Interview with Ash

 

Interview by Laura Callan and Enrique Bazan

Interview with Rolo Tomassi

 

Interview by Laura Callan and Enrique Bazan

Interview with Fightstar

 

Interview by Laura Callan and Enrique Bazan

Interview with Liam Cormier, Cancer Bats

 

Interview by Laura Callan, with help and camera skills from Enrique Bazan.

Interview with Buddy Nielsen, Senses Fail

 

Interview by Laura Callan, with help and camera skills from Enrique Bazan.

Interview with Alan Day: Four Year Strong

© Laura Callan – Four Year Strong’s Alan Day, Live

 

Four Year Strong are an exciting new band from Massachusettes, and we were lucky enough to catch up with Alan Day ahead of their electricifying support performance for New Found Glory in Southamp­ton Guildhall. We were so impressed by them we made sure to catch them at their headline London show in December, see myspace.com/thelivehour for more photos.

 

Q: How is it touring with New Found Glory?

A: It’s been awesome, the whole thing. Right before this we did the whole US version of this tour with Set Your Goals as well, and the whole tour was awesome. Most of the shows were sold out, the kids were loving it and its almost even better here, all the shows have been sold out and all the kids have been going crazy for these shows, it’s been a lot of fun.

 

Q: It’s a great line-up, [Crime In Stereo, Four Year Strong, Set Your Goals, New Found Glory] how did it come about?

A: I knew the line-up a little while before the tour started because New Found Glory were putting a tour together where they wanted similar bands that were doing the same kinds of things, because it’s called the “Easycore Tour” they just wanted it to fit, you know.

 

Q: There are four bands tonight, three support bands who only get around 20-10 minutes each, do you find that that’s enough time to connect with the audience?

A: I feel like that’s definitely the right time for us to do that. As long as our band has been together we’ve always played really short sets. I know like a while ago before things were going so well, we always thought that playing a shorter set was better, because if you put all your energy and put everything right in front of everyone right from the start, if you play a shorter set you can keep people wanting more.

You know, rather than playing for a long time and it’s like “Is this band still playing? When is the band I wanna see coming on?” So if you play a really energetic show, kids go “What the hell was that? I wanna hear more” and maybe they go buy a t-shirt or CD.

Since we’ve always done that I think now we’re used to playing short sets, now when we have to play longer that a half hour we freak out! [laughs]

 

Q: Are you looking forward to your headline London show?

A: Yeah, we played a headline show the first day we were here in Stoke, that was really cool, we played a little bit longer set, we played a couple of covers of older songs and we’ll probably do the same thing in London. But its nice to play headline shows over here because we’re playing second on this bill [New Found Glory show] and it’s still awesome because kids are coming to see us, but it’s totally different when you’re headlining, you know that if everyone there is still there by the end of the show, then they’re there to see you. So it’s a completely different vibe and it’s really cool to be able to do that.

 

Q: Did you want to do your own mini tour while you were out here?

A: Well we didn’t really have the budget to do more but eventually we will definitely be coming out here to do more, definitely.

 

© Laura Callan – Four Year Strong – Live at London’s Camden Underworld

 

Q: You played Give It A Name, and the Give It A Name Presents… Tour in 2008, how was that?

A: The shows were amazing, it was our first time out here and we were playing this huge festival so that was really cool. I think that really helped to get the word our for the tour because we got to say onstage in front of so many people “Hey we’re gonna be doing this tour, come check out these shows” and every single one of the shows was sold out so that was really really cool! It was also really good because the four bands on the tour had never been here before, so I think that made the kids really excited to see the show because no-one had been before and it was a rotating line-up so one day we’d be headlining, one day we’d open, and so on so I think that was really fair considering none of us had been over here before. All the shows were awesome.

 

Q: What are you influences and how exactly would you describe your own sound?

A: As a band we all have different influences, we all grew up listening to hardcore and like bands from Boston and the North East area but we started getting into popular stuff, listening to New Found Glory and Saves The Day and bands like that, and we were intrigued, they were bands playing such pop-punk music that was obviously influenced by hardcore and also we grew up in the hardcore scene, we were kind of the same thing and we wanted to show our roots in hardcore and stuff like that.

 

Q: There are five of you in the band, how do you all manage to get your own influence into the music?

A: Well most of the writing is done by me and Dan, the other singer, and we pretty much have the same idea for what we want to do, it’s not necessarily like different songs have different influences of stuff like that, but we both have a wide range of music that we listen to that we definitely take bits and piece of everything and kinda throw it all in there.

 

Q: Our show, The Live Hour, is all about live music, what do you think is good about seeing bands live?

A: I think live music is extremely important because, you know, people who are so into music, like listening to music all the time know it’s so important to se and experience what they are listening to, it’s totally different sitting at your home listening to your iPod while your washing the dishes, doing whatever, than actually going to see that band your listening to, see who they are and what they really do. It’s hard to explain in words I guess, it’s just a totally different experience, I feel like if kids didn’t have live shoes and didn’t get to see the band that they like live then music wouldn’t be like it is, people wouldn’t be as interested in music as they are, because when you go to a show you feel like you’re a part of it rather than being an outsider listening to it, so I think it’s all really important.

 

Q: What would you say are some of the best bands you’ve seen live?

A: That’s a tough one, I have to say that New Found Glory are probably one of the best, Set Your Goals are also awesome live too. There’s millions, Every Time I Die are also one of my favourites, we were with them at the warped tour all summer, they’re amazing live. I could probably go on all day!

 

Q: So what should we expect from Four Year Strong in 2009?

A: I’m sure we’re gonna come back to the UK, it’s our plan right now! We have some time off right now, we’re gonna write a new record, we already have some stuff written and were working on new stuff, but we would like to release a new record next year [2009] so we’re definitely gone be trying to do that, that’s priority. We have some tours lined up already and we’re looking at some other tours, and we’re definitely, definitely looking into coming back here, yeah!

 

 Listen to The Live Hour on Pure FM Sundays 6-7pm.

Four Year Strong’s debut album Rise Or Die Trying is out now, visit http://www.fouryearstrong.com for more info.

Interview: In Case Of Fire

© Laura Callan

Q: We saw you a couple of weeks ago supporting FFAF, how was it touring with them?

Colin: Yeah it was good, it was a good show, we did the full UK tour with them and Cancer Bats, it was good we were bus-sharing with Funeral [For A Friend] as well so we’re good friends with them and stuff now. It was a good tour, I think some of the crowds on the tour were a little bit quiet in places for all of the support bands, the whole “we just wanna see Funeral” kind of thing but then other shows like the Portsmouth show were really really good and really receptive.

Steven: The Portsmouth show was a bit of a technical nightmare; we use a sampler during our set but it crashed on us in like the first or second song so we kinda had to re-arrange the whole set while we were up there! But it actually ended up pretty good, it was a bit more of a punky set than usual, but it seemed to go down pretty well with the Portsmouth crowd, we think.

Q: You’ve been compared to bands such as Muse, the Mars Volta, while that must be hugely flattering, you do seem to want to forge your own place in music, how would you describe your sound?

Steven: It’s just a natural thing when we go into the rehearsal room and we’re coming up with new material, it tends to verge toward the more epic side of things, our songs just tend to be that bit grander than the normal rock song. I don’t mean that to sound egotistical, we just like the big sound, we like things on a big scope. Not all the songs are like that but we find that that’s just what moves us when we write. So I can understand why people say that we’re like Muse, and that to us is a massive compliment because they’re just an unfathomably good band, they’re unbelievable live, and if we can take our cues from them then we definitely will.
I think sometimes when we play a live show especially to people who haven’t heard us, they kind of look at us a bit, and it takes them about 4 or 5 songs to really get it. There was a guy last night who cam to see us in Leicester, an older guy who was writing a review of the show, and he came up to us after and said that he couldn’t pigeon-hole it at all and came up with some bizarre explanation of our music, he said it was a mixture between trance…

Colin: Trance and something else, and we sort of looked at him and said “Trance? Really?” You know!

Steven: So really if people who come to see our music can be more open-minded then they’ll get the most from it, but we’ll just have to wait and see until the album comes out in February.

Q: You’ve had quite a lot going on this year, what are you hoping next year when the album comes out?

Colin: World domination. [all laugh] We’ve got the Kerrang! Relentless Tour coming up in January which is really good and we’re the opening slot on it so it gives us a real chance to walk off stage after every show and tell the other three bands to follow that, you know that kind of thing, which is a challenge that we love. And after that obviously the album’s coming out so we think we’ll be doing probably another run of headline shows, and then once the album release starts to kick into gear we’ll be touring again, maybe some more supports and some more headline shows. And then we’re in festival season, and then it’s September again, you know what I mean it’s just a complete blur at the minute! But much more touring!

Q: You played quite a lot of the big festivals this summer, how was that?

Mark: It was some experience we only played our first festival last summer, we played Rock AM Ring, and Rock AM Park was our first ever festival, which was absolutely huge.

Steven: One of those venues was an ice hockey rink, they were that big, and Airborne were on before us.

Colin: Airborne opened our stage in Rock AM Ring and Rock AM Park, and then there was another band on and then us, so were sort of looking at the line up and seeing Airborne and going “they’re on before us?!” and they’re album had just gone number one in Germany. So they were like coming out and the place was full and then there was another band and then we walked in like “Hello!”
Both nights we got really good receptions and really good feedback from it.

Mark: The festivals are a real challenge to us, it’s basically like everything we’ve been doing, we’ve been going out there, nobody really knows who we are or anything about us and it’s like giving us a blank canvas, we have to go out there and impress those people every gig that we do. And the festivals especially are almost even harder, but we’ve seen a build over the summer. By the time Reading and Leeds hit we were definitely getting in some good crowds and stuff.

Colin: And since the festivals we’ve had people come to the shows and tours since then and say “Oh I saw you at Reading” or “I saw you and T In The Park”, that sort of thing. So that’s what the festivals are for they’re for picking up new fans that wouldn’t necessarily maybe have come out to see you before you know. That’s what people love about festivals, you just wander around into a tent and go “Ooh”. It definitely worked for us and we hope that by the time next year’s festival season rolls around that we’ll have moved up a little bit maybe on some of the slightly bigger stages, that’s the plan anyway.

Q: You seem to be well on your way, you’ve been really hotly-tipped by a lot of people.

Steven: It can be a bit of a curse, I mean in some of the reviews we read of This Time We Stand somebody wrote it was “the most eagerly anticipated single of this year” which made us laugh…

Colin: We were like “Yeah, by us!”, maybe it’s the most eagerly anticipated release this year by us!

Steven: I think that’s well wide of the mark but I don’t know it’s just, people have written quite a lot about us but at the end of the day we just want to see the fan base get a bit bigger, we want people to really get into the music and we don’t really care, well you obviously care a bit what music journalists write about you but you got to take it all with a pinch of salt, the good and the bad. We’ve read some really bad stuff already, and then there’s other stuff tipping us, so you’ve got to put that all out of your mind and just fingers crossed in 2009 we’ll get that fan base a bit bigger and people will like our music.
There’s a piece about us in Kerrang! like a proper feature all about our growth as a band, and I mean last year before anything happened for us when we just finished recording the album in our own house at home, we’d been doing this for a while so we’d given ourselves three months up ‘til Christmas and if nothing happened we had to realistically look at things, and thank goodness something did happen. But you go from that last year to this year and it’s just unbelievable, so everything for us is a real blessing really, we just feel like pretty much the luckiest band in the UK.

Colin: Even if we are some nights only playing to 6 or 7 people!
Q: Our show on PureFM.com is called The Live Hour and it’s all about great live music. Why do you think live music is so important and why would you tell people to go and see live music?

Colin: I think live music is the crux of what we do, if you’re a band and you can’t play live, you shouldn’t really be a band, you should be a songwriter for somebody else. It’s like if you can’t play live you’re basically a pop band, you need to be able to play live because that’s what you get into a band to do in the first place. If you love a CD and you go and see that band and they can reproduce it live, you can see the full energy of the stage performance, it automatically raises the bar again, you love the album even more. Playing live is one of the most important aspects of being in a band without a shadow of a doubt.

Steven: I think I’d recommend people to see bands play live because it’s like you might love the album but you go and see them play live you feel that if you’re in a good venue you feel the par of the PA system you feel the kick drum hitting you in the guts, the music physically does move you, it’s a completely different experience than listening to a CD, like Col said you go and listen to that band again and you’re almost rediscovering the songs sometimes.

Colin: It even happens sometimes maybe you’re in the middle ground where you don’t know if you like a band, like the album’s okay, but then if you go and see them live and they’re unbelievable, you go back you’re like “That album’s fantastic! I love this band now.” It can have that much of an effect on your opinion of a band so it’s incredibly important.

Mark: Especially discovering new bands, a lot of new bands maybe their CDs aren’t up to scratch, they don’t have a lot of money behind them, but if you go and see a good new up and coming live band, you can take your basis from that.

In Case Of Fire’s debut single This Time We Stand is Out Now, with their album to follow next year. Visit http://www.incaseoffire.com for tour dates and more information.

Funeral For A Friend Live

Funeral For A Friend 31/10/2008 at Portsmouth Pyramids

With three support acts, Funeral For a Friend’s Halloween-night gig at the Pyramids looked to be a bit of a rock marathon. Pop-punk newbies Attack Attack kicked off the night followed by Northern Irish rockers, In Case Of Fire. Both gave exciting performances before Cancer Bats came on to really warm up the crowd. In full Halloween dress, the band really impressed, frontman Liam Cormier gave a hugely energetic performance, thrashing around the stage with true hardcore punk swagger.

© Laura Callan

Having seen Funeral For A Friend live on their past few albums, I knew I was in for a good show; the new album Memory and Humanity is a very good offering slightly reminiscent of their more screamo beginnings, unlike their arguably lighter 2007 album, Tales Don’t Tell Themselves.

Dressed far more casually than their predecessors, FFAF took to the stage with a roar from their eagerly waiting fans and played a succession of old crowd-pleasers and new material.

Singer Matt Davies kept it political sporting a T-Shirt bearing the face of presidential candidate Barack Obama, but was clearly looking to have a good time, joking with the crowd throughout the set. While the rest of the band were drinking bottles of beer, Davies sipped from a flask of ‘tea’, leading the crowd to call for “Tea! Tea! Tea!” Davies then enticed the whole venue into a sing-along of Mr T’s “Mother”, exclaiming “That’s the only T you’re gonna get!”

© Laura Callan

In true Halloween spirit a couple of diehard fans dressed up as the male and female heroes of album cover Casually Dressed & Deep in Conversation, and were brought up on stage as FFAF slowed it down with “Your Revolution Is A Joke”. The tempo was soon built up again, with Davies calling for a circle pit to new album track “You Can’t See The Forest For The Wolves”.

After a lengthy show the band departed the stage, but came back for an encore of the eternal crowd-pleaser “Escape Artists Never Die”, sending the crowd into a moshing, circle-pitting, kicking, screaming frenzy.

Playing live Funeral For A Friend give a fun and lively performance, playing their best anthems from past and present albums and giving the crowd what they want. They have arguably become more emo than screamo over the years, but still offer up great music, and even better live performances.

© Laura Callan

The Script, Live at Portsmouth Pyramids

Really enjoyed the show, I’m really glad this new band from Dublin are doing so well!

All Rights Reserved © Laura Callan Photography

http://www.lauracallan.com

Every Time I Die, Portsmouth Wedgewood Rooms Review

 

© Laura Callan Photography

(Published in the University of Portsmouth’s Pugwash News in April 2008.) 

By Laura Callan

 

Standing through three support acts is usually a bit tedious, but Every Time I Die’s line up is quite impressive. Opening the bill are Blackhole, who energetically warm up the crowd with screaming British hardcore. They’re followed in quick succession by a sweet melodic rock performance from Scary Kids, Scaring Kids, and then by Drop Dead, Gorgeous much to the delight of screeching fans in the crowd.

Thundering out the opening cords of “We’rewolf”, Every Time I Die storm the stage as the crowd come alive, thrashing around and screaming the songs back at them. 

Three songs in, and singer Keith Buckley isn’t happy with beer being thrown over him from the crowd. Towering over the front he calls for the beer-thrower, enlisting the help of his fans and shouting: “Point him out! Get this motherfucker out of here!”

The miscreant is not found, but Keith gets back to business: “We’ve traveled too far to have our night ruined by some anonymous asshole who wants to throw a beer on stage,” he sneers before plunging straight into the next anthem.

They rip through the songs the crowd has been waiting for, from albums “Gutter Phenomenon” and “Hot Damn!”, as well as their most recent offering “The Big Dirty”.

As the riffs of closing song ‘Ebolarama’ streak through the air the mosh pit erupts. Keith shouts for a circle pit, a command to which loyal fans obey, and chaos fills the small venue, before the band exit the stage much too effortlessly cool than to partake in the pretentious encore facade.

An effortlessly electric show from the Buffalo, New York band, which leaves me with ringing ears, beer soaked clothes and an agonising wait for the next album.