EDITOR’S NOTE upsetmagazine.com Editor: Stephen Ackroyd (stephen@upsetmagazine.com) Deputy Editor: Victoria Sinden (viki@upsetmagazine.com) Assistant Editor: Ali Shutler (ali@upsetmagazine.com) Contributors: Danny Randon, Christopher Jones, Emma Swann, Jade Esson, Jasleen Dhindsa, Heather McDaid, Sam Taylor, Sarah Louise Bennett, Steven Loftin All material copyright (c). All rights reserved. This publication may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form, in whole or in part, without the express written permission of The Bunker Publishing Ltd. The opinions of the contributors do not necessarily bear a relation to those of Upset or its staff and we disclaim liability for those impressions. Distributed nationally. P U B L I S H E D F RO M
THE BUNKER W E LCO M E TOT H E B U N K E R.CO M
IN THIS ISSUE... RIOT!
28 SAD13
4 C RE E P E R
30 SLEIG H BELLS
8 T I G E RC U B
34 BALANCE & COMPOSURE
10 COUNTERPARTS 12 THE FRONT BOTTOMS 14 EMAROSA 15 U PS ET RE A D E RS P O L L 201
ABOUT TO BREAK
36 WATERPARKS 40 RAY TORO 42 ‘THE DEVIL AND GOD...’ IS TEN
RATED 44 FRANK IERO 45 ST EV E N BAT T E L L E
16 PETROL G IRLS
46 YO U B L E W I T !
18 NERVUS
48 T R A C K S O F T H E MONTH
19 ITOLDYOUI WOULDEATYOU
FEATURES
VS THE INTERNET
20 FRANK IERO
50 YOUNG GUNS
While working on this issue, news broke of a serious accident in Australia that left this month’s cover star Frank Iero and his band forced to cancel their live dates for the rest of the year. Besides the obvious personal trauma, it may have come at the worst possible point for Frank, right before the release of his new record - but you can be sure it won’t hold him back. After all, ‘Parachutes’ is one hell of an album. He’s not the only former MCR member active this month, either. Elsewhere this issue we chat with Ray Toro, who’s finally dropping his debut. Flip over the page and you can start to get excited about Creeper’s first fulllength too. Never a dull moment. x
S
RIOT ING IN ROCK E V E RY T H I N G H A P P E N
“IT TOOK US FUCKING AGES.” ING. WILL GOULD EXPLAINS ALL. C R E E P E R ’ S D E B U T A L B U M I S F I N A L LY C O M WORDS: ALI SHUTLER.
Y
esterday, Creeper’s guitarist Ian Miles text Will Gould to let him know he’d got some of his lyrics tattooed on him. “I thought they’d be Creeper lyrics but they’re from [our old band] Our Time Down Here,” explains Will. “It’s a line that says: ‘To live this way despite all that they say, means more to me than anything’. Or something like that, it was written a long time ago. He got it on him because of adopting this way of life, focusing purely on what you want to be doing with your life and your dreams versus the crippling realities of the real world. That’s a big theme on this record alongside questions about belief, what you believe in and the choices that you make.” After months of hushed whispers, intrigue and a swelling mass of anticipation, Creeper have announced that their debut album ‘Eternity, In Your Arms’ is finished and will be with us early next year. To say we’re expecting great things is a gross understatement but if it feels like you’ve been waiting an age for it, it’s guaranteed Creeper have been waiting longer. Creeper, at their very core, are storytellers. They simply can’t help it and the tale of ‘Eternity, In Your Arms’ has been amassing in the shadows for a while now. “We’ve been drip-feeding the story really slowly,” explains Will. Everything so far has been a way of setting up for an album. “I knew the sound needed to mature before we got to it, but I had the concept laid out in my head.” As soon as the band found out Roadrunner would definitely be taking the album, Will went for a drink with them to lay out his plan. Sat at Camden’s The Black Heart he pulled out three Disney Tsum Tsums (hamster sized soft toys) and put them on the table. First came Peter Pan to represent ‘The Callous Heart’ and its lost boys. Then came Tick Tock the Crocodile to represent ‘The Stranger’, before Will placed Captain Hook atop them both, creating a cuddly pyramid to explain exactly what he wanted to do with the album. “This is the story we’ve been creating.” “The themes for the record were really apparent at the point when we finished ‘The Stranger’,” starts Will. “We’re introducing the James Scythe
RIOT
BOTTOMS U P!
W
hen their third full-length ‘Back On Top’ was released, The Front Bottoms didn’t quite realise the record they’d written would take their band to another level. “It was like the biggest thing production-wise we’d ever done,” explains frontman Brian Sella. “When we released our previous albums we had this punk rock attitude, like - this is as big as it can get. But it got bigger, and now more people are coming out to shows.
12 upsetmagazine.com
G E T R E A DY, T H E F R O N T BOT TO M S A RE A B O U T T O S TA G E A U K I N VA S I O N . WORDS: JADE ESSON .
“It’s been a really gradual growth for The Front Bottoms, it’s more about the long term plan of being able to make music forever. I think as a band we’ve all kinda matured, not only personally but as musicians, and I think definitely as artists.”
wacky like that,” says Brian. “GDP is a buddy too so it was cool to go on tour together, he did a lot of video stuff for us when he came out on the road too so it was fun.”
This album also saw the band experimenting with collaboration. Having released a split 7” for Record Store Day 2015 with New Jersey-based rapper GDP, they continued to work with him on ‘Back On Top’ where he provides a verse on ‘Historic Cemetery’ - the band even took him along during their UK tour in February, to perform the track.
“Our relationship with the UK is extremely positive,” he continues. “The first couple of tours were really DIY tours - playing in basements, sleeping on peoples floors. We went from playing in front of literally nobody in a foreign country to now being able to go back after years - probably about six years at this point - and being able to play in front of a substantial amount of people. It’s incredibly rewarding.”
“It’s good to do something a little bit
“It’s also getting to go and see a whole
on the guest list, so they follow the band but they are friends. “It’s weird - I never thought I would have friendships with totally random people just because they like to come see our band play. I couldn’t be happier about it, and I’m proud. We definitely have a weird appeal that brings people together. I couldn’t have planned it that way but it’s awesome. That really came together in the UK.”
“ W E H AV E A WEIRD APPEAL T H AT B R I N G S PEOPLE TO G ETH E R.” other family that I haven’t gotten to see in a couple of months. It’s something that’s grown each time we’ve gone over there. I’m very happy and proud about The Front Bottoms and the crew in the UK, and getting to come back and rock’n’roll and party with you guys.” The band even has a gang of dedicated fans who follow them throughout their time in the UK. “People that come to our shows, make friends there and come see our band together, I know them. They’re people I’ve met and put
They’re bringing some of their favourite British acts out on the road with them this November, in the form of Gnarwolves and Apologies, I Have None. “We’ve been friends with Gnarwolves for a while now, we’ve stayed at their house, just kinda being punk rock boys. We needed a place to sleep, someone told us there’s this band that has an apartment we should try to get in touch with them and next thing we’re sleeping there, hanging out and eating pizza,” Brian laughs. “We had this insane getting to know each other experience with Apologies, I Have None when we toured Australia with them and The Smith Street Band. We’re going for a good vibe on this tour!” The next tour is set to be bigger and better than any previous. “We always try to keep it funky. We’ve got a living room vibe on the current Brand New tour. We put a couch on stage and we’ll have a friend sit on the couch, and a bunch of
lamps set up on the stage. “The venues we’re playing with Brand New are so enormous it’s easy to get lost, so the whole kind of vibe we wanted was for it to feel like watching this band play in your parents’ living room with your friend sitting on the couch drinking a beer. So we’re trying to keep that style going on the next UK tour - but I may have a crazy dream and then I’ll have to bring five inflatable dancing guys with me. We’ll see what happens.” After the tour the band have some time off for Christmas before heading back to Australia for another string of live dates. Once they’re home, they’re going to be gearing up for album number four. “I feel pretty prepared in terms of material to start with. I have a lot of time on this tour so I got into the habit of writing little poems or playing some guitar so that when it does come time to actually put the stuff on tape, it won’t be a flustering experience. It’ll be smooth, like ‘Here’s my rock’n’roll hits!’” laughs Brian. There’s absolutely no stopping The Front Bottoms once they’ve set their minds to something, it seems. What else could they be up to? Brian modestly reveals that he’s also been working on a book. “I want to do more story based work. I’m gonna try and keep it creative so that all those things can be incorporated into The Front Bottoms. “I had my little sister edit it - check for spelling, that kinda thing. It was like 500 pages and she gives it back to me with 400 pages cut out! But it’s good to have good editors in your life. That should be the last thing I say - it’s important to have good creative editors in your life so that you don’t release a 500 page book about nothing.” P
The Front Bottoms will play... NOVEMBER 19 Dublin, Academy 20 Nottingham, Rock City 21 Glasgow, O2 ABC 22 Manchester, O2 Ritz 23 Birmingham, O2 Institute 25 Newcastle, Northumbria University 26 Leeds, Beckett SU 28 Bristol, Anson Rooms 29 Southampton, 1865
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ABOUT
THE BEST
B R EAK
TH E H OT TEST
TO
NEW BANDS NEW MUSIC
Petrol Girls With their raucous, explosive and provocative debut, Petrol Girls have arrived. WORDS: HEATHER MCDAID.
D
o you want to or just appear to? Do you wanna be or be seen? Petrol Girls ask exactly that as their debut album draws to a close, and it’s what they have to ask themselves at each step as they make music while advocating for a smashing of the status quo, for a complete overhaul and change. They challenge the listener to ask the same of themselves. “That is something that I think about so much,” admits singer Ren Aldridge. “Especially trying to be politically active and play in a political punk band. How far am I doing, like actually doing, political action? And how far is it just performed? This is a question that all of us that are politically active in the social media age need to think about. It’s like looking both ways - this idea of looking inwards at yourself and what your motivations are as well as outwards at the bigger picture.” Their debut ‘Talk of Violence’ is on one hand performing feminism and politics - it in fact does so incredibly well. They’re aptly violent, raucous and taking no prisoners as they decry many issues of today’s society - but it goes far beyond a statement for statement’s sake. Take ‘Touch Me Again’ as an example. Tackling consent and sexual assault with a bloody fury, the song ends with Ren yelling – genuine throatshreddingly yelling – “Touch me again and I’ll fucking kill you” repeatedly, with no backing. It’s not an aggressive sound-bite for an album – it’s daring you to look away and try ignore the implications.“ When we began Petrol Girls, it was a critical moment amongst our small section of friends and the music community,” she explains. “I was personally experiencing a lot where I was finally talking about assault, sexual assaults that I’d experienced and people were listening and not telling me to shut up about it. “We started to speak more about consent on stage firstly to hope that we could put across this idea, ‘Look, don’t have sex with people when they’re unconscious’ and basic shit because, actually, no one teaches you that. That’s not explicitly taught in sex education. But it was also to reach out to people who had experience of that kind of stuff and say, ‘You’re not crazy, your experiences are true and we stand
“THERE’S C R A Z Y, CRAZY SHIT HAPPENING IN T H E W O R L D AT T H E M O M E N T. ”
with you’.” The album came to life surprisingly quickly. “It was pretty ambitious,” laughs Ren. “We just absolutely went for it, stuck the practices in really hard, wrote it in London and then we were still kind of finishing songs as we recorded it.” No time was wasted – many of the lyrics were improvised during recording and just worked. There was no pressure to be perfect. A lot of it came out on a subconscious level, and afterwards they could step back and take in exactly what the album was about. “I hold quite strong political beliefs that I wouldn’t be able to keep out of it even if I tried,” says Ren, on the influences and issues that seeped into their debut. “When we were writing, I’d just come back from spending quite a lot of time in Calais, and when we recorded it I’d just come back from a conference in Hamberg that was run by refugees. I think being involved in that and also looking at all the other crazy, crazy shit happening in the world at the moment… I’m not going to pretend to be super articulate or have any answers, but this was about expressing all of those thoughts, putting them together, being able to take a step back from it and look at it and realising, ‘Okay, these things do connect’.” And they do. ‘Talk of Violence’ is a game changer, a furious, targeted game changer. It’s the embodiment of the power art and music can have against a hell of a messed up world. “My idea of what a revolution is and can be has really changed a lot over the years,” says Ren. “I hope that this idea of national identity starts to dissolve because at the moment it’s solidifying and it’s literally part of what’s creating walls both metaphorical and physical all across the world. I always think some really cool stuff is happening in terms of the gender binary. It’s not
WSTR’S DEBUT WILL LAND IN JANUARY WSTR have pencilled in a release date for their debut album, ‘Red, Green or Inbetween’ – it’s set to land on 20th January via No Sleep Records.
WEIRDS SIGN TO ALCOPOP There are two exciting bits of news from the Weirds camp: the first is that they’ve signed to Alcopop! Records; and the second is that they’ve new plans underfoot - watch this space.
VANT ANNOUNCE ALBUM FOR FEBRUARY Vant’s debut album ‘Dumb Blood’ is due on 17th February. Check out new track ‘Peace & Love’ now on upsetmagazine.com.
smashing – it would be great if it just smashed – but it is starting to blur and it is starting to dissolve, and the way that we’re thinking about masculinity and femininity is shifting. Ultimately, I want the white supremacist capitalist patriarchy to burn, but I think it’s going to be more of a dissolving…” In the course of revolution, the question of whether you do or appear to is never far off. Based on their debut, Petrol Girls aren’t a statement, they’re a fucking movement. P Petrol Girls’ album ‘Talk of Violence’ is out 18th November. 17
H AV E
A
LITTL E
PATIENCE The second solo album from Frank Iero, ‘Parachutes’ is one of the best of 2016 - the product of a lengthy career that’s already had more high points than most could dream of. It’s a special time. WORDS: ALI SHUTLER. PHOTOS: EMMA SWANN
“I
have no monogamy towards genres of music. I need to have variety. I need to have that change,” starts Frank Iero. He’s counting the tattooed marks on his wrist that commemorate every record he’s ever released. He might have no idea about the number of bands he’s been a part of but the eight lines keep track of the bodies of work. He’s two short though. Death Spells’ debut makes nine and his second solo album, ‘Parachutes’ is number ten. He stops for a moment and lets
that sink in before his face breaks out in a grin. “Isn’t that crazy,” he asks to no one in particular. When he was a young boy, Frank’s father told him to avoid music. “Please don’t do this. Do anything else,” he pleaded - but it was too late. Frank’s mind was made up. Growing up in a household with both his father and grandfather playing gigs, he didn’t stand a chance. “They were my gods and seeing them play, it’s what I wanted to do. I didn’t give a shit about sports, about anything else, I just wanted to be in a band. They had these huge date books that they would go through and talk about gigs they’d played, how they drove here and travelled there. It’s this secret society and it’s fucking awesome. It’s a unique thing. You ask anyone, they want to be in music because it’s so cool. People want to be backstage and backstage sucks, there’s nothing there but it’s unknown. The allure of it was too much for me. When I got to do it, when I got to be onstage and play music and see how it affected people, oh fuck. I got bit by that bug so quick, I was done. There’s no stopping it.” He’s been in pursuit ever since. Never standing still, never covering old ground, he’s slowly built a legacy of change across each and every project. It’s with The Patience, the second incarnation of his solo project, that he’s really come into his own though. “I didn’t think a record this important to me would come along right now and so,
I want to give it everything I’ve got because it’s important enough and deserves it.”
F
rank Iero is the sort of musician who describes songs as soul mates, who never throws away an idea and let’s the music rule by selfdetermination. Every song needs to tell a story and every record needs a beginning, middle and an end. Self-aware and conscience of those around him, he pours himself into everything he does. Not only does he know first hand how music can save, but he can see a photographer’s unspoken want to include a mannequin in a photo shoot [Don’t ask - Ed]. He’ll even go and get it himself. His commitment to a single genre might not exist but his adoration for music is absolute. “For a very long time I was convinced I had real life me and music and art was just something that I did. It took me a fucking long time to figure out that those things are so interconnected. Music and art is so embedded in my DNA that it’s not just something I do, it is who I am. I tried and I fought so hard against it. I clawed and fought against it because it’s terrible. It’s so gut-wrenching, heartbreakingly terrible and wonderful at the same time.” Frank lives for music and he’s pretty certain that, one day, it’s going to be the death of him.
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“ M U S I C AND A RT IS EMBEDDED IN MY DNA; IT’S N OT J UST SOMETHING I
IT’S WHO I AM.”
D O,
22 upsetmagazine.com
Two years ago, Frank Iero released his debut solo record with The Cellabration. A shredded, voyeuristic album that was written in a basement, it saw Frank letting go and was never intended to be shared. The next few years saw Frank slowly grow into his new role as the frontman as the ball started rolling. Despite the pace, when he was asked if there was a future to it, he wasn’t sure. It all felt temporary, transient, almost reluctant. For ages it seemed that he might call time on music at any moment. Even as Frank was looking towards an album two backstage at 2015’s Reading Festival, it wasn’t a sure thing. It’s funny how things change. ‘Parachutes’ feels eternal. It sees Frank Iero embrace and accept. If it feels special, it’s because it is. “This is one of those records where you put so much into it, it drives you to the brink to actually make it,” explains Frank. “As soon as you’re done, you feel so depleted you’re not sure about what you just did.” Once the seventeen days recording with Ross Robinson were over, “I knew it could either be the greatest thing I’ve ever done or he could have just thrown it away. I didn’t know but at the same time I was fine with either because the process was so important for my growth as a human being.” Now he’s had space from his creation, he knows which side of the fence it falls. “Honestly, this sounds silly but this record might be the thing I’m most proud of that I ever made. Maybe you think that about every new thing you make but this feels different. It feels really special. I remember with My Chem, when we were making ‘Black Parade’, it felt like maybe we were making something really special. I didn’t know why or what it was but it felt like we were doing something really great. I don’t know why, but I have that feeling again.” There’s not really a set blueprint for what makes a Frank Iero album. He’s never been one to retread or rehash but despite a rich history of change, ‘Parachutes’ manages to make different feel different. And that’s a deliberate stance. “It has to be. There’s no way I could do ‘Stomachaches’ again. I’m not in that place anymore and it’s
such an entirely different animal. I was scared that there was a fine line between being different to ‘Stomachaches’ and being drastically, crazily different. I didn’t want it to be too jarring but at the same time, these songs, they needed that energy.” Every single one of the quote-unquote finalised songs from ‘Parachutes’ was at least ten BPMs slower before they were recorded. In the studio though, it just felt right with more intensity. “You have to just go with it. You can’t fight against it.” Despite the scale of the record putting Frank Iero and The Patience in the same sonic arenas as Foo Fighters, Biffy Clyro et al, it’s never used to distract or hide. That honesty and the admission that came straight from his basement heart are dialled up just as proudly here. “I’ve never been part of a process where I’ve come out of it knowing I’m a different person now. There was a lot of personal growth and I’m extremely thankful for it. This record is very much about those experiences,” starts Frank. On it, world-altering (or destroying) conversations are happening in real time as outlooks are constantly challenged and reimagined. Even the sure-thing start of ‘World Destroyer’ changed. “As I was tracking the vocals I had the realisation that basically, the only things that you truly own are the things that you give to other people and how you interact with everyone. The things that happen to you are really happening for you. You’re not a slave to that. You’re better off because of it.” Alongside those experiences lay questions about “whether your weakness are really your strengths, and what is the definition of love versus manufactured love and is love and hate kinda the same emotion, just flipped on its head?” Those questions are still tapping at the twisting heart of the record. The confrontation and confusion is left ever present, “because it’s about the journey. The end result means nothing without the journey. If you just end up at the end, it’s fleeting. It’s not going to stick. There has to be a reason why you got to this point and what you had to go through to get there. It’s almost as
important as where you end up.” “Here’s the thing, and this goes back to Ross’ process, it’s impossible to be full of shit. He wont let you veil anything. He gets right to the core. If you don’t want to go deeper, he finds a way to open you up even more and in front of everyone. You become so fragile yet strong. It empowers you to be that honest. He calls it mental surgery and it truly is. We were there for 17 days, we did twelve songs in that time and every day was like this heart-wrenching fucking experience of finding out new things about yourself and the things that you’re writing. You’re crying and everyone around you is divulging these things that you never knew. Holy fuck. How can you not have an honest record after going through that? It’s fucking hard man, but if it were easy I guess everybody would do it.” “When I was younger,” starts Frank, before reassuring “this is related, trust me” - “When I was younger and in bands, I couldn’t be fucked to do vocal warm ups. That’s stupid. Later on, I found out that I had to do vocal warm ups, it’s just imperative. Hey, you want to get better? Do that, then. But you would feel embarrassed and you would hide. Now, I can do them in front of anyone and I don’t give a shit. This is what I do, this is my craft, fuck you if you think it’s weird. I’ll do it cabs, I’ll do them anywhere. It’s the same thing with opening up lyrically, at first you believe it’s stupid to care that much and then you start to really care. You want it to be honest and true and good. When you’re younger a line sounds cool but who cares what it means. Then you really want it to mean something, Then it gets to the point where you don’t want it to mean too much, you don’t want people to know too much about you - but eventually you get to the point where you realise, if I can’t be honest, how can I expect anyone else to be honest. You just try to do that without being cringe-worthy.”
F
rank Iero has always been in bands but each and every record that’s left its mark on his skin has seen him as sum of the part. ‘Parachutes’ sees him front, centre and driving.
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36 upsetmagazine.com
Waterparks &Recreation New band on the block Waterparks have friends in all the right places - but their debut album ‘Double Dare’ is decidedly their own. WORDS: DANNY RANDON. PHOTOS: JONATHAN WEINER & JAWN ROCHA
T
his time last year, Waterparks had barely played a show outside their home state of Texas. Fast forward to this summer, and they’re one of the hottest new names on Slam Dunk’s, Warped Tour’s and Reading & Leeds’ respective bills. The trio’s success in making waves at the transatlantic trinity of festivals has set a promising precedent for their debut album, ‘Double Dare’. That was mainly down to their syrupy-sweet pop-rock anthems, but in the case of Reading & Leeds and their recent jaunt opening for Good Charlotte, it was also hard to ignore the presence of a certain former bassist of My Chemical Romance by their side.
a benefit that Awsten, guitarist and vocalist Geoff Wigington and drummer Otto Wood have reaped with both enthusiasm and apprehension. Even as protégées of The Brothers Madden that have warmed up crowds for Aaron Carter, Never Shout Never and Sleeping With Sirens, Awsten stresses the importance of coming out on the band’s own merits with their first full-length record.
“IT’S ALMOST LIKE IF BRITNEY SPEARS HAD A BAND!”
“Having Mikey [Way] come and play bass on [Waterparks’ 2016 EP] ‘Cluster’ and then do those shows with us was great,” confesses the band’s bubblegum blue-haired singer, guitarist and programmer Awsten Knight. “We’ve always talked about different shows that he could come and do with us and we’ve both been like, ‘Yeah, that sounds sick!’, but we didn’t want to do it too soon.”
“We didn’t want it to seem like we were trying to use anyone’s popularity from other projects to forward ourselves,” says Awsten, speaking from the band’s rehearsal space back home in Houston. “That way the headlines, if there were ever to be one, would look like ‘Mikey Way plays with band’, as opposed to ‘Waterparks play with special guest Mikey Way’!
Having friends in high places is
“We didn’t want to do anything 37
RATED FRANK IERO AND THE PATIENCE
PARACHUTES
Hassle Records
eeeee
F
rank Iero has found his voice and he wants everyone to know. From the opening rampage of ‘World Destroyer’, him and his band waste no time in showing just how far they’ve come over the past couple of years. Every step into the unknown and every calming breath can be seen as ‘Parachutes’ charges through new ground. Gnarled around the edges but moving as an unstoppable force, the twelve tracks see the band ask questions and find answers, whether they want to or not. ‘I’m A Mess’ is an anthem of self-acceptance, ‘Remedy’ is an ode to being saved while ‘Viva Indifference’ celebrates the power of pain. Facing the darkness but never doing it alone, Frank offers a helping hand at every step. Even the gut-wrenching tribute to his Grandfather ‘9-6-15’ puts inspiration before everything. The more he opens up, the deeper you fall and on ‘Parachutes’, Frank isn’t holding anything back. Despite the sonic scale of the record putting The Patience comfortably in arena territory, it’s never used 44 upsetmagazine.com
to hide behind. Instead it’s used as a benchmark to turn everything up by the same degree. The louder the song, the more passionately Frank wants to tell you his darkest secrets. There’s a confidence to the admissions. There’s no shame, only acceptance as ‘Parachutes’ finally establishes Frank Iero as an artist who can truly do anything. Sure, the rage and noise is more grand and commanding than Frank has dared dial up in the past but it’s songs like ‘Miss Me’, a country-infused track about the idea of legacy and the morbid desire to find out how his kids will remember him after he’s died, that show off Frank’s smirking ability as master of all. Despite the many faces he shows, it’s never jarring. The twelve sided die tumbling under one true voice. Despite everything he’s done before, it’s this record that is Frank Iero’s finest moment. ‘Parachutes’ looks at the darkest moments and finds a reason to smile in each and every one. Ali Shutler
FANGCLUB
COMA HAPPY EP
Vertigo
eeee Irish rock music has a lineage to uphold, and Fangclub aren’t about to let that slide. Though they may not cast lazy comparisons to some of their compatriots, they’re certainly keeping the standards up. Their second EP only furthers their signature, direct, scuzzy guitar pop’s cause. ‘Dreamcatcher’ matches riffs with melody, while ‘Follow’ keeps the bar rising higher. There’s little doubt that, if considering brute force and infectious tunes, Fangclub have what it takes to make an impact. A band who can play to the most basic of desires, they may not be the most nourishing food for the brain, but they’ll move you everywhere else. Christopher Jones
TIGERCUB
ABSTRACT FIGURES IN THE DARK
Alcopop Records
eeee
A debut record rarely ever acts as a totally new introduction to a band. Defying the expected norm, ‘Abstract Figures In The Dark’ is like Tigercub have been reborn, not that they ever needed to be. A piece of art you don’t have to listen to in order to get its best picture, Tigercub excel in their ability to be menacingly heavy, soft and sensitive. Lyrically, the album is wise beyond its years, poetic both in lengthy terms or in the snappier tracks like ‘Serial Killer’, which is structured to perfection. ‘Abstract Figures In The Dark’ is - in short - spellbinding. Jasleen Dhindsa
A SHORT
STEVEN BATTELLE
EXIT BRAIN LEFT
Suffer For My Art
eee
It says a lot that Steven Battelle has a song named ‘Steven Battelle’ on his debut solo album; the former LostAlone frontman has always had a touch more belief than most. In the past there’s been more than a dash of selfindulgence to his music, but ‘Exit Brain Left’ is anything but. Over the top but with plenty of refrain, the songs dance on the right side of ridiculous. The majesty of the adventure shines through. Ali Shutler
H... Q&A WIT
STEVEN BATTELLE
MAN WHO S T E V E N B AT T L E I S A SIC; THE U M G N I AT E R C S E LOV TMAN E X - L O S TA L O N E F R O N YEAR T H A S S P E N T T H E PA S O HIS T N I F L E S THROWING HIM HICH W , D R O C E R O L O DEBUT S E IS NOW ON THE VERG OF RELEASE.
BALANCE & COMPOSURE
LIGHT WE MADE
Big Scary Monsters
eeee
The Balance And Composure that emerges on ‘Light We Made’, the band’s third record, is somewhat different to that which came before. Intense, atmospheric and understated, it’s a welcome shift, too. Lead single ‘Postcard’ shows it well - finding new ground in grooves and programmed beats. As an attempt to push their boundaries, it’s an undeniable success. Christopher Jones
SLEIGH BELLS
JESSICA RABBIT
Lucky Number
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Sleigh Bells come crashing back into view with the cutting electro jar of ‘It’s Just Us Now’. As reintroductions go, it’s full of intent and promise. What follows is the band at their weird and wonderful best as ‘Jessica Rabbit’, all bubblegum vengeance and neon dreams, sees the band letting go of all fear. Their confidence is all consuming and their conviction absolute as the duo throw their most outrageous party yet. Turns out you ain’t seen nothing yet. Ali Shutler
Hey Steven, what prompted you to start creating music solo? As soon as the decision was made to end the band a feeling of directionless fear overcame me. I booked a cheap flight to Geneva then took the train by the lake to Montreux (a trip I’ve now managed to do almost twenty times since 2008) and began what became this record. Many more trips alone either walking cities or sitting looking at mountains followed over this past year. How have you found it so far? Is there anything you’re especially enjoying? The main thing really is the lack of business interests to deal with. I LOVE this! The thing I miss is the camaraderie of getting in the bus and heading off on tour with the guys. You band mates and crew become a real family. Where did you look for inspiration for ‘Exit Brain Left’? I’m a relentless writer so songs were always being stockpiled for the record. I did however choose to make this record in a new way for me. I scheduled twelve individual weeks across 2015 with Dan Weller for recording and then took a trip the week before each recording week with the goal of writing the song which would be recorded
the following week. So other than Nine Miles of Light” and “the Jump” this is how I made the record. It’s fantastic to be able to associate a song with a specific week / trip. Was there a key moment when you felt the album was coming together? I very clearly remember sitting in the kitchen of a beautiful pink house in Hastings and myself and Dan Weller (producer) listening back to the song ‘Powers Of Denial’. It was a huge moment for me. Up until that point it was all in my head, I knew what I wanted to sound like but when I heard that song in its rough mix form I realised that I could make a record which would sound completely as I wanted and not just LostAlone part two. What are you most looking forward to about releasing this new album? I’ve really mixed feelings. Part of me feels sad that it will no longer be my thing, once it’s out that’s it it’s done for me and belongs to the listener. However I am really excited to get on recording my next record which I written and ready to go. I really hope the people listen to it on headphones in the dark and feel like they’re entering a world rather than just hearing music. P