Enter Shikari

About to head to Australia for the SOUNDWAVE festival, ENTER SHIKARI’S bassist CHRIS took a break from rehearsing and packing to answer a few questions: 

Enter Shikari

For the record, tell us your name, what you do in the band, and the stupidest thing you’ve ever done for a bet.
I’m Chris, I play bass and vocals, and I once lost a game of ‘Shithead’ and had to wear a pair of French knickers out to dinner and reveal them in spectacular fashion.

Give us a quick history lesson on how Enter Shikari came into being.
Well, we officially formed as Enter Shikari in 2003. Three of us went to the same primary school, and after playing as a three-piece, Rob went to school with Rory. After playing in a few variations of the band, and after going through a few name changes, Rory joined and we changed our name to Enter Shikari. 

You were last in Australia for the 2008 Big Day Out, and the reports from those shows were something special – what can Australian fans expect from an Enter Shikari performance this time around?
Well obviously we have a new album out this time round. We’re playing in the evening also so the vibe should be really pumping by then. We really feed off the audience so I’m sure we’ll really be going for it during these shows! It’s so exciting for us to play in front of people who may not have seen us much, or at all. So we’re gonna pull out all the stops.

Enter Shikari

One of the main themes running through your latest release, ‘Common Dreads’, is a pretty bleak outlook for the world. Gallows also put out an album in ‘Grey Britain’ that took a shot at the current state of affairs in your home country; what was the trigger for you guys – arguably the two biggest hardcore acts in Britain – to put out such records?
Well I think it just came from us growing up more and not being afraid to put forward our opinions. The first record did cover some of the same themes, but the lyrics were written in a more metaphorical way. We realised that one of the things about being in a band, whether we like it or not, is that people are going to listen to what we have to say. And with that, comes a responsibility to speak our minds. One thing we wanted to do with our music was not to focus too much on how bad things have got. Rather to make our music uplifting, and to inspire unity between people, no matter who you are, or where you’re from. We believe that change comes from the ground up, not from the top down, that that’s the reason we want to focus on moving forward, rather than just pointing out how bad things have got.

A lot of the lyrics on the album are sang and shouted rather than screamed, making them more easily heard and understood. Was this because Common Dreads was more concept-driven – and therefore the lyrics were more important – than Take To The Skies, or did it just happen that way?
Yeah I guess that was a part of it. The lyrics are important on this album so it was obviously important to us that they were put across in the right way. We also felt that a lot of bands were doing the more throaty type of screaming and we were just aware of how much of it was out there. I guess we got a bit bored of it and wanted to do something different. The more shouting/singing style Rou (Reynolds, band vocalist) uses really injects a lot of passion, and you can really tell he means what he’s singing about. Rou was also inspired by a lot of spoken word artists such as Low Key, so that came out in our music too. Again, it was a good way to say more in a shorter space of time. It allowed us to have parts that really didn’t hold back on the lyrics.

For me, the songs off Common Dreads are much more suited to large live arenas than Take To The Skies was – more dance-able, bigger choruses, easier lyrics for crowds to shout back, that sort of thing. Was this due to your move from small, underground venues into the festival arena, with bigger crowds and so forth?
I don’t know really. We always write our music with the thought of how it will work live. We even went on tour during the writing process to test out songs live so I guess that could explain why they are suited to a live environment. 

One of the more impressive aspects of the Enter Shikari story is fact that much of the band’s success has been achieved independently, without being signed to major record labels – what was behind your decision to refuse deals from major record labels, and instead establish your own label ‘Ambush Reality’?   
Well we’d spent years touring the UK, making our own cds and, merch, so we were never a band to sit around and wait for something to happen. We knew we were at the point where we were ready to release a full length album, and that there was a demand for it. At the time no labels were interested in putting it out so we went ahead by ourselves. It was only once we started releasing singles and playing some more “high profile” shows that anyone started to show some interest in signing us. However, by then we were more than happy with the way things were going and decided it would be best for us to stay on our own course, we’d already come that far… 

Obviously one of the major signatures of your sound is your use of synths, drum’n’bass samples, a lot of things you usually see in dance or trance acts. What initially made you think “hey, maybe it’d be cool to start using synths?”
Well the first piece of electronic equipment we bought was a Kaoss pad. We used it for more atmospheric effects at the time. Rou then bought a sequencer and away we went. It was never a sudden idea we had, we just noticed people were liking what they heard and found it quite original. 

Was there ever a point in your history – in the early stages of the band perhaps – where you didn’t use these elements? Has Enter Shikari ever been a “conventional” hardcore band?
Yep! When we were a three piece we used to be a much more conventional rock band. Covering the likes of Muse, Rage Against The Machine, even Oasis and The Beatles in our earlier days. We just got bored of doing the same thing as everyone else and started to experiment. 

You guys have just come off a supporting slot with The Prodigy, but have traditionally been lumped alongside metalcore bands – which acts do you feel more comfortable playing alongside?
Well we haven’t had as much experience playing to purely dance audiences as we have metal fans, but it really makes very little difference to us. One thing we’ve noticed since starting this band is that we can adapt to different situations. Play heavier sets when we need to, and vice versa. For us it’s all about having a great time anyway and not taking ourselves too seriously. 

There’s been a lot of names bandied about regarding your ‘genre’, some of the more prominent ones including synthcore, happy hardcore and trancecore. Is there one you like better than the others, or do you classify your sound as something different?
We dislike all of them to be honest. It’s hard as artists to limit yourself to one genre. Bands put so much time and effort into writing and recording, and every bands influences spread throughout lots of different styles. For us to limit all of that into one word seems pointless. We’d hate being a band who only wrote one style of music. For us it’s about moving forward and testing ourselves, rather than sticking to rules and boundaries. 

Any up-and-coming British bands that you think people should be taking notice of?
Qemists, Your Demise, Rolo Tomassi, The King Blues; some of them have been going a long time, so are not exactly “up and coming”, but there’s still a great selection of British talent to choose from 

What’s next for Enter Shikari? What does 2010 hold?
Shows Shows Shows. We’re in the process of booking which festivals we’ll be appearing at, so keep the eyes peeled. Also we have a release called Tribalism released on 22^nd February. We’ll also be spending a lot of time this year in the States before starting work on album three towards the end of the year. 

And finally, what is one thing you want to achieve with the band, that you haven’t accomplished yet?
Well we’ve already surpassed any expectations we had for the band. So anything from here is a complete and utter bonus!

A Wilhelm Scream

When you ask someone about their plans for the New Year, you don’t often receive an answer in which they outline plans to seize control of their home town – but that’s exactly what I got when I asked Nicholas Angelini, drummer for Massachusetts-based outfit A Wilhelm Scream, what the band was planning for 2010.  

A Wilhelm Scream

“We are going to run for Mayor of New Bedford as a group,” he says.
“I think we got a pretty good chance.” 

While the group’s political ambitions may go unsatisfied for the foreseeable future, it is this sense of fun and irreverence that is seeing punters flocking to A Wilhelm Scream’s brand of 90’s-influenced hardcore punk, a sound harking back to the glory days of the genre.  

Forming in 1994 as “Koen”, the band also went by the moniker “Smackin’ Isaiah” until settling on the current name in 2002. Taking cues from the royalty of the genre, including Propagandhi, Hot Water Music and Strung Out, the group’s gritty, in-your-face punk has seen them criss-cross the world, with touring cycles for their latest album – 2007’s Career Suicide – taking them to such far-flung regions as Portugal and Russia.  

“I’m totally blown away by people in other countries singing along to every song, and after the show I can barely have a regular conversation with them,” Angelini comments when asked about touring to such places.
“It’s crazy that your songs can travel thousands of miles without you, break language barriers, and meet you in a place like Russia in the form of a bunch of screaming fans.”  

The band’s next overseas jaunt, however, will be less of a culture shock – February will see them head to our own shores, to join the mammoth bill for the SOUNDWAVE festival, alongside Faith No More, My Chemical Romance and Jane’s Addiction.  

“I want to enjoy the weather, the beaches, and the Coopers,” Angelini says.
“I’ll tell you what I don’t want to do, is eat one of those hamburgers with the beetroots. Beetroot is a great way to ruin a hamburger.”  

A Wilhelm Scream has enjoyed great success in Australia on previous headlining tours; but what can fans expect from a forty-minute outdoor festival slot, in the middle of the Australian summer heat?  

“I’m going to have one of those cages around my drums that lifts me off the ground and spins around in circles, after that someone is going to light me on fire, and fireworks are going to shoot out my ass,” Nick says jokingly.
“But seriously, we are going to go out there [at Soundwave] and bust our asses like we always do and have a good time. I want everyone to have fun with us, but there is a lot of great bands playing… so if you miss our set we’ll catch ya at the beer garden!”  

The band’s latest offering, a self-titled EP put out in November, is their first release on new label Paper + Plastick after moving from larger label Nitro Records late last year. Angelini says that the switch was more to do with greater benefits of working with Paper + Plastick, rather than any problems with Nitro.  

“Paper + Plastick is geared more towards putting out something people are going to want to hold in their hands, rather than just downloading the MP3′s. They are open to crazy layout ideas that might cost a little more to make, but in the end it makes for a piece of art rather than a piece of paper in a jewel case,” Angelini says.
“Remember back in the day when you were just as excited to check out the insert of a CD as you were to hear the music? Paper + Plastick is trying to bring those days back from the past.”  

Described by the band themselves as an “eclectic mix of all the avenues the band have gone down since Mute Print”, the five-track EP contains some of the group’s fastest and most energetic work to date. Angelini chalks this up to a combination wanting to stay fresh in an increasingly stale genre, as well as the fact that the band took on the recording responsibilities themselves.  

“For me, it was just as challenging recording with my boys as it was with Bill [Stevenson] and Jason [Livermore] over at the Blasting Room [in Colorado, USA, where AWS recorded their last three albums]. My guys were just as strict… I was physically and mentally drained at the end of each session.”  

The EP, following on from the critically acclaimed Career Suicide, has solidified A Wilhelm Scream’s reputation as one of the world’s premier punk/hardcore cross-over acts, while injecting new life into an almost forgotten genre. The band are fast establishing themselves as the natural successors to the mantle currently held by Propagandhi and Strung Out, exposing whole new generations to fast, honest punk.  

When asked where the band goes from here, Angelini is optimistic about the future, saying that the band’s tight bonds of friendship will – hopefully – keep them together longer than most bands in this day and age.
“I’m lucky I travel with 6 of my best friends. We all have an understanding, a mutual respect, and we like to party… We have toured with bands in the past that can’t stand each other. It’s kind of sad that it is a rarity for bands to get along as a whole. Don’t get me wrong, my guys aggravate the shit out of me sometimes, but I’m not going to kill them – at least, not yet.”

Set Your Goals

Dual vocalists, pirate-themed albums, and entire concerts as a Dave Grohl cover band – SET YOUR GOALS have never been ones to do things ‘by the book’. Heading our way for the Soundwave festival in February, vocalist MATT WILSON was kind enough to answer a few of my questions:

First things first – tell us your name, what you do in the band, and your worst habit?
My name is Matt Wilson, I sing and my worst habit is probably spending too much money on records.

You were last here in June with All Time Low for the Take Action Tour, which aims to bring attention to youth suicide. Is the vibe different on this kind of tour – one with a definite message and ethos to broadcast to fans – as opposed to a regular tour?
The Take Action tour was a little more of a serious cause than, say, a normal tour, but it’s a good feeling knowing that you’re helping to spread a positive message and support a cause that helps a lot of people out.

I read somewhere that you guys once did a whole set of Foo Fighters and Nirvana covers, billing yourself as Set Your Grohls (after Foo Fighters frontman and Nirvana drummer Dave Grohl). Aside from the best wordplay I’ve seen for a while, what made you decide to do this?
This is true! We did it for the Hoodwink Festival in New Jersey. Every band playing had to pick a band to cover for their set and we thought we’d get creative with it and do all Dave Grohl songs because we love his music!

For me, the thing that makes you guys stand out against the plethora of pop-punk/hardcore cross-over bands is your lyrics. Instead of just dealing with girls and partying, your lyrics look at issues from the environment (Gaia Bleeds) and religion (An Old Book Misread), to the music industry itself (Mutiny and The Few That Remain). Are these songs about experiences you’ve personally had, or just things you notice happening around you?
The bulk of our lyrical content comes from personal experience. Even the issues that may not necessarily be tales of events from our personal lives are usually issues that affect everyone equally (Gaia Bleeds).

Is it more difficult to write lyrics when you have two vocalists? How do you decide who handles which vocals, and does that decision impact on the actual lyrics themselves?
Jordan and I have developed a formula for this where we’ll agree on a topic we want to address for a song, sort of a “thesis,” if you will. From there we’ll usually write a page or two of lyrics independently from each other, then we reconvene to form vocal melodies, then we’ll take our lyrics we’ve written and form them to fit the vocal melodies. We try to break up the singing parts as evenly and creatively as possible. So yes, sometimes the words are changed around a bit to fit the structure of the melody but we always keep working with the same thesis in mind.

You’re heading back out to Australia for the Soundwave festival, what are you most looking forward to doing while out here?
I’m very much looking forward to all the great bands and friends we’re going to see while we’re there. I love being in Australia, it’s everyone in SYG’s favorite country in the world so just being there is always a wonderful experience for us. The weather is amazing during that time of year and the people are beautiful. I may have to move there someday!

What can Australian festival-goers expect from a Set Your Goals set?
A party! Lots of energy, people moving around, singing along, jumping, dancing and fun. We feed off the energy of the crowd and if it’s not going off then you know something’s wrong haha.

Paramore are also on the Soundwave bill; will we be seeing Hayley Williams again lending some guest vocals on “The Few That Remain”, as she did on the recorded version?
You’ll just have to wait and see!

I heard you guys got tattoos of koalas last time you were out here; is this true, and if so, where is your tattoo?
It’s true! we all loved Australia so much that we got koalas to celebrate! Mine is on my inside left ankle.

What does 2010 have in store for Set Your Goals?
LOADS of touring! So far we’ve got a US tour with Motion City Soundtrack, This Providence, and The Swellers lined up, followed by a headlining run shortly thereafter. Then we head out to Soundwave in Australia and Punkspring in Japan. We hope to do Warped tour in the states this Summer as well, fingers crossed!

Last one – what’s one thing you want to accomplish with Set Your Goals, that you haven’t done yet?
I want to play in Russia, Southeast Asia and South America!

Lungs

Fresh off supporting Bodyjar on the NSW trek of their farewell tour, ADAM from Sydney punk outfit LUNGS took time out to have a chat with me:

First off, tell us your name, what you do in the band, and your first celebrity crush
Hey it’s Adam from Lungs here. I sing and play guitar. Um… I can’t actually remember my first celebrity crush. Does Jessica Rabbit count? Maybe Winne Cooper? I definitely wanted to BE Michael J. Fox. And I turned out to be a bit of a man child, so be careful what you wish for.
 
Educate me a bit as to how Lungs got started.
Nelson and I got talking after our other bands Staying at Home and The Reason broke up, and we wanted to return to playing fast punk like we did in high school. We wanted to taste that energy again! So kinds poached Tom, who also played in Between the Devil and the Deep as well for a while, and starting practising in his bedroom.

You guys are gearing up to tour with Bodyjar, for the NSW leg of their farewell tour – how much of an influence have these guys had on the face of Australian punk?
Definitely one of the best melodic punk bands to form in Australia. It’s a shame they’re not going to be playing anymore, because this whole style of music seems to be poorly-represented now. I saw them last at the Poison City Weekender, and they were eviably tight and impressive. Awesome harmonies

You put out three releases in your first two years together, but its been a little while since we’ve heard anything new. When can we expect some new stuff?
Yeah, I guess our plan of releasing something every year is going to be broken a little, because EP came out at the end of last year. Basically, we just really wanted to be on top of this second album, so that it wasn’t as rushed as the first one. So we figured we should take more time on it. Also, Nelson and I went back to uni and had a lot more commitments. We’ll start recording our second album next month though, and it will be out early next year.

You’ve played alongside Propagandhi, A Wilhelm Scream and Lagwagon among others – what is it like to share stages with bands who you look up to, and who you draw a lot of influence from?
It’s weird. I’m awkward at the best of times, so I never really know how to act. To make matters worse, I just always feel amateur, like an imposter or something, you know? It’s hard to know where to find that confident bluster those guys have. I guess it comes with time and possibly anti-anxiety medication.

Whats the best show you’ve ever played?
Okay, I’m terrible at these sorts of questions. I’m going to say Propagandhi at the Metro. Partly because I wasn’t too down on how we played, which is a start, but mainly because Propagandhi were amazing.

Worst show you’ve ever played?
For me personally, I almost had an emotional meltdown or something this one show we played in Adelaide. We don’t play there often, so that makes it worse! Nothing was going right for me. I lost my voice, and I just got heaps down about the whole thing; a huge negative feedback loop. I’m a bit of a nutter though.

What does 2010 have in store for Lungs?
We’ll be releasing “The Two Chief World Systems”, our second full-length, and touring it as crazily as uni timetables allow! We’re really excited about the songs.

Finally, what is one thing you want to accomplish with the band, that you haven’t done yet?
We were planning on mixing the new record at the Blasting Room, which we ended up not being able to do. Being able to actually record there with Bill Stevenson and Jason Livermore would be excellent. Also, touring overseas is something we definitely have to figure out.

Every Time I Die

After 10 years, 5 albums, and tours with everyone from Gallows and Bring Me The Horizon to Parkway Drive and Underoath, EVERY TIME I DIE can lay claim to being one of the premier hardcore acts in the world. With their latest offering ‘New Junk Aesthetic’ dropping only a few months ago - and already featuring in many ‘Best of 2009′ lists compiled by respected industry outlets – EVERY TIME I DIE are heading to Australia to headline the annual ‘Boys Of Summer’ tour in early 2010. Vocalist KEITH BUCKLEY took time away from packing for the band’s upcoming European tour, to answer a couple of questions:

Give us a quick lesson on how ETID came together
Buffalo is an incredibly small town. The same people were at every show within a 10 mile radius 4 nights a week. That’s how Jordan (Buckley, ETID guitarist) and I met Andy (Williams, ETID guitarist) and Ratboy (former drummer Mike Novak). I can’t remember what show it was exactly when things came together but chances are we were all in a mosh pit. After a few songs were written in Ratboy’s basement, the revolving door of bass players began. 

In the lead-up to the release, I read somewhere – it may have even been from one of you guys in a blog, or on Twitter or something – that your new album ‘New Junk Aesthetic’ was “the best thirteen ETID songs you’ve never heard”. Do you think this is apt?
No, I was just thumping my chest. I think it’s the 12 best songs we’ve ever written. “The New Black” just so happens to be on another album. 

Every Time I Die

How do you think NJA stands up to your previous releases? I read an interview where you guys said you couldn’t stand listening to Gutter Phenomenon anymore
Its not that I can’t stand to listen to it, I actually love a lot of songs on it and we still play 2 or 3 live. It’s just not a very personal record for me. I was trying a different writing style and its not one I necessarily believe stands the test of time, nor one I’ve ever gone back to. It was prominently spontaneous prose. Whatever came into my head at the time, I put into lyrics. It was a lot of fun at the moment, but looking back, I don’t feel as if those words are my kin. 

Take us through the writing process. Do you all sit down at the beginning and say “this is what the album is going to sound like”, or is it more “lets just wing it and see how it turns out”?
It’s very much “let’s wing it”. I mean, we’re from buffalo, we love wings. We all have enormous trust in each others talents and just allow each other to do their thing. I honestly have NO idea what the song writing process is like for the other guys. As for me, I get a recording of what they think a completed song is and I sit in my room with a bottle of something and attack it. Well, not attack it. I romance it first. Then I attack it like a true creep. 

You credited Matt Caughran (The Bronx) and Greg Puciato (Dillinger Escape Plan) in the liner notes as doing guest vocals, but kept Pete Wentz (Fall Out Boy) ‘s part a secret for a while after the release. What was the logic behind that?
It’s no secret that Pete is a celebrity. But more so than that, he’s a POLARIZING celebrity. People either love him or hate him, there’s no in-between. He admits openly to this. I’m in the camp that loves him. I think he’s an amazing, innovative talent. He’s also my friend. When we put him on the record, we didn’t have him play bass in order to say “he we have the bassist from FALL OUT BOY!!” we had him scream because he used to scream for a hardcore band and is still a fan of that kind of music. By not telling people where his voice was, it prevented narrow mindedness from judging something before they heard it. It was kind of a social experiment. People couldn’t say “oh Pete’s on THAT track? Yea, I fucking hate that track.” we watched people that said “I can’t believe ETID is going to get Pete on their record, how emo” hear the record and say “holy fuck, THAT is PETE?!?! He sounds brutal!” and he does. We enjoy taking the piss. 

On the new DVD, Jordan was talking about wanting to make his illustrations for the album booklet into a sort of illustrated short story – do you think this is how the rest of the album is, like a short story?
I absolutely do. It’s the story of the last 2 years of my life. 

Which NJA song is your favourite to play live?
Wanderlust is fun but its EXTREMELY challenging. It goes from screaming to singing to screaming in 2 seconds. I think for me, “Roman Holiday” is the best. People don’t really know how to react to it. We play it first and people that haven’t heard us before are crushed. If I had a picture of all the open jaws I saw on the BMTH tour from little girls in the front row I could make a book. 

Out of ALL your stuff, which song is the best to play live?
My favourite live is “The New Black”. Its got an attitude that I think represents us perfectly. And people sing along loudest in that one

You just finished up the Epitaph tour with Bring Me The Horizon. You guys are pretty renowned for being a straight-up, no-bullshit rock band, and BMTH have had their critics for perhaps focusing more on their appearance and popularity. How were the dynamics on the tour, seeing as you guys are pretty much polar opposites in terms of expectations and also your sound? 
The dynamics clashed severely. Not all the way through, but at first. It was not easy backstage. The shows however were incredible so we both suffered it. But by the end of the tour all the kinks were worked out amongst us personally and we got along famously. They’re good dudes. 

I saw you guys last in Australia in February, in Sydney with Dillinger, Poison The Well and Evergreen Terrace. You could easily lump all four of you guys under the banner of ‘metalcore’, but there’s such variances in your styles that it would be almost unfair to put you all in the same pile. Where do you think you fit, in the heavy music spectrum?
I don’t think we do, and that’s something we pride ourselves on. Nor does Dillinger. I mean, bands that are noisy and heavy and technical are compared to DEP. they didn’t fit the spectrum so they added a layer. I like to think we did to. We looked at hardcore and said “ok, we love this aggression, but where’s the fun? You can’t be angry ALL the time, can you?” we couldn’t. We’re fun people. We enjoy laughing more than anything else in the world. We put a bit of self deprecation in to our songs and commented on the “heavy music spectrum” as a whole. We weren’t satisfied being another heavy band. We were the Jerry Maguire’s. Haha. We went in and took people with us. 

So you’ve played with Dillinger, you did the UK with Gallows and you’re about to do Taste of Chaos with In Flames – that’s a pretty varied lineup, what kind of bands do you feel more comfortable playing alongside?
That’s really hard to say, I don’t think I prefer one over the other. They’re all very similar things. We’ve grown up with DEP, we love touring with them because you watch them in awe and then after the show you’re best friends. Gallows, luckily, turned out to be exactly the same. They are fucking MANIACS on stage, and off they’re some of the coolest people we have ever toured with. However, we have never really toured with In Flames but the thought of it- going to places like Norway and Finland and all these new places with a band as seminal as In Flames is going to be such a remarkable experience. It’s going to leave us in awe. 

If you were given the chance to plan your own dream gig, where would you play and who would be the support bands?
It would be in Tokyo. It’s my favourite city in the world. I would want Converge, DEP, Underoath, Gallows and Norma Jean. They’re the most intense live bands I can think of. 

You’re heading out here for the Boys Of Summer in January, what’s summer like in Buffalo?
Wait, what’s summer? Is it those 3 days that it doesn’t snow? I guess those are cool. 

Keith, you’ve just finished up with your acoustic side-project, “Finale”. What was it like having your head in two different places, between the much more chilled out ‘Finale’ as opposed to ETID?
Finale was an amazing experience. It happened while writing The Big Dirty that I was starting to hear all these melodies and just couldn’t appropriately get them into ETID songs. I had these lyrics that were significantly less metaphoric and they too just weren’t working with ETID. When my friend came over and showed me some songs he wrote on an acoustic guitar I knew we had to do something together. It was perfect for me, it allowed me to sing without tacking it onto an ETID record just to say “hey guys I like to sing too!” and to be honest, I wrote most Finale songs while writing New Junk Aesthetic simultaneously and I think its because of having the avenue of Finale that this became the fastest, hardest ETID record we’ve ever done. 

 You guys tour a lot. I mean, a LOT. What’s the best impulse purchase you’ve ever bought while on your travels?
I bought a late 19th century gun from a pirate themed bar in Florida. Then I left it on the bus after tour. I miss it. 

Finally – what’s one thing you want to accomplish with ETID, that you haven’t done yet?
I want to write the theme song for a horror movie. 

‘New Junk Aesthetic’ is out now through Epitaph Records. Every Time I Die will be touring Australia throughout January, headlining the ‘Boys of Summer Tour’ with 50 Lions, Trap Them and Mary Jane Kelly.

The Galvatrons

Mixing equal parts Van Halen and Gary Numan, you’d be forgiven for thinking THE GALVATRONS were a long-forgotten relic of the 1970s or 1980s… but in fact, they’re a noughties Australian band who have racked up an impressive list of achievements in their two-year history, scoring a national support slot alongside Def Leppard & Cheap Trick, and getting evicted from Hyde Park by Sting himself. Keyboardist GAMMA RAY (yep, thats apparently his real name) was kind enough to answer a few questions:

First off, tell us your name, what you do in the band, and your favourite thing about the 1980s
Gamma Ray, keyboard player. The main thing about the 80’s I like is the fact that hair managed to elevate above the level of mere biological inevitability to the level of innovation and decadence.

The Galvatrons... unashamedly 1980s, since 2007

Tell us a bit about how The Galvatrons got started:
The Galvatrons started in a weird bubble of time and space… no, really, Johnny wrote some songs and found some like minded people to play them – we all came from different places to join this band.

I heard you were signed by Warner after playing only 4 shows, how did that happen?
Quite bizarrely – all I really knew was that there would be some industry people at show number four (three really for me; I didn’t play the first ‘Trons show). We played it, and it went well, so, I guess the rest has already happened.

You’ve done three or four national tours since Laser Graffiti was released, what kind of day jobs do you guys have that let you just pack up and leave whenever you want?
Apart from the national tours we have pretty much been gigging since we began; jobs have sort of come and gone but the touring has pretty much meant that work has been sporadic if anything.

You guys played the Big Day Out and Meredith Music festivals, did a UK festival tour, supported The Police at Hyde Park in London and were the national support for Def Leppard and Cheap Trick, all after only releasing one three-song EP – did you ever have to pinch yourself, to make sure it was all real?
The weird thing with the whirlwind crazy- thing is that things end up happening, and you don’t have time to think about it till well after – all you are really concerned bout is doing the next gig

Too loud for Sting...

Is it true you got yelled at by Sting, when you were supporting The Police at Hyde Park?
The real question is whether Sting’s hired help act alone or are they an agent of some larger Sting-like force????
(n.b.: according to their Wikipedia page, they were kicked out of their dressing room by Sting, after singing Metallica songs too loudly for the Police frontman’s liking)

You recently cancelled some NSW shows on your current ‘Laser Graffiti’ tour, what happened
Quite strange-  a few of the band after spending a week in QLD got terribly ill, myself and Johnny included… or exclusively… so singing was completely out of the question.
Or another way of thinking about it is that there was massive amounts of interference on the radio waves causing disturbance of astronomical proportions in the levels of delta waves passive through the cerebral cortex of our drummer causing the beats to meld into late 70’s disco…

When can we expect a new album?
In the future…

 Can you give us any spoilers as to how the new stuff is going to sound?
That’s cheating

You guys played at the final of the Rugby League world cup last year; have you noticed any increases in drunk footy bogans at your gigs lately?
That’s quite an inflammatory question – I can only reply that there is a drunk footy bogan lurking within any one of us, just waiting for the right moment to emerge…

One band you could listen to for the rest of your life:
Sonic Youth

One band that should never be allowed to record another song:
I hate this question – I’m going to say Sly and the Family Stone, because :
a)  They can’t really record another album ‘cause they’re long gone
b)  I wouldn’t change their current output for the world – they don’t need to release anything more because I’m satisfied.

What does 2010 hold for The Galvatrons?
2010 is a year of change, a year or contradictions, a year of new experience… In other words I don’t know, but hopefully it will be a lot of fun.

Finally: whats one thing you want to achieve with the band, that you haven’t done yet?
A mass venture into the middle of the desert to find our inner swami…

Polar Bear Club

POLAR BEAR CLUB, as an activity, is a bunch of old guys swimming in frozen lakes during winter. Polar Bear Club, as a band, is 5 guys from Rochester, New York, who are setting the world alight with a sound harking back to Hot Water Music and Small Brown Bike . I had a chat to vocalist JIMMY STADT about their new album ‘Chasing Hamburg’, lumberjack hats and sandwiches.

Polar Bear Club

First off – tell us your name, what you do and your first celebrity crush
My name is Jimmy and I sing. My first celebrity crush was (and still is) Elisabeth Shue. Adventures in Babysitting.

Polar Bear Club have sort of come from nowhere to be one of the most talked about bands in punk/hardcore – tell us a bit about where you guys came from.
Geographically we are from upstate New York. I’m from Rochester and some of the other guys are from Syracuse. We are about five to six hours away from NYC. The hardcore scene there was amazing. A lot of kids from bigger cities went to college in Rochester so they got some really great bands to come through. Bane always came through and Strike Anywhere. The Syracuse hardcore scene was kinda famous as well. Earth Crisis and Snapcase from Buffalo. That’s where we come from musically. We all range different eras of hardcore and punk I guess.

You’ve toured with Frank Turner and The Gaslight Anthem, played the Gig Life tour with Set Your Goals, and now the Bridge Nine tour with Strike Anywhere and Ruiner – what do you think it is that makes you appeal to such a wide range of fans?
I’m not sure really. We have a real wide array of influences and try to include them all. It’s important for us to play passionate and honest music and that’s something everyone can relate to.

What made you decide to upgrade Polar Bear Club from a side-project to a full-time touring band?
Well we had done everything we could do as a part-time band. We weren’t doing the music justice at that level. The next thing for us to do, and the most exciting and scary, was to go full-time.

I heard your name came from a song by Silent Majority – have you ever thought about covering the song?
We’ve thrown the idea around here and there. Crime In Stereo covers it I know. I don’t know, maybe we will save it for our last show or something whenever that will be.

Polar Bear Club Sandwich... geddit?

You guys can lay claim to having one of the best merch items of all time, with the ‘Polar Bear Club Sandwich’ shirt – who came up with the idea?
Hahahaha. Thanks! I’m not sure who conceived it. It might have been our drummer Emmett. The guy who drew it up and designed it was our friend Bobby. He has done some cool shirts for us in the past. I’m glad you like that shirt though, we should make more.

What’s it like being linked up with Bridge Nine Records? Those guys are doing so well lately
It’s cool. I feel like they are branching out as a label and getting a lot more kids behind them. It’s exciting to be a part of that. They are great to work with also, we couldn’t be happier.

You guys tour a lot. I mean, a LOT. What’s the best impulse purchase you’ve ever bought while on your travels?
Hahahaha. I buy dumb hats. I just bought like a flannel, fur flapped lumberjacks hat. That happens more than I’d like to admit.

You’ve just released your second album, “Chasing Hamburg”; how have crowds been reacting to the new songs?
Really well! I’m still not used to kids knowing those songs, so when they start singing a long and getting into it, it still surprises me. Overall, reception to the new album has been great.

How would you compare ‘Chasing Hamburg’ to [previous releases] ‘The Redder The Better’ and ‘Sometimes Things Just Disappear’? What are the major differences?
When you listen to “Hamburg”, I think you can really tell that we are a touring band. The songs are shorter and more straight-forward. They gear towards a live show more so than anything else we’ve done. We wrote what we know and we know playing shows. We went into recording “Hamburg” having been a full-time touring band for almost a year. On the other albums, we were more concerned with doing stuff that sounds awesome on recording but maybe not so much live.

The thing that struck me about ‘Chasing Hamburg’ was that it just felt like an incredibly mature release, especially in terms of the softer songs like ‘Drifting Thing’ and ‘Song To Persona’. I’m not saying your previous records weren’t mature, but you’ve really cranked it up a few notches on this one; not just lyrically but musically as well – was this a conscious decision, sort of like “we’ve signed with a big label, let’s get serious about this,” or did it just happen?
It was a little conscious and a little of just where we are at now musically. It didn’t have anything to do with the label, we always have and always will write the music and albums we want to hear. Nothing more. But we are still learning so who knows what the next one will sound like!

Was it harder to write and record because of the expectations set by (seemingly) every online blogger in punk?
Hahahaha no not really. We just did what we do. That’s what we did on all the other albums and that’s what we will always do. It’s hard to ignore those expectations and they start to weigh heavier when the album is all done when you are just waiting for it to get released. But during song-writing, it’s not there.

Can you tell us a bit about the lyrics on ‘One Hit Back’? To me, it sounds like you’re having a crack at some critics…
A little bit. More just that all these people get to say what they want about me and I get nothing back! It’s the nature of this whole thing and I don’t expect it to change but I felt like venting about it for a song. I’m fickle, sorry.

One band you think everyone should take time to listen to:
Title Fight

One band that should never EVER be allowed to record another song:
Nickelback

You’re heading out to Australia for the first time in January, what are you most looking forward to doing?
Going to a new place! Ditching our winter for your summer! We have touring the US a bunch now and Europe as well. I’m ready for something new.

Last one – what is one thing you’d like to accomplish with the band, that you haven’t done yet?
There is so much I could put here. I’ll say convincing Paul Westerberg (The Replacements) to do guest vocals on a song. There’s a lot more I want to accomplish though.

Polar Bear Club head to Australia in January, for a tour with Break Even and The Gifthorse. “Chasing Hamburg” is out now through Bridge Nine Records.
Check PBC’s Myspace the Bridge Nine website for more details

When The World Sleeps – May 09

It’s always tough for a new band to get a gig; it’s especially tough when the band in question happens to be a post-rock quintet, trying to score a show in the traditionally punk-dominated music scene of Wollongong. I sat down with Jared Chappell, guitarist and vocalist for Wollongong ambient outfit ‘When The World Sleeps’, to have a chat about McFlurries, trumpets and general post-rock pretentiousness.

First things first – who are you?
My name is Jared Chappell, I play guitar and do vocals in the band When the World Sleeps.

What is ‘When The World Sleeps’?
When the World Sleeps is a post rock band consisting of Mark Storey, Rick Murray, Chris Cullen, Mitch Prothero and myself. We’ve been playing together for about 7 or 8 months; we’ve been trying to write a lot of our own material rather than rely on covers.

Describe your music
Without getting too pretentious, we try to write mostly instrumental, post rock styled songs to capture emotion in shorter pieces than your typical post rock song. We try to keep the tracks from getting too boring, we like to keep them around the 5 minute mark.

Why did you decide to form the band? For fun? Chicks? World domination?
We formed the band because we all had a love of post rock, but we all were really into other genres of music as well. There weren’t any bands in Wollongong playing post-rock music (as far as we’re aware), so we wanted to start from a post rock perspective and work from there, hopefully creating our own little unique niche within the Wollongong music scene, especially as there’s such a focus on punk and hardcore music within the area.

Like you touched on, Wollongong has traditionally been a punk and hardcore stronghold, but recently there’s been a bit of a fightback by mellow, ambient sort of acts like yourself, guys like Lumiere and Inanimate Objects. Can you see this continuing?
Yeah, definitely. Lumiere in particular I can only see moving forwards and getting more popular, they have quite a strong local following. I wouldn’t quite call our music mellow, though, but we try to vary our songs – we have a few mellow tracks and a few songs that are a lot harder. Hopefully there’ll be a large audience for that alternative kind of music.

OK, pretend you’ve just won a competition, and the prize is that you get to book your dream gig; where would you perform and who would you play with?
Our dream gig, hmm. To speak on behalf of the band, I’d have to say Sigur Ros. They’re an amazing post-rock band, the way that they arrange their songs is phenomenal…although we might want to choose a shit band to make us look better by comparison (laughs). But in all seriousness, Sigur Ros are an amazing band, and we take a lot of inspiration from them; if we got to choose any band to share a stage with, it would definitely be them.

Outline a typical rehearsal session for WTWS:
A typical rehearsal session for WTWS is a pretty laid back affair to be honest. 95% of the time we’ll book a three hour session at a rehearsal studio, we’ll run over two or three songs that need work, then we’ll play through everything in an effort to emulate the flow of a proper gig. And once the rehearsal is over, we head to Maccas. McFlurries at midnight is a band tradition.

What’s the biggest challenge facing bands in Wollongong?
I think the biggest challenge in Wollongong is getting your music heard. There are plenty of venues that stage regular shows, such as the Oxford Tavern and the Brewery, but getting a gig and ensuring you get people outside of your own circle of friends to come…that’s a tough job. That’s where promotion over Myspace and Facebook has helped us a lot; they’ve allowed lots of people to hear our music, and it just makes promoting shows so much easier.

Whats the biggest challenge facing YOUR band?
I think the biggest challenge facing our band is to push ourselves forwards musically. Most of our songs are relying around three guitar arrangements at the moment, so we’d love to start writing some songs with a bit of variance, throw in some synth, or trumpet, or something different, just to make sure our material is constantly vibrant and interesting to hear.

What are the future plans for WTWS?
Basically, just to have fun with it all. We’re really enjoying writing and playing music at the moment, and hopefully we’ll keep writing and keep enjoying the time we play together. We’re all good friends, we’ve got a few band in-jokes by now, hopefully there’s more to come.

You can check out some songs by When The World Sleeps at www.myspace.com/whentheworldsleepsband;or, if you’re into the live stuff, they’re playing a free show at the Oxford Tavern on May 29, supporting Lumiere and Sleepmakeswaves

Mary Jane Kelly – May 09

At age 17, most aspiring musicians have likely never made it beyond the confines of their garage – but by this age, Jamal Salem already had a record deal, two CD’s, two national tours and substantial national radio airplay under his belt with Wollongong band Mary Jane Kelly.

Mary Jane Kelly

The band, affectionately known as MJK by fans, have been going from strength to strength since forming  two-and-a-half years ago, riding high on the recent wave of Australian punk and hardcore initiated by acts such as Parkway Drive and I Killed The Prom Queen. The Wollongong four-piece have toured and played with many successful punk bands from Australia and abroad, sharing stages with crushing acts such as Carpathian, The Ghost Inside and Bring Me The Horizon; but like any band, drummer Jamal Salem says that playing alongside their musical idols was the most exciting chapter of the band’s story so far.

“Bands like A Wilhelm Scream, With Honor, Propagandhi and Shai Hulud are probably our major influences,” he says. “Over the past year we were given the chance to play with A Wilhelm Scream and Propagandhi, which for us was both crazy and an honour, being able to support bands that we’re obsessed with.”

Despite having much in common with the heavier end of the musical spectrum, it is the band’s genre-spanning efforts that have gained them the most attention.

‘Our music is an amalgam of a bunch of aspects found in punk, metal and hardcore’, according to Salem; ‘a lot of bands around now tend to stick to one of those tags, but we’ve found that we can write much more interesting material if we go across a bunch of different types of sound’.

Salem points to this shunning of the stereotypes found in heavy music as being largely contributory to their recent success, and their appeal to wider audiences. “To me, it [the band] was more of an attempt to write music using ingredients from all the bands we were listening to and seeing what we could come up with. We weren’t aiming to be different, we just wanted to play the music that we loved.” 

Either way, the band seem to have stumbled upon a formula for success across many music-loving demographics; whilst often playing alongside metal and hardcore bands, MJK have also been featured on bills with much more mellow acts. Touted by many as the ‘next big thing’ in Australian music, the band played the recent ‘Soundwave’ festival in Sydney alongside alternative acts Nine Inch Nails, The Bloodhound Gang and Anberlin, and have been added to the sold-out Sydney leg of the ‘Take Action’ Tour featuring American pop-punk heavyweights Set Your Goals and All Time Low.

With another national tour in the works, and plans to record their debut full-length album by year’s end, don’t be too surprised to be hearing more from the band before too long.

Mary Jane Kelly join Hopeless and Dropsaw on the ‘Burning Up Winter’ tour throughout July, while their latest EP ‘Our Streets Turn White’ is available through Trial And Error Records. For more details, head over to http://www.myspace.com/maryjanekellyhc