PANIC! AT THE DISCO
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EDITOR’S NOTE Pop is not a dirty word, and in 2016 its stars don’t always come as shiny and pre-packaged as they once did. Brendon Urie is a pop star. If he wasn’t before, he certainly is after ‘Death of a Bachelor’. At the time of writing, Panic! At The Disco’s new album sits pretty at the top of the US Billboard 200, having shifted 190,000 copies in its first week. Knocking Bieber and Adele off their perch, he’s duking it out with the big boys now. It’s easy to see why, too. The album is a work of crazy genius, shifting direction at will but always sounding both loads of fun and part of something bigger. Our massive cover feature gets under its skin. Better still, Panic! are about to take to the road with the returning Weezer stateside. x Get us on that tour.
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IN THIS ISSUE RIOT 04. WEEZER 06. ALL TIME LOW 10. ENTER SHIKARI 12. DIET CIG 14. FARRO 16. BEACH SLANG 18. TONIGHT ALIVE ABOUT TO BREAK 20. THE DIRTY NIL 21. SO PITTED FEATURES 22. PANIC! AT THE DISCO 34. BURY TOMORROWNG 38. YUCK 42. SWMRS 46. GHOST RATED 50. CREEPER
51. FARRO 52. DIIV 53. SIMPLE PLAN 54. TRACKS OF THE MONTH LIVE 56. PANIC! AT THE DISCO 58. BEACH SLANG 59. DIET CIG 60. DILLY DALLY 61. TURNOVER COMING UP 62. MOOSE BLOOD 63. MEET ME IN ST LOUIS 64. ON THE ROAD FESTIVALS 66. SLAM DUNK 68. 2000TREES 69. READING & LEEDS
Editor: Stephen Ackroyd (stephen@upsetmagazine.com) Deputy Editor: Victoria Sinden (viki@upsetmagazine.com) Assistant Editor: Ali Shutler (ali@upsetmagazine.com) Contributors: Alex Lynham, Amie Kingswell, Danny Randon, Emma Swann, Heather McDaid, Jack Glasscock, James Fox, Jessica Goodman, Kristy Diaz, Phil Smithies, Ryan De Freitas, Sarah Louise Bennett 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 Upset. Disclaimer: While every effort is made to ensure the information in this magazine is correct, changes can occur which affect the accuracy of copy, for which Upset holds no responsibility. 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
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RIOT
E V E RY T H I N G H A P P E N I N G I N RO C K
EVERYTHING WILL BE ALL WHITE IN THE END
A F T E R T H E I R S U RP RI S E RE L E AS E O F T WO N E W SO N G S AT T H E E N D
O F 2015, W E EZ E R A RE BAC K W I T H T H E I R T E N T H A L BU M - A N D T H EY ’ V E C H OS E N T H E M OST
LOA D E D C O LO U R F RO M T H E I R PA L ET T E .
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ere they come. Weezer have announced the release of their tenth studio album, their self-titled-butnot-really ‘White Album’. And boy, it sounds like we’re in for a treat. The record will be released on 1st April, and is their fourth colour coded album technically titled ‘Weezer’, following 1994 debut ‘Blue’, 2001’s ‘Green’ and 2008’s ‘Red’.
Including the previously released ‘Thank God For Girls’ and ‘Do You Wanna Get High?’, the ten-track full-length also features ‘King of The World’, which is streaming on upsetmagazine.com now. When’s the last time we went into a new Weezer album three for three on brilliant songs? The signs are better than good. Not just that, the band have announced a huge world tour, which even includes dates in the UK and Europe. We know. Only three so far, but it’s better than we’ve had for a long time. They’ll play Manchester and London on 3rd and 5th April, before heading to Amsterdam on the 8th. Then in summer, they’ll take on the US with Panic! At The Disco. Writing about the album, frontman Rivers Cuomo says the band took their lead from the Beach Boys and Southern California. “The inspiration behind the songs were my experiences hanging around the Westside of Los Angeles, which has been our home since Weezer began,” he
explains. “Hanging out with people in Venice and Santa Monica, the beach, the Hare Krishnas, the Sikh on roller blades with the guitar, girls on Tinder within a four mile radius, seeing other bands, the kids from La Sera. I would just tweet out ‘does anybody wanna hang?’ and then I’d get together with people who responded and talk about life. I love California. I wanted the album to make you feel like you were there with us SoCal weirdos even if you’re in Milwaukee in December. “Obviously my favourite band has always been the Beach Boys, and what I love about them most are the melodies and the chord progressions. I guess the harmonies too. And the orchestration. Can’t forget about the lyrics. So basically everything. I wanted to get that kind of vibe: beautiful tunes and sweet lyrics. I also love the dark side of the beach – Venice after dark, hearing at the Del Monte Speakeasy about how the gangsters used to drag the bodies through the catacombs and leave them under the pier.” P”
NEED TO KNOW... BUMS BUMS BUMS
The Joy Formidable’s new album ‘Hitch’ will be released on 25th March. They’ve just unveiled the first track from it, ‘The Last Thing On My Mind’ - the video for which features lots of scantily clad men. “It’s a song about freedom, about feeling alive and a part of that is about sexual liberation,” explains lead singer and guitarist Ritzy. Watch now on upsetmagazine.com.
NEW BRAND NEW
Brand New – never giving it to you straight, always being a bit secret squirrel. An email from the band’s Procrastinate! Music Traitors ‘label/ shop/whatever/thingy’ that released the leaked 2006 demo tapes at the back end of last year. seems to suggest 2016 will bring with it a Brand New release on an ‘unconfirmed format’. Can you release a record on internet rumour?
LI STENI N G POST
“OBVIOUSLY WEEZER MY FAVOURITE KING OF THE WORLD BAND HAS ALWAYS BEEN THE BEACH BOYS.”
Just like the Cuomo-namechecked Beach Boys, it’s Weezer’s ability to hit those harmonies which sets them apart, and when matched with grittier, discordant melody they’re without peer. Few bands have a template that should be massaged rather than aggressively challenged; but Weezer are certainly one of them. With those both hooked up, we can have all the “demented lyrics” Cuomo wants. ‘King Of The World’ is Weezer on top form. Listen now on upsetmagazine.com.
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“WE TEND TO COBBLE THINGS TOGETHER AND SEE WHERE IT GOES.”
LI STE N IN G POST
ENTER SHIKARI REDSHIFT
(l-r) Tinky Winky, Dip... wait, we already did this, didn’t we?
“Redshift is a song about bloody good luck! On the grandest of scales! Literally!” says Rou. “Our universe is expanding faster and faster and a few trillion years from now, everything will have sped away from us so fast that all we would see when looking out from Earth is empty space. We would deduce that we were totally alone in the universe. A lost sheep. The last and only biscuit in the tin.” Listen now on upsetmagazine.com.
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E N T E R S H I K A RI H E A D O U T O N T H E ROA D T H I S M O N T H FO R SO M E O F T H E I R B I G G EST H E A D L I N E S H OWS TO DAT E . WO RDS : JAC K G L ASSC O C K . year ago, Enter Shikari released their genrebending album, ‘The
Mindsweep’. Today, they find themselves hard at work preparing for their biggest UK tour to date. The boys from St. Albans gaze up at an arena-shaped cliff face they’re about to scale; the shows are imminent, the set list is penned and the production is prepared, but how did they get here? “We’re not really that ambitious as people,” says vocalist Rou Reynolds. “We’re not constantly striving to become a bigger band or anything. When we’re lucky enough to keep stepping things up it always comes as a bit of a shock. But then, once you get past that, it’s just utter excitement really. Your mind just starts whizzing through the various possibilities you have with production and the different tracks that will work better in bigger venues and you just start planning it.” This tour is not a ‘final payoff’ for years of hard work, but an opportunity to expand, progress and amaze. “Even though it’s an arena scale tour, it’s still very DIY. We’re doing all the programming ourselves. I’m doing all the footage and the effects for the screens. So yeah, even though we’ve been off tour it’s felt like we’ve had a day job.” Rou laughs at the realisation of what his obsession for creative control has driven him to. “I’ve
ES T O U R D AT FEBRUARY Academy 18 Glasgow, O2 rn Exchange Co , gh ur 19 Edinb pital FM Ca m, ha ng 20 Notti Arena al uth, Internation 22 Bournemo Centre torpoint Arena 23 Cardiff, Mo r, Victoria ste he 25 Manc Warehouse xandra Palace 27 London, Ale
basically been in front of the screen coding for the last few months and it’s going to be good to get out of the house to see the fruits of our labour on the big screen.” It’s while discussing Shikari’s formative years that Rou remembers “a kind of vibe; this sort of discomfort. It’s not like sitting down at the theatre or going to watch a pop group. I think we’re trying to keep that sense of excitement and exhilaration. This is a way we’ve found we can keep that in the bigger venues. “We’ve always been a band who likes to keep pushing ourselves,” Rou affirms. Enter Shikari aren’t desperate to become the biggest act in the world; they’re desperate to provide the best sonic, visual and even spiritual experience they can. It just so happens that this attitude, paired with their focus and talent is what’s providing them with the pathway to being a bona fide massive band. If anything, Rou appears uncomfortable when posed with the question: what are Enter Shikari looking to achieve with this huge run of shows? “We don’t really think about things that far in advance in our band. We tend to cobble things together and see where it goes. I don’t know really where we’ll go from here, but it’s certainly exciting to be doing something different that’s not our normal circuit.” For Rou to suggest that Shikari don’t plan things may appear contradictory when you consider the time and effort they’ve been putting into their set over the last few months. But that forethought is simply the product of opportunity. In fact, if you want proof of Shikari’s make-do-and-mend attitude, all you have to do is ask Rou about their support slots for the upcoming tour. “At the beginning we were looking at a few bands, but things weren’t working out with schedules. Then The Wonder Years were put forward. One of our techs is a big fan and plays them backstage all the time, so we’ve all grown to really like their music. They’re a great live band; song writing, melodies – really, really good. It’s not your straight down the middle, typical pop punk either.
“Then The King Blues: I hadn’t heard from Itch for quite a while, I hadn’t seen him for about a year. Then I get a text out of the blue saying ‘The King Blues are getting back together, I don’t suppose you’re doing anything or are up for touring?’ So we just sorted that out and it’ll probably be like old friends back together again; a school reunion or something.” Now, with the band’s latest single ‘Redshift’ dropping completely out of the blue recently, is it a sign of things to come from Enter Shikari, or more just a patch of their ever-expanding quilt? “That’s the best thing about being an independent artist really; you’ve got no one trying to fit you in anywhere. You’re given free reign. You’re allowed to be inconsistent. You’re allowed to be erratic. You can make music as you feel and I think that’s what we do. We’re never going to make an album that’s purely heavy and we’re never going to make an album that’s purely mainstream or more immediate. I need that balance. I’m too fidgety; I get bored too easily.” Given Enter Shikari’s passion for progression and their vocal political engagement, it would seem natural for their music to be used to inspire change. “I’m not a full on romantic in the sense that ‘music can change the world’. I think it can be a crucial fuel. That’s what I think music can do. It provokes such strong emotions; it can embolden people and their views. Obviously that can be used in negative ways as well. But, for us it’s important to keep spreading this basic messages of unity and peace and everything else we’ve been talking about for years.” With that statement, you can’t help but continue to be endeared by Enter Shikari’s approach. Where many bands would ascribe their successes to hard work, they’re more likely to suggest that their achievements are down to luck. And where some bands would insist that their music will change the world, they humbly admit their music is more likely to enthuse their fans, encourage growth and fuel activism. That said, Enter Shikari’s first foray into an arena scale headline tour is certainly set to be inspirational. P 11
JOSH 2.0
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A F T E R L E AV I N G O N E O F T H E B I G G EST BA N DS I N T H E WO RL D, J OS H FA RRO TA L K S L I F E A F T E R PA R A M O RE . WO RDS : H E AT H E R M C DA I D.
lot can change in half a decade. Heck, a lot can change in a year. But in 2010 when the Farro brothers upped and left Paramore, many questions were flying around about the future of all those involved. Speed through the subsequent five years and Josh Farro is on the cusp of launching his debut solo album and starting a new chapter, songs neatly surrounding the story of what he’s been doing in life and music, and the fear of going it alone.
band shortly after, but that dissolved pretty quickly. After that I did a lot of songwriting and met a lot of people around Nashville that were songwriters and made some cool relationships. Once I had done that for a little bit, I got the itch to do the band thing again and couldn’t seem to find the all the guys I needed, the right guys, so after a long process of trial and error I just decided to do a solo project.
to a place where I was happy with it. The more I wrote and the more I sang, the more I liked what I heard. It just started as me and a guitar.” Josh and his guitar evolved, in time, into ‘Walkways’, his debut album. “I had a few songs that I had written over the past few years with some of my songwriting friends, and I thought some of those songs might be worth keeping, so I decided to grab some of those and add some that I had just written on my own to that list of songs and I started thinking about what I had to do.
“I DIDN’T REALLY KNOW IF I COULD DO THIS, BUT I GAVE IT A SHOT.”
It’s clear from the opening track, ‘Cliffs’, that he does so with apprehension, but a growing confidence. He sings, almost reassures, that you’re going to make it out alive. It’s like a message as he steps into the unknown that he can do it, and to listeners that it’s a journey they’ll go on together. He’s ready to unleash Josh 2.0, Farro, into the world.
“I left the band in late 2010,” explains Josh. “After that, I wanted to take a break from music for a little. Of course, it didn’t take long - next thing I knew, I was playing music with some of my friends and trying to form another 14 upsetmagazine.com
“I started writing music on my own just practicing, I guess you could call it practicing singing. I would just write songs and see if I could do it. I didn’t really know if I could do this, but I gave it a shot. At first, it wasn’t exactly what I wanted to hear but I thought that there was some potential there and if I worked hard enough, then it could get
“Obviously, I had to make an album, so I started recording with who I randomly met through a producer engineer we did the album with. I was just going to self-produce at first, but then I randomly met Jacquire King [City and Colour, Kings of Leon]. I loved him and we hit it off and decided I wanted him to produce it. Next thing you know, we were recording an album.
On how much Jacquire helped evolve and change his work, Josh notes that, “in ways he did and others he didn’t. I think that’s what makes him such a great producer. He heard the songs - the songs he felt needed changing, we would change in some areas and collaborate on ideas on how to change them, then on others he was just like ‘that song’s ready to go it doesn’t really need anything’. I think that’s what makes really great producers: someone who doesn’t always have to change something in a song - they can see it for what it is.”
In dealing with his life through music, many songs stand out to him for reasons that range from just enjoying the vibe of what he made, to personal ties to the lyrics. “’Walkways’ is one of my favourites because of the energy and the overall feel of the song. I wanted have like a throwback feel - I wanted to go for like the Beach Boys, a lot of harmonies. Although it doesn’t really sound like the Beach Boys, it has that mindset. I’m really happy with the outcome and lyrically I think it is really cool. It takes you on a journey and how I’ve been all over the world, seen so many great things, been to so many great places, experienced so many cool cultures and it says that really all these cool places don’t compare to you. I’ve been thinking about my wife, that everybody’s got that special person in their life or people that when you’re travelling often and experiencing different cultures that are so cool, I think we all have that urge and desire to travel and experience different things, but we are always drawn back to the one we love. It’s pretty simple but I really love it. “Another one I really enjoy is ‘Islands’, definitely a more mellow, darker vibe. I just love the feel of it - it’s very eerie almost, and emotional. I wrote it with a friend of mine, writing about two people in a relationship and finding a place where they didn’t know they had gotten that far, it leads them to a ‘how did we get here?’ sort of thing. The last line is, ‘Why did we say we were an island?’ - it’s off that expression ‘no man is an island’, like you can’t do life alone and even when you’re in a relationship, you need support. I had my parents in mind, they got a divorce quite a few years past and it resonates with me. It’s kind of a sad song... I tend to lean more towards the sad songs, I don’t know why but I do!” So it’s been a fair few years since we’ve heard from him, people will be viewing this both as newcomers and as fans who’ve followed him from his teens - what does he hope people take from the album? “I hope they love it just for what it is. I hope there’s a song for everyone on there. I just want them to enjoy it - I hope it makes them feel all kinds of emotions but overall the feeling I want them to walk away with is happy, to feel joyful and that feeling when you listen to music and it gives you this unexplainable feeling. I hope it resonates with people.” P Farro’s album ‘Walkaways’ is out now.
TONIGHT, THEY’RE LIVE B E FO RE T H E M U C H -A N T I C I PAT E D RE L E AS E O F T H I RD A L BU M ‘ L I M I T L ESS ’, TO N I G H T A L I V E A RE H E A D I N G O U T TO V E N U ES AC ROSS E U RO P E A N D T H E U K FO R T H E F I RST T I M E I N A LO N G W H I L E A F T E R A B RI E F RU N A RO U N D T H E I R N AT I V E AUST R A L I A . VO CA L I ST J E N N A M C D O U G A L L T E L LS U PS ET W H AT ’S G O I N G TO G O D OW N . WO RDS : ALI SHUTLER.
AS TH E K I L L E RS O N C E AS K E D - “A R E W E H U M A N , O R A RE W E DA N C E R ?” Last month, Tonight Alive decided to name their fanbase. “Can a band name their fandom?”, they tweeted “We think it’s about time. Hope you like it, Humans. It’s who we are” Then, a few weeks later, their new video to ‘Drive’ drops. Complete with dance moves. Human? Dancer? In your face, Brandon Flowers. This lot are both.
You’re diving straight into the ‘Limitless’ tour with a ten week run. Why are you going in so hard? It’s just that time again! We’ve been off the road for seven months since making the record, which is something we did deliberately to give ourselves and our fans a break, but it definitely reinforced that we belong on the road. We’re ready and excited to play new music and feel the rush again. You mentioned that the touring cycle for ‘The Other Side’ was healing. Was that from the support of fans, overcoming personal struggles or the unity in the band itself? All three played a huge part in the healing process. Through the end of the touring cycle for ‘What Are You So Scared Of?’ and into the writing of ‘The Other Side’ we were facing a lot of challenges internally. There were break ups, sicknesses and letting go of our first manager in a really complicated situation. There was so much I didn’t know how to vocalise at the time, so writing the record really forced me to face my
demons. LI STENIN G POST Any nerves about playing the new songs live? No nerves at all if I’m honest! This is definitely the most natural that our music has felt to perform and I ‘How Does It Feel’ shows a band growing past the pain think that’s because that once defined them as they try and turn it into a writing it took a very positive. The fact this track is probably one of the most conscious shift to exhilarating songs Tonight Alive have ever written is just let go of rules and a happy bonus. Listen now on upsetmagazine.com. formulas and even any ideas of what to their lives and continue approaching Tonight Alive ‘had to’ things the same way, unless of course it’s sound like. working for them. But I’m very aware that we all follow negative thought patterns How do you think the new songs will and get caught up in other people’s change the shape of the set? expectations and subliminal control, so The set is so much more colourful now. I hope to inspire people to take their The highs are higher and the lows are power back and learn how to say no. lower. I love it. I used to feel unsettled about the fact that we didn’t have ‘one What’s the reaction been like to the four sound’, but we’ve just totally embraced songs you’ve released so far? Is it what the polarities in our lives and in our you were expecting? music and for that reason I think this It’s been a passionate response. And I record is more exciting. say that because of course it has been quite mixed but that’s exciting to us and Is it difficult to balance the new material I think it means we’re doing something with the older tracks or do you still get a right. The point we made when we thrill from playing the ‘classics’? were making this record was to do it on I think playing the older material is our terms; and when you start making actually more enjoyable for us now decisions based on your happiness and because of the nostalgic attachment to your standards and not those of others, it. We’re finding that when we headline, not everyone will be satisfied. With our singles are taking on new meaning our age and experience we’re far more and each song really plays a different inspired by risk and intuition in music role in the set for the first time. When we and we totally stand by everything we started rehearsing for the Limitless world did. tour I was really happy to discover all the songs complementing each other so well. And as the release date of the album draws closer, how are you feeling about At what point in the writing/recording for ‘Limitless’? ‘Limitless’ did you start thinking about I’m ready now. I worked my ass off the live show or do you treat them as two writing and recording this album, now I separate entities? want to go and live it. P I find with our music, the show really follows the songs rather than the songs following the show. Certain tracks were kind of screaming to be played live and had a more obvious rock tone to them, but with the nature of the song writing ES style for ‘Limitless’ which was really T O U R D AT about removing any concept of borders or boundaries in our sound, we had FEBRUARY rum to adapt to the songs and relearn our ntish Town Fo 18 London Ke z instruments to suit them. Rit r ste he nc 19 Ma University 20 Newcastle What do you hope people take away C 21 Glasgow AB ntre from a Tonight Alive show? h Pyramids Ce 23 Portsmout I hope people leave our show at the y em ad Ac ol 24 Brist end of the night in a renewed and m Institute 26 Birmingha empowered state of mind. The last thing I could ever want for our fans is to return
TONIGHT ALIVE
HOW DOES IT FEEL?
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ABOU T TO
BREAK
THE BEST NEW BANDS TH E H OT TEST NEW MUSIC
THE
DIRTY NIL
“WE DON’T TA K E O U RS E LV ES TO O S E RI O U S LY. ”
C A N A D I A N T R I O T H E D I R T Y N I L A R E M A K I N G W AV E S W I T H T H E I R S N O T T Y R O C K ’ N ’ R O L L S O N G S . W O R D S : H E AT H E R M C D A I D . P H O T O : P H I L S M I T H I E S .
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he Dirty Nil are a band who find themselves falling under many labels - punk, garage rock, or even grunge at times - there’s definitely hat tips to all of them, but what underlies it all is a “snotty” rock’n’roll approach that packs all their songs with a demand piercing through your speakers or headphones - one that you must pay attention. Their live prowess is wild, and it’s been channelled into album ‘Higher Power’, cranking it up as far as it can go. Luckily, the Canadian trio have come from a thriving music scene in Hamilton, Ontario. “There’s a lot of fantastic bands in and around there,” begins Luke Bentham, vocalist and guitarist. “About 45 minutes up the road you have got Toronto too, so there’s some excellent bands up there. There’s a lot of fantastic music, and there’s a lot of mutual support.” The rock’n’roll snark that pushes through is something that binds them all together in influence. “We definitely got together as a band around late-1960s, early 1970s rock music. We have all gone off in all different directions when exploring other types of music but that’s central to the DNA of our band.” Their years so far have seen them release 7”s, and even cassettes, keeping tangible music at the core of what they create. “I think that is kind of paramount in the
FACT FILE Band members: Luke Bentham (guitar/vocals), Kyle Fisher (drums), and Dave Nardi (bass/ vocals) Hometown: Dundas, Ontario (Canada) Formed: 2006, while still in high school Signed To: Dine Alone Records
philosophy of our band,” notes Luke. “Dave Nardi, our bass player, has been the talent of all of our packaging, all of our artwork and our merchandise. He’s really big into vinyl. It’s important to have something you can hold and look at; that’s kind of central to my enjoyment of music, at least.” If we’re talking about enjoyment of music, little can compare to an album that makes you want to listen, that feels like time well spent. Their debut ‘Higher Power’ is one such record, unrelenting and just downright fun. “We had a series of conversations of what we want to do and what we wanted to present, what was going to be our first fulllength album,” he says. “We wanted a more amped up version of us playing live on our best night. “We took a couple songs from our earlier 7” and our 10”, we wanted a very cohesive group of songs that flowed well together. It was definitely a conscious assembly of songs rather than, ‘hey, I’ve got a bunch of ideas, let’s just go record them and see how they fit together’. We definitely put some thought into how we wanted to sound and how we wanted to flow.” Their full-length album is a step up to try something bigger, a fuller vision of what they’re all about: as a statement of intent for The Dirty Nil, what does it say? “It’s a pretty snotty declaration of supremacy. We don’t take ourselves too seriously but we wanted to make a pretty aggressive rock’n’roll record. ‘It’s higher power than your band’.” So you’ve got an album ready to unleash into the world, you’ve just played your first UK dates with more planned as part of a hopefully relentless touring schedule, what else does 2016 hold for the band? “Volume, stars, anger and just a good rock’n’roll show. Come have some fun.” P The Dirty Nil’s debut album ‘Higher Power’ will be released on 26th February.
SO PITTED
SO P I T T E D A RE W E I RD, W I L D, LO U D A N D U N FO RG I V I N G . T H E S E AT T L E P U N K T RI O A RE S ET TO RE L E AS E T H E I R D E BU T ‘ N EO’ . J E A N N I N E KOW E L E R , W H O P L AYS G U I TA R T H RO U G H A BASS A M P, TO O K O N SO M E Q U I C K F I RE Q U EST I O N S . WO RDS : H E AT H E R M C DA I D.
How would you describe So Pitted? Loud. How does role-shifting in the band impact your sound? We can’t be anyone but ourselves. How did you approach ‘neo’? Yolo. How much of an indication is ‘rot in hell’ of what the rest of the album holds? Think the singles hold pretty true to the rest of the album. What are the main themes? Mushroom trips. Give us some deets on one or two songs... ‘chop down that tree’ is a sick ass song, there’s a remix that sounds like it should be used in a chase scene from that movie ‘Go’. ‘feed me’ makes me feel like my spirit animal - the sullen brooding teenager. How was playing a few dates with Bully and METZ? Great fun. Bully and METZ can really put on a show! All of So Pitted had the flu though. What should fans expect from you in 2016? So Pitted is comprised of three wild cards, J9 is very moody and you definitely can’t hold her to anything! Anything to add? Hold on to your butts. P 15
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WITH ‘DEATH OF A BACHELOR’, PANIC! AT THE DISCO’S BRENDON URIE HAS EMBRACED HIS CRAZY G ENIUS AND COME UP WITH A MASTERPIECE. WORDS : A LI SHUTLE R . PH OTOS : E MMA SWANN.
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anic! At The Disco’s debut album ‘A Fever You Can’t Sweat Out’ was written in a Las Vegas practice space by four kids who knew very little about music but adored it all the same. Surrounded by “shitty nu-metal bands” that sounded exactly the same, the fledgling Panic! were pushed into doing something different. Teenage rebellion or artistic desire for identity, the band wielded a “let’s just do whatever the fuck,” mentality because “we don’t want to sound like these guys.” Two million records later and the rest is history. It’s Brendon Urie’s history to be precise. Now the sole member of Panic!, it’s his decade of memories at the eye of the storm that provide the catalyst for his latest and greatest adventure, ‘Death Of A Bachelor’. Five albums in and Panic! At The Disco are still doing whatever the fuck they want. It’s the Monday morning of release week and he’s in a west London studio. As people set up spotlights, steam suit jackets and compare schedules for the day, Brendon Urie walks over to a beat up piano nestled in the corner, lifts the lids and fingers the keys. A few cautionary notes later and he removes his jacket, pulls up a chair and begins to play. He isn’t practicing or showing off, it’s far more playful than that. It’s almost like he’s reconnecting with an old friend. During the photo shoot, he’ll sing along to a mixture of David Bowie and Kanye West, familiar and at ease with both - except for ‘Stronger’, he skips that track citing it as his least favourite of Ye’s work. Moving upstairs, drinks are poured (just water) and he finds an acoustic guitar and
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gets acquainted. “If I hear something I like, I don’t necessarily want to copy it or do the exact opposite, I just want to do what I want to do,” ventures Brendon. “A lot of the time though, that does ends up being different,” he adds with a smirk. Panic! have never repeated themselves or echoed anyone else, but it’s on ‘Death Of A Bachelor’ that their freedom rages with unhinged joy. Written across a three-month period almost immediately after the release of ‘Hallelujah’, Brendon wasn’t out to sculpt a cohesive body of work. “I was just writing songs. I wanted to write a Sinatra song, a Queen song. I wanted to write a rock party song, so it was this mishmash of different ideas that somehow ended up on the same album,” he laughs. “Every song is so weird from each other but I love that.” Going into the process with a handful of thirty-second ideas that “weren’t even demos, just little hooks” and the occasional verse, nothing was fully formed until he sat down “to just write random songs for an album.” It wasn’t until the eleven tracks that make up ‘Death Of A Bachelor’ were complete, that Brendon could step back and see the arching theme that tied everything together. The journey that Panic! At The Disco have been on and their constant, defiant victory. The experiments are just how Brendon goes about writing. “It’s mostly just to see if I can do something that I haven’t before, which is fun. I’d just gotten a piano in the house. It’s this old sixties Yamaha and I’m just in love with it so I was playing with it all the time.
Playing piano kinda put me in the mood to do Sinatra stuff, so half the songs were written like that, on piano, and half were written on guitar.” The ball for ‘Death Of A Bachelor’ only started rolling once their record label, having heard ‘Hallelujah’ and deciding to release it the following week, told Brendon to write the album. “I’ve always been writing, it was just the first song finished,” he explains of the decision to share that track. “That definitely kicked my ass into gear. I love [doing music], I just need a little push. It helps to have people backing you, saying ‘you can do this, just show up and do the work’, which is awesome but yeah, I could just write all day. That push gave me that one-track mind to finish an album, which is good. I’m glad I did it.”
T .
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he ease in which the songs were written varied as much as the end results sounded. “Easy is a tough word because some songs sneeze out, metaphorically speaking. They just happen,” like ‘Impossible Year’ which was written in the moment where “everything comes to a head and seems all too overwhelming. Others, I definitely had to work for. I had an idea for ‘The Good, The Bad and The Dirty’ but I didn’t have it fully formed. I knew I wanted to go in a certain
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TO M O
RROW NEVER
DIES AS T H EY H I T T H E I R TE N TH A N N I V E RSA RY, BU RY TO M O RROW F I N D T H E M S E LV ES AT A TI P P I N G P O I N T. WO R DS : H E AT H E R M C DA I D.
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“ T H E M US I C I N D UST RY I S D U C K E D.”
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“ M 8. T H AT ’S C L E A RLY A G O OS E .”
I N 2010, Y U C K FO U N D TH E M S E LV ES AT T H E P I N N AC L E O F H Y P E , TO UTE D AS O N E O F B R I TA I N ’S B EST A N D B RI G HT EST N E W BA N DS . F I V E Y E A RS A N D TH RE E A L BU M S L AT E R , IT H AS N ’ T A LWAYS B E E N A S M O OTH RI D E . WO R DS : J ESS I CA G O O D M A N .
swim when you’re
winning.
t
F R O M T H E I R A P P R E C I AT I O N O F P O P C U LT U R E , T O T H E I R S U P P O R T O F SOCIAL ISSUES: FEW BANDS ARE AS CLUED UP AS SWMRS.
WORDS: AL I SHUTL ER . PHOTOS : A LI C E BA X LEY. he first proper look at SWMRS came with ‘Miley’. The debut cut from ‘Drive North’ celebrates Miley Cyrus as a “punk rock queen” after Cole Becker saw her, alongside Laura Jane Grace, covering The Replacements’ ‘Androgynous’ for her Happy Hippie Foundation. “It was crazy,” he says. “I used to watch her doing dumb TV shows and now she’s covering one of my favourite songs and she donated all the money to homeless LGBT relief. “ “It’s one of those things where it’s not necessarily about adoration as much as it’s an examination,” he ventures, furthering the statement the band made following the track’s release: “Our song ‘Miley’ is not intended as a sweeping intersectional feminist statement and in no way reflects an alignment with the more problematic things that Miley says.”
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“She’s constantly piquing our interest. She went from that to somehow offending the whole world in a day and still manages to play sold out shows, y’know. She’s not really a punk rocker but neither are we. She’s doing what she wants and that’s something that speaks to us.” In a previous life Miley Cyrus was Disney child-star Hannah Montana but she’s not the only one with a colourful past. In a parallel story, SWMRS used to be known as Emily’s Army. Formed in 2004 by Cole Becker and Joey Armstrong after watching School Of Rock, the pair recruited Cole’s brother Max and the band was born. Two albums - 2011’s ‘Don’t Be A Dick’ and 2013’s ‘Lost At Seventeen’ - a string of EPs and a couple of summers on the US Warped Tour followed, alongside an appearance at Reading & Leeds that saw the band spend more time signing and taking pictures with a mob of fans next to the Pit stage than they did playing on it. With Green Day’s Billie Joe Armstrong producing all their records (as well as being their drummer’s dad), you could already tell where this story was going. However, the band weren’t interested in manufactured fairytales and pulled away. Despite the different spheres of influence, there are similarities between the evolution of Miley Cyrus and the evolution of SWMRS. “Both of us went through a transition of being young and not really grasping the breadth of the business we
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The
Ghost he in t
Machine
“I
THREE ALBUMS IN, AND G HOST’S R U N AWAY S U C C E S S S H O W S N O SIG NS OF SLOWING DOWN. WO RDS : A L I S H U T L E R . P H OTOS : SA R A H LO U I S E B E N N ET T
mage is very important to everyone,” starts one of Ghost’s Nameless Ghouls. “Even the artist who doesn’t have an image has an image. Adele has an image. In the indie world especially, people think that bands are so great because they don’t even want to be stars,” he explains before lowering his voice to a whisper and leaning across. “If they didn’t want to be stars, they wouldn’t stand on stage.” Later tonight Ghost will take to the stage of KOKO, in London, for a long sold out show. It’s their final live date of a year that’s seen them nominated for a Grammy, release their best and most successful album yet and seen them properly crossover from being a big fish in the world of metal to being a mainstream concern. They tread the boards knowing they’re stars. The band have already announced, and sold out, their next London show
and plans are already afoot for the one after that. “Image is very important,” the Ghoul repeats before asking why people like bands that dress in everyday clothes. “It’s because they look like you. It’s because you feel you can grab onto them and what they’re doing,” he ventures. “It’s one of the reasons we end up in the limbo. Nobody dresses like we do.” Ghost use their individuality to their advantage though. At the moment they’re sat backstage and, even though doors won’t open for a good few hours, there’s a queue of people standing outside in the miserable winter weather. We’re not talking a straggling group of enthusiasts and bad-timekeepers. We’re talking a mass stretching around the building. Ghost aren’t your typical heavy metal band. Formed in 2008, the group remains anonymous despite demanding more attention with every release. Rumours suggest that Dave Grohl once dressed up and performed with the band, but that’s neither here nor there. The five Nameless Ghouls and current vocalist Papa Emeritus III (the younger brother of previous vocalist 47
RATED CREEPER THE STRANGER
Roadrunner Records
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WITH ANOTHER KILLER EP UNDER THEIR BELTS, THE UK ROCK SCENE’S NEW BRIGHTEST HOPES ARE SET UP PERFECTLY FOR A DEBUT ALBUM TO RULE THEM ALL
‘T
he Callous Heart’ was a glorious record of escape. It saw Creeper throw out an invitation to join their gang with big songs about bigger unity and, well, it was hard to say no. ‘The Stranger’, a sequel in-kind, deals with the aftermath. Opening with the mournful procession of ‘The Secret Society’, the band soon launch into sky-high chants of “because we’re young” alongside admissions that “The Callous Heart rose and fell,” and “we don’t feel anything”. Front to the back, Creeper are building something new. From the sleeping beauty of ‘Black Mass’ through the open-book confession of ‘Misery’ until the final defeated moments of ‘Astral Projections’, ‘The Stranger’ cuts deeper, is darker and more striking that anything
the band have gone near before. It’s in those shadows that Creeper flourish. The record may deal in defeat but ‘The Stranger’ is nothing but a triumph. In previous outings, Creeper has led the way in forward motion but with ‘The Stranger’, there are more echoes than commands. Instead of short, sharp bursts of inspiration; this record allows the band to paint their narrative across five distinctive but cohesive chapters. Rather than just messages to relate to, ‘The Stranger’ truly represents a world to get lost in. Seeped in wistful romance, the record is a rose-tinted look at the past from the solitude of the gloom. There’s a sense of closure to ‘The Stranger’: Loves lost and found. However, in amongst the misery, the paralysis and the lows, there’s a glimmering sense of hope. An allin-this-together mentality that sees Creeper take their stock and trade of unifying anthems and cut them with brand new ideas and grander vision. ‘The Stranger’ is a collage of punk ideals, childlike wonder and grim fairytales. The pieces that make up the puzzle are glorious and intricate, held together with passion and good intentions. Taking a step back to see the sprawling horizon though and it’s clear that Creeper are looking at a much bigger picture. This is for forever; kept safe in that half dreaming space. Ali Shutler
TRACK BY TRACK
WILL GOULD CREEPER
THE SECRET SOCIETY
This is the first song we’ve ever written like this. We felt the need for a really good introduction song, as our last two records have relied simply on guitar and vocal to open them. Originally I wanted this to sound like the Arcade Fire song ‘Wake Up’. What actually happened was we took that idea and applied some of our hardcore punk sensibilities. There’s influence from AFI here too, but new ideas also from Hannah on the organ and influence from Jim Steinman in the section before. Overall this sets a tone for the journey you’re about to go on.
VALENTINE
Again a first for our band, this is a type of song that was a little out of our comfort zone until now. Ian wrote this riff that reminded me a little of The Nerve Agents and we built around it. As the vocal comes in so strong on the song before, we intentionally started it on a dynamic here. Again the chorus for this song was a departure for us, I wanted it to sound like REM. Poppy but not patronisingly so, the way all good pop songs are. ‘I’ve been low. I hate to tell you, but what the hell can I do?’ is maybe one of the most frank lines I’ve written for the band. I wanted this chorus to be an upfront confession, in contrast to the sweeping metaphors of the verse. This was one of my favourites to record.
BLACK MASS
This is one of my favourite Creeper songs, because I think it’s a good 51