other people; there are always different things you can be learning about but the overall picture, we’re always just doing things because they’re right for us.” The band “didn’t know what we were doing,” they just knew why they were doing it. “We want to encourage other kids to do something like that as well. Whatever it is that you do, music, art or whatever, do it in your own way. Don’t do something just because a band or an artist you love is doing it that way, do it because it best represents who you are.”
“ Yo u don’t have to like the same music that everyone else is listening to.” 19
And who you are is allowed to change. Living with ‘In Our Bones’ all summer meant they found new meanings in some of the songs. “It’s what makes them enjoyable and keeps them interesting,” explains Dan. “I think a lot of them have developed way more than I thought they would,” starts Chrissy. A song like ‘Roses’, the bridge is about someone passing away, and when I wrote it, no one close to me had passed away, so I wasn’t writing about a direct experience, I was writing about a feeling. Then I lost a very, very close friend of mine, who was a huge influence on my life, a couple of months ago and that song gained an entirely new meaning for me. I loved that song to begin with, and then it became so much more to me because every time I would sing it, I would think of him. I think all of the songs have had something like that, where we’ve rediscovered them. You’re writing your own soundtrack when you’re writing a record.”
who I am now and what this record has shown me and how I’ve grown through it.”
“We’re learning a lot more about what ATC is about, especially in the past couple of months,” continues Will. “We always try and outdo ourselves. For better or worst, we always try. Every tour turns out to be an improvement in some way. We’re excited to get out on this US headline run because I think we’re the most united we’ve ever been. We’re all on the same page right now, and we’re ready to do it good. We had time off after a crazy Asia and Europe tour, so we sat down, talked and asked ourselves ‘What is ATC?’ ‘What does Against The Current stand for?’ ‘What does this record mean to us?’ ‘What does it mean to the people listening to it?’ We found a lot of clarity, and we just know what we want. We know what we’re doing right now.”
Gravity was an entirely stream-ofconscience writing attempt,” she continues. “We just sat down, wrote six songs and recorded them start to finish in 9 days. We started with nothing and ended up with an EP. There was less planning, less thought to what it all meant; it was just raw emotion. ‘In Our Bones’ was a defined, edited and rephrased statement of what we were all about.” Reaching people old and new, ‘In Our Bones’ saw the band reintroduce themselves to the world. It’s something that’s going to happen time and time again. “I’ve seen so many artists, especially those big pop stars, do that. They re-imagine their world on every record, and that’s cool. It shows growth and how you’ve changed. It’s like, ‘This is my new world I’ve created over the past couple of years. This is where I am now.’ Every record should be a reintroduction; every record should show you that this is who I am now. Kids our age, I say kids our age because I’m 21 and I consider myself a kid still, we’re constantly changing. This is such a time of growth, and I’m definitely so different to how I was three years ago. I want to continuously reintroduce myself to people. Maybe someone didn’t like this record, but maybe next time we put out a record, they will find something they do like in it because it’ll have changed and grown. You always have to be making a new statement. If you want to be making new fans, you have to introduce yourself like it’s the first time with every new release you do otherwise people will feel as if they have to play catch up.”
As always with ATC though, right now also means thinking about the future. There are more tours in the pipeline, “We did a lot this year but the first half of next year is already packed,” and the band are “thinking about writing some songs on our own. I don’t know if we’re thinking about the next record yet, we haven’t sat down and written in a while because we’ve been on tour, so we’ll see,” offers Dan. “We’re going to start working on some new music because we want to keep showing ourselves off,” promises Chrissy. “Even on this record cycle, I already feel like I’ve changed as a person so much. We want to keep showing who we are to people because we are constantly changing. I’m excited to show people
The band are living a life they’ve always been dreaming of. The reality is “better and worse” than they imagined, though. “It’s way more work than I could ever have expected it to be. It’s a 24/7 job. Even on off time, there are interviews to do and things to dream up. You can never truly sit down and pretend you’re on a break but this life is also way more fulfilling and amazing than I ever expected it to be. I never expected to connect to people like we’re connecting with people now. I didn’t realise what sort of relationship you end up having with your fans. Our fans are very close to me; it feels like they’re part of our family and I don’t want to ever let them down. I never realised how much you could drop that
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barrier and connect with people.” The self-proclaimed outsiders have got to this point by doing things their way and no one else’s. It might look confusing, but it feels right. Along the way, they’ve united people who feel the same and surprised others who don’t. Against The Current are an open door, everyone is welcome. “We are all so different to each other. There are certain threads, empathy and our basic human traits that make us alike in a way that we can all bond and connect but everything about us is so diverse and beautifully unique. Having such diversity is what promotes change, growth and all of those amazing things. If we were all the same, everything would be stagnant. It’s important to be who you are and let your colours fly because you’re going to contribute something to this world that no one else is going to contribute, even if you don’t see it,” beams Chrissy. “You might not realise the value of it, but you are a piece of this world that no one else can be. It’s so important that you are that piece. We’re not all the same, we all have our strengths and weaknesses,” and your weaknesses will be shouldered by someone else’s strengths. “It doesn’t matter what you can’t do; it matters what you can do. Focus on your strengths.” Against The Current know their strengths. They know who they are and what they want. No one can tell them any different. “We want to be able to do what we do, just bigger and bigger,” states Dan with absolute conviction. “I want to achieve everything,” adds Chrissy with just as much determination. “Not in a mean or a rude way but we don’t care what everyone else wants or thinks. We just do our own thing. It’s what the band has been about since day one; it’s just doing you the way that you do you. Whatever it is that makes you, you, whatever it is you’re into, you can do that, but you still don’t have to follow a precedent. There are a billion other bands out there in the world, and so many of them are incredible, but it doesn’t mean their path is the path for us. There are so many different paths to get there. Some of the most amazing, influential bands got to where they were because they didn’t follow someone else’s precedent. They said this is us, this is so truly and deeply and genuinely us that we’re just going to do it the way that is us. We’re not going to do it the tried, tested or safe way.” P
THE BEST OF
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THE BEST OF
2016
Panic! At The Disco With chart success both sides of the pond, and packed out megashows all over the world, Brendon Urie has had the best year.
F
or Brendon Urie, Panic! At The Disco has always come with a certain freedom. “It just means carte blanche to me,” he starts. It’s the day before the first of two shows at London’s Alexandra Palace, and he’s excited. Everything to do with the band is “great”, this year has been “phenomenal”, the future is “amazing”, and life is “awesome”. Brendon Urie is relentless, he’s always in a good mood, and he wants to share that. From the live show, which is a celebration of each and every one of the eleven years this band has been a thing, to their fluorescent fifth album ‘Death Of A Bachelor’, Panic! have spent 2016 letting the good times roll. “That’s what excited me when Panic! first started,” he continues. “It’s why I never bothered changing anything about it in terms of name or anything like that, the drive and the passion has always been the same. If anything it’s grown or, at least, I’ve now got a deeper appreciation for it.” From the classic come club contradiction of ‘A Fever You Can’t Sweat Out’, through the ultimate about-turn of ‘Pretty. Odd.’ and off across the swaggering return of ‘New Perspective’, the reflective ‘Vices & Virtues’ and the decadence of ‘Too Weird To Live, Too Rare To Die’, Panic! At The Disco have always practised what they preached. Anything goes. “I can do whatever I want, we can just create these amazing productions for fans, and we can tour all over the world, it’s just phenomenal. It’s a really fortunate experience.” The reaction to ‘Death Of A Bachelor’ was “really surprising in the best way possible.” Hitting number one on both sides of the Atlantic and setting off a chain of events that have elevated the band to new heights, it’s been a wild ride. “I didn’t know what to expect,” admits Brendon. Creating in
WORDS: ALI SHUTLER. PHOTO: EMMA SWANN.
the isolation of his home studio, “You never know how people are going to react. To say it’s bigger than it’s ever been, I don’t know numbers-wise. I don’t talk to enough people to get the
“ I CA N D O W H AT E V E R I WA N T, I T ’ S J U S T PHENOMENAL.”
real information about how everything is with sales and stuff, but in terms of touring, it’s been amazing,” he beams. “You get that immediacy, and you can’t hide from it. It’s awesome.” Brendon Urie has never stood still. Ever. So, “Where do I take Panic next? Oh man, that’s a great question. It’s always surprised me what Panic! is now but in terms of where we go next, that’s up to the ambition of what happens with the albums. I never know what’s going to happen until I finish an album. You have an idea what it could be and what it means to you personally, but it’s really surprising, and lately, it’s just been amazing. I hope the future involves doing something Panic! has never done before. Maybe we’ll create a Broadway show, I’m all about Broadway, it would be so fun.” Panic! At The Disco are constantly evolving. “Dynamics change, ideas come and go, and it’s something of an organic process. I’m constantly doing different stuff when I’m writing,
and amazing people surround me. I’m really enjoying everything we’ve done but I’ve been writing a lot, and I’m looking to the future. As soon as possible, I’m going to be working on new stuff. I’m tracking ideas here and there, demoing on the road, but it’s so different when you’re home. You’re comfortable, you’re in your own studio, and you’ve got everything you need, but I think something sooner rather than later. I’m hoping to get more time in the studio right away before the real tour starts at the end of January. There are a few cool things planned for next year, but that’s all I’ll say about that.” “The world is turmoil right now,” Brendon continues. “America just elected an internet troll, and it’s going to be interesting to see how it really affects us ‘cause who knows? There’s plenty of material to write about. I’ve never concerned myself with being ideally political, but there’s so much happening. I do feel strongly in my ideals and believe that music is an escape, though. It’s escapism, and I love it. I love using music as an uplifting source instead of an angry source. It’s okay to be angry, but I love using that facet to escape and uplift you.” From a tour with Weezer that felt like a summer camp, through real world events and a new app that lets Brendon select a country and a year and then listen to music from that particular era, there’s a lot of inspiration about for the future. “Anything that I hear that excites me finds a place in something I write. Specifically, there are a couple of songs that I’ve heard, and I know I want to write something like that. Whether it’s a 1970’s Icelandic jam or a disco jam from Brazil, it doesn’t matter as long as it’s exciting. That’s the thing with having no rules. I hope it continues.” P 23
THE BEST OF
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Muncie Girls M
We don’t want to spoil it for you, but Muncie Girls have done pretty well in Upset’s Albums of the Year list. It’s no surprise, really. ‘From Caplan To Belsize’ is one hell of a record. WORDS: MARTYN YOUNG. PHOTO: EMMA SWANN.
uncie Girls’ 2016 has seen them fulfil years of promise and hard work with their storming debut album, ‘From Caplan to Belsize’. For singer and guitarist Lande Hekt it’s been a long and arduous year, but one of immense satisfaction and relief at achieving their ambitions.
embarrassing.”
“The release shows were a real achievement, and we were proud of ourselves,” she explains, relaxing in a brief post-winter tour hiatus at home in Exeter. “We waited so long from recording it to putting it out. We were excited to put it out, but it was a relief when we finally did it. Those shows were great.”
This attitude is part of the reason why Muncie Girls have had such a great year. Lande distills their sharp conscious rock songs to one simple premise: “Trying to talk about something important but making it relatable. That’s what we try and do.”
Muncie Girls’ rise has been gradual yet all the while they have been reaching out and capturing new audiences and giving voice and hope to idealistic music fans up and down the country. There’s something about them that people instantly warm to, yet their success still comes as a shock to the band. “The fact that people seemed to like the record was a surprise,” laughs Lande. This year saw the turning point that all musicians wait for when the shows start to fill with actual fans. “Before it was just our friends. People who were in bands were listening to us because they were in bands,” says Lande. “Now there are some people who are not in bands listening to us.” Despite the influx of new fans and capturing a new audience, the band are still remarkably down to earth. “We’re not trying to be people that we aren’t,” explains Lande. “That’s more of a fault of other bands than us doing that intentionally, though. When other bands are horrifically cringeworthy and think they’re the best thing ever, it’s a gut reaction for us to find that 24 upsetmagazine.com
Muncie Girls operate on a strictly no dickheadedness basis. “It’s really important to make it clear that you’re not a dickhead and you could chat to anyone,” she says. “I don’t think that’s a great thing, just necessary and normal. Anyone who does it any other way is just outrageous.”
Running next to Muncie Girls’ breakout has been the ever-expanding success of the UK DIY rock scene, of which they’re champions. Lande breathlessly reels off a string of bands she loves, like The Cut Up’s, Colour Me Wednesday and The Tuts as evidence of a thriving scene. “They’re all like us,” she excitedly exclaims. “We’re all just trying to have a creative and expressive outlet while trying to figure out what we think about things. Alternative politics has come to the foreground of the DIY punk scene, and that’s super exciting. It’s not that differences are tolerated, they’re celebrated.” 2016 was a busy year for Muncie Girls, but for a band with such a dedicated work ethic, next year promises to be even more productive. “We’ve written loads of new songs, and we are booking shows in new places,” says Lande. “Loads of different shows and a whole load of new songs. Basically what every band does,” she laughs as she sets the course for Muncie Girls year ahead. “It’s the next natural thing. There’s no break whatsoever.” Of course, Muncie Girls aren’t like every other band though, and this year they’ve very much proved it. P
“A LT E R N AT I V E POLITICS HAS C O M E TO TH E
FOREGROUND OF THE DIY PUNK SCENE, AND T H AT ’ S S U P E R E XC ITI N G .”
THE BEST OF
2016
Albums of the Year 2016 has seen all kinds of amazing albums released. Here’s just some of them in an arbitrary order we’ve decided as fact.
#1 Muncie Girls From Caplan to Belsize
Muncie Girls aren’t ones for grand sweeping statements, so allow us: their debut album ‘From Caplan To Belsize’ is one of the most vital of the year. The band are charming yet challenging; unafraid to take on the world, the record tackles everything from free healthcare, sexism, and anxiety to heartbreak and uncertainty about the future. ‘From Caplan…’ sees Muncie Girls find their voice and, at the same time, so does a generation. Ali Shutler
#2 Panic! At The Disco Death of a Bachelor Once again it’s all change for Panic! At The Disco. Swapping the decadent homecoming of ‘Too Weird to Live...’ for the theatrics of ‘Death of a Bachelor’, the band shock and delight in equal measure. This is Panic! at their most vibrant; it’s Brendon Urie on maximum. In among all the sequins and shine is a nuanced record of heartfelt honesty that’s constantly entertaining. Ali Shutler
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#3 Milk Teeth - Vile Child
#6 Frank Iero and the Patience - Parachutes
‘Vile Child’ is Milk Teeth. Capturing their tension and chemistry before roughly grabbing a loose thread of influences and running with it, their lightningin-a-bottle debut is the perfect snapshot of
Frank Iero has found his voice, and he wants everyone to know. From the opening rampage of ‘World Destroyer’, he and his band waste no time in showing just how far they’ve come. Every step into the unknown and every calming breath can be seen as ‘Parachutes’ charges through new ground. Ali Shutler
who the band are, marrying charming DIY punk with an ambition to take it worldwide. Ali Shutler
#4 SWMRS Drive North SWMRS have used their new slate as a declaration of self, a middle-fingered salute to anyone who tried to push them down and as an invitation for you join them. ‘Drive North’ is for turning up, but SWMRS aren’t a band you’ll turn down. Ali Shutler
#5 Against the Current In Our Bones Against The Current know their way around a great song. From their soaring debut EP to covers of Taylor Swift, Adele and Paramore, the band have a history of surrounding themselves with big ol’ anthems. ‘In Our Bones’ sees them go bigger. Ali Shutler
#7 Black Foxxes - I’m Not Well Black Foxxes’ debut is deeply personal. You can feel the battle behind every moment, but it’s also a thrilling ride. From the destruction of ’How We Rust’, through the agility of ‘Maple Summer’ and out, towards the pointed ‘Home’, ‘I’m Not Well’ is a record to get lost in. It’s also a record to find yourself in. Ali Shutler
#8 Moose Blood - Blush There’s an intensity across ‘Blush’ that’s a new look for Moose Blood. Energetic but never in a rush, every idea is developed but not over-saturated. The record shines bright but still has that rough-and-ready glint in the corner of its eye. Ali Shutler
#9 Against Me! - Shape Shift With Me As charismatic as it is cathartic, ‘Shape Shift With Me’ keeps Against Me!’s saga of reinvention as unpredictable as the cruel world that it shakes the foundations of. This album is the sign that Against Me! are no longer one of
punk rock’s most beloved bands. They’re now one of punk rock’s most vital bands. Danny Randon
#10 Of Mice & Men - Cold World ‘Cold World’ is goose bump inducing just seconds into its first track ‘Game of War’. Modest and mystical, it’s an almost ethereal art piece that starts the journey of this colossal album. Of Mice & Men are truly a force to be reckoned with, and so much more. ‘Cold World’ is a game-changer. Jasleen Dhindsa
#11 Blink-182 California What do you get when you cross 2/3 of Blink with 1 part Alkaline Trio? A great album. Who knew? Stephen Ackroyd
#12 Doe - Some Things Last Longer Than You Underground sensations with an album that packs more than its fair share of mega-bangers. Stephen Ackroyd
#13 Weezer - Weezer With their white album, Rivers and co. are back on form. Turns out everything will be all right in the end. Stephen Ackroyd
zone. Heather McDaid
#18 Basement - Promise Everything Basement didn’t just meet expectations, they knocked them out of the park. Stephen Ackroyd
#19 PUP - The Dream Is Over PUP’s venomous mix of abrasion, melody and adventure sees ‘The Dream Is Over’ run riot. Ali Shutler
#20 Pierce The Veil Misadventures The very best version of everything Pierce the Veil could be. Stephen Ackroyd
#17 Deftones - Gore Deftones will never churn out the same album twice, and this is their declaration not to stay in their comfort
#29 Twin Atlantic - GLA A belter of a record: fun and full of surprises. Heather McDaid
#30 Modern Baseball Holy Ghost The endearing self-deprecation is still very much apparent. Jack Glasscock
#31 Car Seat Headrest - Teens of Denial #32 Black Peaks - Statues
#34 Johnny Foreigner - Mono No Aware
#22 Ray Toro Remember the Laughter
#35 The Hotelier Goodness #36 Pinegrove Cardinal
A fully-formed expression of self. Ali Shutler
#37 Touche Amore Stage Four
#23 Joyce Manor - Cody
#38 Into It. Over It. - Standards
#24 Babymetal - Metal Resistance
The four-piece take their shoegazing wares to breathtaking levels of sonic astonishment. Danny Randon
Waterparks deliver on their promise of a big splash. Danny Randon
Tonight Alive set their own limits now. Stephen Ackroyd
Fun, feminist surf pop punk; Tacocat are bigger and bolder than ever before. Jasleen Dhindsa
#16 Nothing Tired Of Tomorrow
#28 Waterparks Double Dare
#33 letlive. - If I’m The Devil
The result of a band constantly hitting their peak. Kristy Diaz
Hooky yet uniquely disjointed melodies against wholehearted narratives. Jasleen Dhindsa
With sparks and smarts, White Lung are a special band indeed. Stephen Ackroyd
#21 Tonight Alive - Limitless
#14 Tacocat - Lost Time
#15 PWR BTTM Ugly Cherries
Paradise
Utterly bizarre, but what do you really expect? Ali Shutler
#25 Architects - All Our Gods Have Abandoned Us Unforgiving and merciless, yet inspirational and hopeful. Ali Shutler
#26 Lonely the Brave Things Will Matter
#39 Real Friends - The Home Inside My Head #40 Boston Manor - Be Nothing #41 Jimmy Eat World Integrity Blues #42 American Football American Football #43 Biffy Clyro - Ellipses #44 A Day To Remember - Bad Vibrations #45 Death Spells - Nothing Above, Nothing Below #46 Petrol Girls - Talk Of Violence #47 Trash Boat - Nothing I Write…
A great British band with a great British rock album. Stephen Ackroyd
#48 Issues - Headpsace
#27 White Lung -
#50 The Devil Wears Prada Transit Blues
#49 Field Mouse - Episodic
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THE BEST OF
2016
SWMRS
They dropped one of the albums of the year, then signed to one of the best labels in the world. 2016 has been alright for SWMRS. WORDS: STEVEN LOFTIN. PHOTO: SARAH LOUISE BENNETT.
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ne of 2016’s biggest success stories came in the form of California punks SWMRS. No only did they release their debut album independently, they were soon picked up by pop punk monolith Fueled By Ramen. This was certainly their year, with ‘Drive North’ marking the beginning of a new journey for the band. Having just wrapped up an extensive worldwide tour, frontman Cole Becker reflects on this year, their debut - and Oasis.
kind of where we come from. Some people keep commenting like, “Oh you guys are like sell outs - I can’t believe you have a song about selling out but then you sold out,” but that’s not what it’s about. It’s about not waiting for that kind of push. The reason we established the idea of do it yourself is because we know there’s a lot of kids who want to do things, to create things, that listen to our band and they’re waiting for someone to tell them to go. They need someone to tell them to go now instead of later.
So tell us about your year. You put out ‘Drive North’, and then re-released it after signing to Fueled By Ramen? It’s been awesome… we were lucky because they wanted to re-release it so we kind of got to breathe some new life into the tour cycle and now we can stay out longer, play more shows play bigger shows because they keep growing which is really cool. They’ve [FBR] been so cool and they really care about music.
Going for it has definitely worked well for you. I mean, there’s a stigma attached to a band that do want to turn it into their life I think. We just know so many people who live or die by it by doing it for pure love, the difference is we
What does it mean to have found FBR, it must’ve been a confidence booster? It’s good to have that reassurance that we’ve done something right, you know? But then the process is going to remain exactly the same as we approach this next one because we don’t want to readjust who we are and our standards of music because now we don’t want to approach it like, “Oh we’re a major label band so we’ve got to think differently”. It’s like, we’re still going to do our thing, but it’s nice to have that confidence boost for sure. It’s a nice thing to have, it’s cool that they understand where we’re coming from and the kind of things we want to do. What does ‘Drive North’ mean to SWMRS as a band? For us, it just means don’t wait for anybody. Do it now and do it for yourself and nobody else, that’s kind of what ‘Drive North’ is about. We don’t actually hate Los Angeles, it’s just about kids in a bunch of places who are like, “Our lives are going to start once we get the fuck out of here and move to LA and NY.” The reality is, start the life now. You don’t have to wait for anyone, just do it. That’s an ethos that’s certainly rich in ‘Drive North’, how does this new success affect the working of the band? We’re not by any means a “real” DIY band, just all the shows we played, we cut our teeth in that world and that’s
“ YO U D O N ’ T H AV E T O WA I T F O R A N YO N E , J U S T D O I T. ”
treat this equal parts love and this is our craft, this is our career. If we take it very seriously and think the music we make isn’t always meant to be put out there for free, some people go for quantity and we try to do a small amount of like really tediously crafted music, you know? The thing is there is no better feeling than playing to a full room of people and the best way to do that is to take it really seriously and make it your life. Where did the inspiration come from to throw everything into ‘Drive North’ as SWMRS’ starting point? I think it kind of runs parallel with Oasis being big in the States again. We all had our Oasis phase when we were like nineteen and when we heard ‘Definitely Maybe’ for the first time we were like, “Damn, so that’s what a first album should be.” You should come out firing, so that’s when we were like, “We’re definitely starting a new project.” There’s that really funny Noel Gallagher quote: “You know, people always talk shit on me for being so
arrogant and not giving respect to like Paul Weller or Mick Jagger, but the truth is, I know all these other British bastards personally and I wrote the best first album.” That’s certainly one hell of an album to set as inspiration. Didn’t that add pressure to what you were doing? The cool thing is like, we do this because we love it and it wasn’t pressured, we were ready. We were ready to do something that we took seriously and that’s where the album came together. We didn’t pressure ourselves into writing songs too much. It helped to have Zac [Carper from FIDLAR produce] because he helped us differentiate which ones we were gonna put out there in the universe forever, and that was really cool. It didn’t feel like pressure as much as it did excitement. With the tours being extended, has that taken a toll on you guys yet? I still haven’t got sick of any of the songs yet and it’s been almost a year, which, I have a very short attention span so I’m really very proud of that. Even after 175 shows this year, it still feels really magical to get up there and play these songs with my best friends. We’re all really serious about our instruments and stuff but we don’t like to add pressure on ourselves because that stifles creativity. I’m really proud of how we approached it. You’re over in the UK early next year with All Time Low, how’s the SWMRS reception been here? People are like insane about music there, I love that. People are really passionate fans of everything. It’s cool to see how there’s just a different identity to British people when it comes to enjoying music, like they go crazy, and it translates over too, like when they watch rap shows, we saw BBK at Reading Festival and that was probably the most punk show I’ve ever been to in my life, it was so cool. I like that it seems that it’s giving a voice to a lot of people who weren’t like a big part of older British culture, you know? I really think that’s cool and I think that’s something that’s really important to have, in the same way, hip-hop did that in the 80s/90s. Absolutely. What does the future look like for you guys? I don’t know. You never know where creativity will take you, and to see how the last two years of us translates in the studio. P 29
THE BEST OF
2016
Moose Blood Moose Blood had a Top 10 album in 2016. Moose Blood are a big deal now. WORDS: DANNY RANDON. PHOTO: PHIL SMITHIES.
Between touring four continents and breaking the Top 10 with their incredible second record, ‘Blush’, it’s been a year which has seen the Canterbury quartet ascend from darlings of the emo revival to one of the brightest in Britain’s next generation of stars. “It’s been surreal,” guitarist Mark Osborne chuckles when asked to sum up the year in three words. One of the most bizarre highlights of Moose Blood’s ram-packed year was their sold-out headline tour in October. It was a week which taught the band a long-overdue lesson in embracing their insecurities, and as a result, their confidence as performers came to glorious fruition. “When we were getting offers off the back of [debut album] ‘I’ll Keep You In Mind From Time To Time’ to tour with Mallory Knox and Lower Than Atlantis, we always felt like we shouldn’t have been there, or that maybe it was too soon for us,” says Mark. “Now that we’ve moved into bigger venues, we’ve started learning to take everything in our stride.” Something which seems far less understated is the not-so-distant future of Moose Blood thanks to the blind-siding success of ‘Blush’. A dazzlingly authentic proposition over just ten heartfelt bangers, the album epitomises the knockout year for many of the British underground bands counted firmly as members of the infamous ‘Mates Club’. “We never could’ve anticipated how
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well ‘Blush’ did,” admits Mark. “[Getting to Number 10] was an achievement that we couldn’t be prouder of. As much as we love the record and we couldn’t have put any more into it, we never thought we were going to release an album that would end up in the Top 10! “We just wanted to make a record that was better than our first in our opinion. We thought we had done that, but we also thought that if it went down as well as ‘I’ll Keep You In Mind…’ and it allowed us to have a solid touring schedule off the back of it and it allowed us to be a band for a little longer, then that was as far as we saw it.” One thing that people may have wanted, but not expected, from Moose Blood in 2017 is more new music. That said, this transformative year has seen them plant their songwriting feet a little further away from home. “We’re really excited about the third album already, we’ve even started messing around with some ideas whilst we’ve been on tour,” says Mark. “It’s the quickest we’ve ever started writing again, and we’ve never really been able to write while we’re on the road. Nothing sort of clicked before. “This time, though, Eddy and I have just been sitting around with our guitars and naturally started messing around with lyrics and melodies and stuff already. We normally give ourselves a bit of time, but I guess that once you feel like you can start writing again without forcing anything, then why not start writing? We want to be as prolific and as busy as we possibly can.” What’s even more delightful to hear is that Moose Blood will be recording
Quality Street or Celebrations? It’s got to be Celebrations, I hate Quality Street. It’s the worst chocolate because it’s Nestle, isn’t it? Hot chocolate or mulled wine? It’s got to be hot chocolate! Watch the Queen’s speech or have an afternoon nap? Have a nap, 100% every time! Are there any Moose Blood Christmas traditions? We usually have our Christmas party, which usually involves taking our whole crew out in Canterbury and getting drunk, but that’s as far as it goes with traditions. If Moose Blood could cover one Christmas song, what would it be? ‘All I Want For Christmas Is You’ [by Mariah Carey]. We’d find some way of ruining it and making it miserable!
Quickfire Xmas Questions
I
f you leaf through the pages of Moose Blood’s 2016 schedule, you wouldn’t even find an inch of room in the margins to doodle one of their poignant lyrics.
demos in the spring, but after the stark progression in sound between ‘I’ll Keep You In Mind…’ and ‘Blush’, the sound of album number three remains a mystery even to Mark. “With the ideas we’re knocking around with at the minute, I think they’ll completely change again before they become a song,” he teases. “With everything that we’re doing, they’ll hopefully still sound like Moose Blood - we don’t know what else to do!” P
“WE NEVER THOUGHT WE WERE GOING TO RE L E ASE AN ALBUM T H AT W O U L D END UP IN THE TO P 10!”
THE BEST OF
2016
Milk Teeth
Upset’s first cover stars of the year have delivered, but they’re not sitting back now. WORDS: ALI SHUTLER. PHOTO: SARAH LOUISE BENNETT.
T
he road to ‘Vile Child’ was an uphill struggle. People left, doubts were had, but Milk Teeth never said die. “It’s been the craziest year to date,” grins Becky Blomfield, coffee in hand and looking back over the past twelve months. “It’s been nice to see lots of the world, see lots of people, and have an actual album out. It feels like we’ve been waiting for it for so long, so it was cool to have a solid set and be stoked to go out and play new music. It’s still such a baby band, but it’s grown massively.” Back in January, Milk Teeth were preparing for a tour with Tonight Alive, and they all shared a feeling of “we don’t know what the fuck we’re doing.” Now they’re at the tail end of the year, about to head out on a tour with Against Me! and it feels right. “I wouldn’t say it’s been plain sailing, it’s been great to have the opportunities, but there are times where we’ve wanted to kill each other because we were on tour for five months straight.” Surviving the tour, the band are now an even stronger unit. “I’ve seen Chris, Oli and Billy more this year than I’ve seen my family,” laughs Becky, but the group, missing each other when they’re not on tour, are like a family all of their own. “You learn to appreciate the people you’re around. We were thrust into this like, ‘Okay, you’re now legit doing this’. It was a hell of a lot to take in. There was an adjustment period, but we now know it’s what we want to do.” No doubts. Since ‘Kabuki’ and the headline tour, so many kids have come up to me after shows and spoken to me about mental health. You do want people to see it as less of a taboo. If I can publicly expose my more human side, then maybe that might help some other people feel
more comfortable.” The past year has taught Becky that “this has a purpose bigger than just
“IT’S BEEN THE CRAZIEST YEAR.” me selfishly writing songs to deal with my shit. I think that’s made me grow up quite a lot. It is nice to talk to people through music; you’ve got that instant connection. You get to know strangers, and they become your friends, which shows what music can do.” “It’s just encouraging people to have a voice. Our generation has been so downtrodden, and that’s half the reason people don’t vote because they feel like, well, what can I do? I want people to be like what CAN I do. I don’t want us to be seen as that band where the other stuff takes away from the music; I just want to use the music as a platform. We talk about it ‘cause we care about it, and we’re in a position where people may pay attention to what we’re saying. We’re just trying to encourage people to be accepting of everyone.” “To think that people have been sat at home listening to our record is so strange because to me, that’s just what I do with other bands,” she laughs. “I’ll
buy whoever’s CD and listen to that in my room. You don’t think of that happening to you. It’s a weird concept, but amazing. I try not to think about it though because it might drive me a little crazy.” As well as connecting to strangers, Milk Teeth have played shows with some of their favourite ever bands this year. It’s situations like that where they “feel super lucky. I’m never complacent about that. I’m always trying to level down my excitement, so I don’t look like a complete nerd. I’ve still got the excitement.” That excitement carries over to new material. Album number two is written, and the band are “in the process of making changes and trying to get them to be the best songs they can be.” The relentless tour schedule has influenced the new record in part “but because touring is something a small number of people get to do, I’ve tried to broaden it. I don’t want to isolate anyone. There’s a lot of personal stuff on there, I’ve had relationships start, and I’ve come out of relationships while I’ve been on tour,” so there are songs inspired by that. There’s a fullon love song, capturing that ultimate gooey phase and the whole thing still feels “like a diary.” “We always want to be better. We’ll watch other bands, and we’ll ask, what are we missing, what is not in our live show, what can we do to improve this and we’re constantly thinking about the next step. That’s so important. Nothing’s ever good enough. Not in an ignorant way, we appreciate everything, but once you’ve reached a level, you should be shooting for the next. That work ethic keeps us ticking along. As soon as you think you’re the best band on the planet, you’ve fucked it.” P 33
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his year saw Twenty One Pilots go from the biggest cult band around, hiding in shadows, in secret handshakes and squirrelled away on headphones, to one of the biggest bands around, full stop. There might have been a warning shot when ‘Stressed Out’ broke through, but it’s ‘Heathens’ that carried Tyler Joseph and Josh Dunn into the spotlight proper. As always with this band, it wasn’t intentional. Delicate and honest, there’s a fragility to ‘Heathens’; a vulnerability to the way Tyler welcomes people to this new world. A bare-bones heartbeat underpins the heads down tour while the electronic twitch distracts, desperate to escape. While the rest of the soundtrack for Suicide Squad deals in pomp, in lookat-me neon and day-glo confidence, it’s Twenty One Pilots and their openness to being open that demands the most attention.
was part of the same once-secret society. The entire room moved as one, rapping along to ‘Migraine’, bouncing with the ‘Message Man’ and celebrating all the band have achieved. ‘Heathens’ saw the voices sing a little louder, the phones were held a little higher, and that sense of ownership, of a community, of togetherness, was held a little closer. It meant a little more. Opening their little world right up, ‘Heathens’ is the first Twenty One Pilots song that truly belongs to everyone. The track may have charted around the world, sold countless copies, won numerous awards and been playlisted alongside the goliaths of pop, but it hasn’t escaped the band’s carefully cupped hands. In those one-hundred and ninety-five seconds, ‘Heathens’ broke through to the masses. Radio, TV and beyond, it was an inescapable part of 2016, but it bought all those who heard it back through to where it came from. It’s an open door to Twenty One Pilots’ world of fantasy, escape and confrontation. It still belongs to
the few, the proud and the emotional but the numbers are growing with every play. “We don’t deal with outsiders very well,” it warns but “it looks like you might be one of us.” No other song has had as much impact this year as ‘Heathens’. It’s opened eyes, doors and minds. It’s affected culture as a whole and people as individuals; it provides a gateway and an escape. In 2016, as genre lines tumble away, it’s a song like ‘Heathens’ that genuinely change lives. P
‘Heathens’ was written for a film but make no mistake, this is a Twenty One Pilots song. Deceivingly simple, outlandishly weird and finding strength in the community that surrounds them, the track doesn’t sound like anything they’ve done before; it doesn’t sound like anything else around - which is exactly how Twenty One Pilots like it. When the band played Reading & Leeds earlier this year, the curious and the converted stood shoulder to shoulder, united in the brief moments of ‘Stressed Out’ and ‘Car Radio’. During ‘Heathens’ though, everyone was on the same elevated level. A few months later at Alexandra Palace, the clique had opened its doors, and everyone THE BEST OF
2016 Track of the Year
TwentyOne Pilots Heathens
In a year of bangers, it’s Twenty One Pilots who took their magic and dominated the world. WORDS: ALI SHUTLER. PHOTO: SARAH LOUISE BENNETT.
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New from Topshelf Records Enemies Valuables
TSR164 / December 9, 2016 / CD, vinyl, cassette, digital
The band’s triumphant final album—a brilliantly focused nine songs of layered, soaring, pop-infused math rock. For fans of: American Football, TTNG, Foals, toe, Bon Iver or Tame Impala. “A richly textured piece of atmospheric pop.” -The Line of Best Fit “A mighty collection of songs that sits head-and-shoulders above most rock records you’ll hear all year.” -Gold Flake Paint topshelfrecords.com/valuables to listen & see upcoming tour dates.
LITE Cubic
TSR163 / Out now / CD, vinyl, cassette, digital
Ten songs of psychedelic noodling and technical songcraft mixed by Keith Souza (Battles) and mastered by Heba Kadry (!!!, Prefuse 73, The Mars Volta). For fans of: Don Caballero, Battles, Tera Melos, 65daysofstatic or Adebesi Shank. 65d “Plenty of potent, progressive punches.” -CLRVYNT “Jagged yet infectious rhythms contribute to their deeply physical feel... navigating incredible swoops and curves with remarkable confidence.” -CLASH topshelfrecords.com/cubic to listen & see upcoming tour dates.
Heat
Overnight TSR162 / January 20, 2017 / CD, vinyl, cassette, digital
The band’s debut album—nine tracks of effortless cool punctuated by cathartic spikes of energy. For fans of: Pavement, Echo & the Bunnymen, Sonic Youth, The Jesus & Mary Chain, The Strokes or DIIV. mo exciting bands we’ve heard all year.” -NME “One of the most “The LP finds them expanding their VU/JAMC-influenced post-punk sound into poppier territory.” -Brooklyn Vegan topshelfrecords.com/overnight to listen & see upcoming tour dates.
New 2016 & 2017 releases coming from Special Explosion, mouse on the Keys, Us and Us Only, Del Paxton, Ratboys & more.
tsr-store.com topshelfrecords.com
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wenty sixteen has been quite the year for Black Foxxes. Having released debut album ‘I’m Not Well’ in August, which was received to mass acclaim, they’ve suddenly found the future is looking a whole lot more promising. With a sound that has an earnest but unapologetic savagery, Black Foxxes are more than in control of their fate. Mark Holley talks us through their year, including stand-out moments, not being a “cool” band and what the future looks like. So Mark, how’s your year been? It’s been really good! Obviously, this is the year that the album came out so it’s all been gearing up to that. We’ve done pretty much all the major UK festivals as well as going over to America which was huge for us as a band. It’s set us up for the bigger stuff next year, we’ve done everything, and more than we intended to, but with things progressing so quickly behind the scenes it’s more planning for next year. It’s quite nice because we have November and December off now to chill then we’re going to write as much of a new record as we can and use that time wisely before we come back stronger with everything in January. What are your stand out moments? The NME / Radio 1 Stage at Reading & Leeds was a really big one, we did it the year before on the Lock Up Stage and we said it’d be nice to go up to the bigger stages, which we did within a year. And just having the album out. We’ve all been in bands before, we’ve all experienced touring and day to day band life so none of that was new, but having a record in a shop was. That was quite a surreal feeling, it was something that we all felt really proud of at that moment. It’s quite a daunting and terrifying thing, having your album come out to the world, because we were quite stoked on that album, especially given its content - it’s a really important record. Just being able to go to HMV and pick up your own album is such a cool feeling. It certainly gives you the tangibility of something you’ve worked on. Yeah, and I think as well, this industry is all talk half the time. Sometimes when you’re touring it’s just like travelling, you go away travelling and you go, “Ah shit, that was so good!” You’re obviously having such a good time while you’re there but I’m one of 36 upsetmagazine.com
these people where it doesn’t really click until I’m not really doing much. When you’re touring you get caught up in it, it’s day to day so it just becomes a routine, and then you go home and it’s like I’m not really able to take it all in. Let’s talk about the album - influences, lyrics, content... I think we started writing after we’d already written an EP that we liked a couple of tracks on, but we’d only been a band for a couple of months, so you can hear we’re trying to sound like other bands. We didn’t like that, so we just went into our practice space and wrote whatever came naturally; this honest and dynamic music. It was just flowing out, which is great, and the guys gave me free reign with the
“WE DIDN’T JUST WA N T T O BE A HYPE BA N D.”
lyrics. I found it was the last six or seven years of my life in which there was depression and chronic illness, I just kind of went through it and looking back you could almost say the album was a concept album, I don’t really like using that term too much because it wasn’t at all intended to be that way. I think it’s quite funny looking at it now where I can see a real movement with the tracks and there’s the theme overlying it all. We just wanted to do something, there just seemed to be so much beige rock music at that time, and we just wanted to do something really gripping that was just really honest. I feel like I’ve done that and the connection has been incredible, especially with this headline tour it just clicked; same thing when the album came out, some things just click. It really does touch upon something that’s been missing. Yep, I think as well we’re one of these bands that’s not really in the cool clique, we’re not mentioned in magazines amongst all these cool hip bands, so the majority of people
aren’t sure if it’s “cool” to get into us yet. It’s quite funny but the fans that have been there from the start, and then this new wave of fans that have heard the record, the connection they get instantly is just massive. The whole point of this band was to never be a part of a mould, to just completely be our own thing. I think that will take longer to get successful but I think once you get there you’ve got fans who stick with you ’til the end because there’s nothing fickle about it. We’re not writing music that’s cool that month, or that year, we just wrote an album that’s important to us and I think that’s where we stand out compared to the other bands. We didn’t just want to be a hype band, which is kind of everywhere at the moment but you know, fair play to those bands that are doing it but we want a career in music so that’s what we’re aiming for. Talking of career, you say this year has set you up for a good new year, what does that look like? We’ll 100% record the new record, which is obviously the big one as far as I’m concerned. Writing a debut album, it’s really important to get it right but if your debut album sucks, I don’t really see where you can progress that much. You would’ve had those songs for a while, they’re not rushed, you don’t find a deal and then come out with an album filled with half-arsed content. Now we’ve got to go and write a better second album. That’s all we’re concerned about, no ifs and buts about that, the second one’s always the hardest. We definitely need to make sure we leave ourselves enough time to do that, it looks like we’re going to go with Adrian [Bushby] again because we love the guy, on a personal level he really smashed the first one and I think with more time and an even better studio and more people on board with it, we can write something really special. I think we’ll also be getting some pretty big tours and festivals and all of that stuff, there are things in the pipeline that I obviously can’t say but we’ll definitely be getting out of England a lot more next year. And one final question - what are your favourite musical moments of the year? Foals at Reading was amazing. As well as Biffy, that was really special. I’d also say the Radiohead album, that was great. Was that this year or last year? That’s definitely up there. P
THE BEST OF
2016
Black Foxxes
First Muncie Girls, now Black Foxxes: there must be something in the Exeter water. This trio’s debut album was one of the unexpected gems of 2016. 5* all the way. WORDS: STEVEN LOFTIN
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THE BEST OF
2016
Tonight Alive Tonight Alive don’t just want to get you on your feet for a dance about and a sing-song: they want to make your life better. WORDS: ALI SHUTLER. PHOTO SARAH LOUISE BENNETT.
“T
he greatest gift you can give another person is to be yourself, because it gives them an opportunity to do the same,” explains Jenna McDougall. It’s a lesson that allowed Tonight Alive to create the revolution of ‘Limitless’ and this year has seen that record grow, change and impact. “We didn’t realise what it was until we started playing it,” starts Whakaio Taahi. “It’s become about more than the music now.”
confident as the vision for ‘Limitless’ is, and there’s not a moment that isn’t tackled with full-bodied commitment and belief. “Touring it and playing those songs every day, it’s been able to sink in,” starts Cam Adler, before Jake Hardy adds: “People have had time to let the album sink in and grasp what everything is about.”
“We’re trying to encourage our fans to be a part of it with us,” adds Matt Best.
The band have spent the bulk of the year on the road spreading the word of ‘Limitless’, but it’s not a lesson confined to a Tonight Alive show. “We want it to be engrained in them. We don’t want them to go away and be depressed because the show’s over, we want people to take away how they feel now and implement that into their lives,” explains Whakaio. “There are a lot of people trying to stop you from doing what you want, and we want everyone to take away the message of just fucking be yourself, and do it with everything that you’ve got.”
More than a reinvention or a stylised leap, ‘Limitless’ is Tonight Alive opening up. It’s the record the band have always threatened to make, dialled up to the extreme. It’s an album you live. As
“I feel like ‘Limitless’ opened a door and we can take any direction from now,” beams Jenna. “I don’t want to be confined to one thing; I never have. My image is speaking on behalf of that at
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the moment, but the music will do that with the next album. We’re not sure what it’ll sound like, but we’re going to keep experimenting with what feels good for us and what we’re capable of doing, which we still don’t have a full understanding of and never will. That’s exciting. The reason I change my image so much is because I outgrow myself every few months and it feels a lot more natural for me to do things differently frequently than it does to stay the same. I don’t think we’ve ever been a band people have attached to because of our image, but hopefully, we set a tone that people are not their physical self. They are who they are.” “We want this so much, and we’re starting to realise what ‘Limitless’ actually is,” explains Whakio. “It’s got so much life to it, and when you talk about the crowd and us, there’s just this energy now. I keep saying everyone’s present, but it feels like that now.” “We understand it more every day and every show we play. The songs are part of our beings,” adds Jenna. “It’s not like we’re playing something we recorded; we’re living something we created.” P
THE BEST OF
2016
Blink-182
Blink-182’s new album is a first for the band: one without Tom DeLonge. Of course, it nearly didn’t happen - but we’re very glad it did. WORDS: ALI SHUTLER
A
fter false starts, soap opera twists and a lot of questions, Blink-182 finally put out a new album this year, which was a surprise in itself. What’s more surprising, however, is how great ‘California’ is. More than a legacy act churning out some of the same, the record is cohesive, true to the form of old but still takes it someplace new. Self-aware without trying too hard, it balances reckless abandon with heartfelt care. If you ever wondered what a Blink-182 record in 2016 was going to sound like, ‘California’ is all your hopes coming true. It’s a feeling shared by the band, as Travis Barker explains.
came and filled in at Musink Festival and came into the studio, it was a green light from there. Nothing could stop us.
Hello, Travis. You’ve had a busy 2016, how’s it all been for you? It’s been an amazing year. A really great year. The Blink-182 tour was fun, I just played the AMAs the other week, that was fun. For me, every week there’s a new highlight.
Not letting down the fans of Blink-182, is that important to you?
Speaking of Blink, you released ‘California’ earlier this year. Looking back on it, how do you feel about that record? It’s a great album; I thought it was incredible when we wrote it. It’s one of our best pieces of work to date, and it’s going to age well as well. What inspired the record for you? It was just that’s where we were at the time, and those are the songs we wrote. We didn’t go in saying these are the kind of songs we’re going to write or this album is going to stand for this. It was an album inspired by our lives in California, and some of the things we’ve seen living in LA and relationship wise, something each of us has been through but really, we’re just talking about real life stuff that we’ve experienced. Were you worried about the reaction? From the outside, it felt like there was a lot that could go wrong. Y’know, I wasn’t super worried about it. I knew no one had heard it and no one knew what we were doing, but I knew we were onto something. I knew that we made an incredible album and it was something that I could be very proud of, it was just a matter of time before everyone heard that. We weren’t able to record an album for so long. There was so much going on with the band internally - not everyone wanted to go into the studio, not everyone wanted to tour - but once Matt [Skiba]
Were you expecting the reaction that it got? I hoped fans would love it and I felt like we were very genuine and true to ourselves in what the album sounded like, and in it feeling like a Blink-182 album. I was stoked to hear fans say they loved the album; that was confirmation, and you feel proud. The fans have waited so long for an album, we thought we made an incredible album and then to find out the fans supported it… The fact we didn’t let anyone down was rewarding.
“THERE’S NO ONE AND N OTH I N G HOLDING US BAC K .”
To me, that’s really, really important. When we were making the album there were conversations saying, ‘Lets put nine songs on the album’, and I was like, ‘Everyone’s out of their mind. We need to put as many songs on as possible. We haven’t delivered an album in so long.’ We owe the fans so much, and I feel like we gave it to them. And what does the future hold for Blink 182? Right now it’s just the beginning. The future is we’re finishing the deluxe edition of the album, and we’re coming to the UK and Europe next summer to tour. Deluxe edition? It’s still being worked out, but it’s really cool. I know two of the songs that are going on it and I love them so, so much. I almost wish they were on the album. Why give people more music? Why not? I guess it’s expected when
you come out with an album; you come out with a deluxe version, and we had so many songs left over but that wasn’t good enough for us so we wrote a couple more songs. Matt and Mark [Hoppus] went into the studio for three or four days while I was rehearsing for the AMAs and then I went in yesterday and did all my drums. No part of this album felt like work. It comes with ease. With Mark, Matt, myself and [producer] John Feldman, there’s just such great vibes and energy. Why do you think people still care about Blink? I’m not a music scientist, so I don’t know the exact formula for why it works, but I think it’s the same reason that someone will go and see The Rolling Stones or The Eagles year after year. Generations learn to love the band. We see young kids at our show as well as people in their twenties and people in their forties that love the band. It really has been this eternal youth band that people feel like they don’t outgrow. They want to go, have a good time and feel young. They want to relive the memories of when an album came out and they were a huge fan, or those new fans who have just heard a new band and love ‘Bored To Death’. That’s the biggest reward, people saying they love the new stuff as much as the old stuff or getting a crowd reacting to the new stuff like old classics. Does the legacy of the band put you under pressure? Do you worry that there are these generations of people you need to impress? No, we have to impress ourselves. We have our own standards. We don’t want to make new music and have people go, ‘nah, we want to hear the old stuff’. The new stuff has to be as great as the old stuff. I don’t think we’d even put out albums if it wasn’t. And aside from Blink, what else have you been up to? I am finishing a remodel at my studio; I have tonnes of projects I’m working on. I’m working with Vic Mensa on his album, Yelawolf on his album. I play with a lot of different artists when I’m home, so in the last three weeks, I’ve played with D.R.A.M, who has a big song in the States called ‘Brocolli’, played with Vic Mensa, Steve Aoki, and I’ve just done some stuff with The Chainsmokers and Halsey. I love all my time in Blink, but when Blink isn’t doing stuff I’m just blessed to play music. P 41
THE BEST OF
2016
Readers’ Poll We asked you to vote. You told us what you think.
Band of the Year WINNER
Panic! At The Disco
RUNNERS UP Twenty One Pilots Frank Iero and the Patience
Album of the Year WINNER
Frank Iero and the Patience Parachutes
RUNNERS UP SWMRS - Drive North Panic! At The Disco - Death of a Bachelor
Best Festival WINNER
Slam Dunk RUNNERS UP Reading & Leeds Download
Best Live Band at a Festival in 2016 WINNER
Creeper RUNNERS UP Fall Out Boy Biffy Clyro
Best Cover Version WINNER
Banger of the Year WINNER
Creeper Suzanne
RUNNERS UP Frank Iero and the Patience - I’m A Mess Twenty One Pilots - Heathens
Best Live Act WINNER
Twenty One Pilots RUNNERS UP Panic At The Disco Enter Shikari
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New Clothes Band Who Really Need To Get In The Bin Right Now, TBH ‘WINNER’
Falling In Reverse Band Who Split, But On Reflection It Would Be OK Now If They Un-split WINNER
Panic! At The Disco - Starboy
My Chemical Romance
New Band Who Will Make 2017 10/10 Amazing
Band Who Most Need To Get A Move On And Get A New Album Out ‘ASAP’
WINNER
Creeper RUNNERS UP Partybaby VANT
Best Video WINNER
Panic! At The Disco - Emperor’s
WINNER
Paramore RUNNERS UP Brand New Fall Out Boy
Don’t look dumb.
Never miss an issue. Subscribe to Dork now at readdork.com/buy - or else.
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RATED
BRING ME THE HORIZON
THE 02, LONDON
WORDS: ALI SHUTLER, PHOTOS: SARAH LOUISE BENNETT
THE BIGGEST ARENAS ARE NOW WHERE BRING ME CALL HOME.
B
ring Me The Horizon have spent much of 2016 out of their comfort zone. From the orchestral showing at the Royal Albert Hall to Glastonbury Festival, the band has been pushing ‘That’s The Spirit’ onto pastures new. It’s almost weird to think that an arena show is where the band are at their most comfortable yet tonight at London’s O2 Arena, they’ve never looked more at home. Sure, they’ve been on this ascendancy since they wrote ‘Drown’ for that leap of faith Wembley Arena show back in the winter of 2014 but there’s none of that journey today. There’s not a moment of the set that feels left to chance and instead, the whole luxurious affair sees Bring Me The Horizon flex how good they’ve become at this. And it’s very good indeed. From the streamer flanked pop of ‘Happy Song’, Bring Me The Horizon come out beaming. The song is still a promise of intent, it’s just bought to life by a capacity crowd. “You can go left or you can go right,” starts Oli Sykes trying to control the chaos but for the band, their direction was decided long ago and they spend the rest of the evening driving it home. The setlist is present-heavy, with only ‘Chelsea Smile’ providing a glimpse of what came before ‘Sempiternal’, but the room demands it. “If this is your first circle pit, it’s fun. It’s right fucking easy,” offers Oli during ‘House of Wolves’. “You just run around in a circle like a fucking maniac.” Later on he promises “I can’t guarantee your safety but I can guarantee it’ll be a right laugh,” as he makes the whole of the o2 sit down then jump up and he even addresses the parents after ‘Antivist’, “Are you regretting bringing your kids yet?” As the band have grown, they’ve opened their doors and they’re determined to make everyone feel welcome. Sure, ‘Throne’ is dedicated to “the haters” but Bring Me The Horizon have always had them. Luckily you can’t hear the dissent over the rainbow-drenched joy that twirls around the o2 tonight. The band bound about the tiered stage like playful kids and there’s as much abandon and free-spirited escape in the crowd. The whole thing, arena stage-show and snarled bangers, fits together and is comfortably brilliant. P
PIERCE THE VEIL
02 BRIXTON ACADEMY, LONDON
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WORDS: ALI SHUTLER, PHOTOS: SARAH LOUISE BENNETT
ierce The Veil have guts. Every step of ‘Misadventures’ sees the band boldly following that pit-of-your-stomach magnet onwards as they continue to do the unexpected with class. Unsurprisingly their UK tour is no different.
Both Creeper and letlive. are on the ascent. They’ve both got a reputation for being incredible and recently they’ve opened their wings fully and begun to soar. Creeper, all Main Stage theatrics and back room secrets, arrive with a sincere urgency. Doors have been open for less than an hour but Brixton Academy is filling up fast. Patched and patchless, cult and curious, there’s no escaping the snarling wonder and golden daze the band provide. letlive. have always been a stick of dynamite; toss them into a room and watch it explode. That renegade spirit is still alive tonight, but ‘If I’m The Devil…’ allows the band to be more. “This world is going to act like you owe them something,” Jason says, addressing the women in the room. “I’m here to tell you, you don’t owe the world shit. You are the reason this world spins around. To the men in this room, if you feel entitled to take that away from them, I’ll be around the room all fucking night to show you otherwise.” ‘Muther’ swells with a newly discovered importance, especially with the addition of Creeper’s Hannah Greenwood before ‘Good Mourning America’ pulls everyone together. Crash-landing on stage in a spaceship, there’s a mischievous sense of occasion to the whole show. From the opening ‘Dive In’, the band cut spectacle with sing-alongs as they make every inch of the room feel involved. “We want to make you hear something you’ve never heard before, feel something you’ve never felt. That’s our goal,” beams Vic Fuentes as the band, cartoon grins and genuine art, do everything to keep that promise. There’s no sugar-coating tonight as the band tear through a set of their greatest. From the pace of ‘The Divine Zero’ and ‘Texas Is Forever’ until the triumph of ‘Circles’ and ‘King For The Day’, Pierce The Veil show they haven’t just earned this, they deserve it. And they own it with guts and glory. P
Hey, ‘bands’...
What was the album of the year? “Man, that’s a tough one. I’ve been really, really wearing out the grooves on the new Aloha record, but I think David Bazan’s ‘Blanco’ has got to take the cake for me.” TANNER JONES, YOU BLEW IT
“Probably Skepta ‘Konnichiwa’ because I feel badass listening to it.” GEORGIA, NOVA TWINS “Aaaagh I can’t pick just one. This year’s been too good for music. Strong contenders: Xenia Rubinos, NAO, Weaves, Mitski, Rihanna, Solange, Santigold, Big Thief, the Sammus album!” SADIE DUPUIS, SAD13 “Hmm, favourite album of the year is a tough question. It’s something I take way too seriously. If I had to say something off the top of my head without thinking too much about it, I’d have to say Renounced with their album ‘Theories Of Despair’. Great record front to back, one of the best bands doing the classic metalcore throwback style without compromising what
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made you fall in love with the genre in the first place. I would highly recommend it.” BRYAN GARRIS, KNOCKED LOOSE “I really rate Clams Casino’s new record this year to be fair. It’s a collaboration of so many good musicians and the whole album also contains every track as an instrumental meaning people can spit bars of their own all over it if they wanted to. It’s not the same genre I know, but it’s a valid contender.” SHAUN MILTON, LANDSCAPES “The 1975 - ‘I Like It When You Sleep…’. Simply because they are the best band of all time. If I tried to explain my love for them in detail the Gmail server would crash, straight up. I know the sound of your heart.” BRENDAN MURPHY, COUNTERPARTS “’Blackstar’ by David Bowie. I loved it so much on the Friday it came out, listened to it intensely over the weekend, felt like it was very close to one of my favourite records of his
‘Station to Station’ and then woke early on the Monday to see on twitter that he had passed away. It was hugely impactive moment. I’ve no time for people who say “you didn’t know him so why are you sad” etc. When you love music it becomes your best friend and Bowie for me was a constant companion.” STEVEN BATTELLE “It’s not out yet [Well, it is now - Ed] but after seeing them live recently I’m convinced it will be ‘Do Hollywood’ by The Lemon Twigs when it arrives.” MATTIE VANT, VANT “Either Suuns’ ‘Hold/ Still’ for its sinister dissonance between the jangly guitar tones and behemoth bass tones from the rhythm section that has created a beautiful and horrid abyss that works OR Skepta’s ‘Konichiwa’ as I think he’s finally nailed his flow and created his own language as an artist that transcends grime into something universal; all without a label, beautiful.” JOE, IDLES
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