Latest / HEAVY Music Interviews / Pushing Things To The Extreme With PAULA And NICK From KUNTSQUAD
Transcript
- 0:00Speaker 1: So I'm Paula from count Squad and Nick, Yeah, Nick.
- 0:08Speaker 2: From Come Squored from Come Squored.
- 0:11Speaker 1: Lead guitarist, new lead guitarist.
- 0:16Speaker 2: Yeah, because and you know me, I've been around forever.
- 0:20Speaker 3: Yeah, I could could anyone not know you guys, Thanks
- 0:22Speaker 3: for joining us, pleasure to speak with you.
- 0:25Speaker 2: Yeah, cheers, yeer cheers.
- 0:27Speaker 3: So God, I recently released your second album, Statan's Pox.
- 0:32Speaker 3: So how's the early reception been for it?
- 0:35Speaker 1: Quite positive? Got to say, it's been really well received.
- 0:38Speaker 1: I think people a bit uh surprised. I suppose that
- 0:43Speaker 1: it's how heavy it is, but yeah, like it's it's
- 0:48Speaker 1: been so fast, so good. Like we've not had any
- 0:50Speaker 1: sort of negative reviews actually, but one was a bit
- 0:55Speaker 1: interesting in the sense that I can't even remember that one.
- 0:58Speaker 1: But it again, yeah, overwhelmingly positive. So, you know, like
- 1:04Speaker 1: all the radio stations, particularly you know, PBS, Triple Are
- 1:07Speaker 1: and you know interstate overseas podcasts, like we've had a
- 1:11Speaker 1: fair bit of attention based on on the release or
- 1:15Speaker 1: since it's come out, a lot of streams and hits
- 1:17Speaker 1: on on Spotify and basically I think, you know, this
- 1:22Speaker 1: time round, the Americans have jumped on board, which is
- 1:26Speaker 1: really interesting because we didn't we didn't get much of
- 1:28Speaker 1: like American interest last time with the first release, but
- 1:32Speaker 1: this time it seems to be quite Yeah, it's like whatever,
- 1:36Speaker 1: it's it's touched something over there.
- 1:41Speaker 3: It was funny because I'm not dyslexic at all, but
- 1:43Speaker 3: while I was typing these questions up the amount of
- 1:45Speaker 3: times I put Sander's cock.
- 1:50Speaker 2: Sassin.
- 1:53Speaker 3: So tell us a bit more about the album. You've
- 1:54Speaker 3: sort of touched on the heaviness of it before, but
- 1:56Speaker 3: go to a bit more depth musically with the album.
- 1:58Speaker 2: What you're going for, Well, I think it was a
- 2:03Speaker 2: concerted effort.
- 2:04Speaker 1: We took a lot more time this time to actually
- 2:06Speaker 1: finish it, and to you know, when we started the recording,
- 2:09Speaker 1: which is probably two years more than two years now,
- 2:14Speaker 1: the intention was to like have do four songs. We
- 2:17Speaker 1: put four songs down and it sounded a lot crap
- 2:19Speaker 1: and we thought, no, I'm got to start again. And
- 2:21Speaker 1: then we had some dramas you know, our engineers had
- 2:24Speaker 1: some issues, Jason, So long story short, basically we started again.
- 2:28Speaker 2: We wrote some more songs down, tuned again.
- 2:32Speaker 1: And just to get it right because the last release
- 2:34Speaker 1: was a bit we weren't expecting a record deal, to
- 2:38Speaker 1: be honest, so it was done in a very rushed way.
- 2:40Speaker 1: So this time around we took a lot more time really,
- 2:43Speaker 1: you know, did a bit of a critical review and
- 2:46Speaker 1: you know where we were kind of going with it,
- 2:49Speaker 1: and just kind of solidified what we'd already been doing.
- 2:53Speaker 1: But it just needed to be more direct because not
- 2:57Speaker 1: everyone sort of got it. This time it was a
- 3:01Speaker 1: lot more sort of measured and how we did it.
- 3:05Speaker 3: So, yeah, nice, And today you've released a single, Satan's
- 3:09Speaker 3: Cold Gained Pschotropic Life. So if that's all someone's heard
- 3:12Speaker 3: of the album, is that a good sonic representation or
- 3:14Speaker 3: is it just such a service?
- 3:17Speaker 2: I think? What do you think?
- 3:19Speaker 4: Yeah? Pretty good songs. All the songs on the album
- 3:23Speaker 4: are good. Yeah, and they're they're all in the in
- 3:28Speaker 4: the same sort of attitude and style. So yeah, if
- 3:34Speaker 4: you like one, you're gonna like the rest.
- 3:36Speaker 2: Definitely.
- 3:37Speaker 1: Yeah, it's like I think, you know, it does those songs,
- 3:41Speaker 1: Satan's Cock's quite simple. Was there only one message in
- 3:44Speaker 1: that it's about consumerism?
- 3:45Speaker 2: Is that people didn't get it?
- 3:47Speaker 1: But which is really important to watch the video which
- 3:50Speaker 1: accompanies those songs when they're they're out, because it gives
- 3:53Speaker 1: you more clues as to what it's about. But in
- 3:55Speaker 1: terms of like the structure of that song, like Satan's
- 3:57Speaker 1: Cock itself, I mean the idea was derived through actually
- 4:02Speaker 1: Nick and I were hanging. Maybe you can tell the story, Nick,
- 4:04Speaker 1: but essentially it's it's also a comedy skip skip by
- 4:09Speaker 1: Bill Hicks, who's quite a darkment.
- 4:12Speaker 2: He was around, but he's passed away.
- 4:14Speaker 1: But a lot of the samples that we use in
- 4:17Speaker 1: the in the records basically you know from him, and yeah,
- 4:22Speaker 1: so we thought it was quite fitting because he kind
- 4:25Speaker 1: of represents what we actually feel in terms of.
- 4:29Speaker 2: That area anyway.
- 4:31Speaker 1: But apart from that, like you can see, I don't know,
- 4:34Speaker 1: if you've listened to it, you'll realize that there are
- 4:37Speaker 1: some things that have held true, and that is that
- 4:40Speaker 1: it's still quite crusty in the sense that the message
- 4:43Speaker 1: we deliver and that the construct of the songs are
- 4:46Speaker 1: very much that.
- 4:47Speaker 2: But sonically it's it's just death metal.
- 4:50Speaker 1: So it's it's you know, everything that it was before,
- 4:56Speaker 1: but taken to the next level and a little bit
- 4:58Speaker 1: more streamlines. Soy, yeah, those songs pretty much represent you know,
- 5:03Speaker 1: where we're heading in our evolution.
- 5:06Speaker 4: And even if you don't get it, like the message
- 5:09Speaker 4: is sort of like secondary. If you dig the music,
- 5:14Speaker 4: then keep the music. But yeah, it's not really you know,
- 5:19Speaker 4: huge on messages, but the messages that are there, you know,
- 5:23Speaker 4: sort of the stuff we stand boys.
- 5:27Speaker 3: Well you sort of touched on this a little bit,
- 5:29Speaker 3: but the press release says that one of the band's
- 5:32Speaker 3: poor ideologies used to ensure every release is different progression
- 5:36Speaker 3: from the previous.
- 5:37Speaker 2: So ye, you.
- 5:37Speaker 3: Elaborate on that and how you actually going about doing that?
- 5:40Speaker 1: Yeah, well, I think in terms of production, in terms
- 5:44Speaker 1: of the songwriting.
- 5:45Speaker 2: I like a challenge.
- 5:46Speaker 1: So I'm not one of the person that like sits
- 5:49Speaker 1: on their hands and go, oh, you know, we did that.
- 5:51Speaker 1: Last one was good and we should do more of
- 5:53Speaker 1: the same. I like to challenge myself. I like to
- 5:56Speaker 1: challenge the guys in the band. So I always try
- 5:58Speaker 1: and think of, you know, more new and interesting ways
- 6:01Speaker 1: to you know, go about writing, and you know construct.
- 6:06Speaker 1: The end result of the construct, you know, is different
- 6:10Speaker 1: in some way, Like for me it is organic. I
- 6:12Speaker 1: don't like to sit there and none of us sit
- 6:14Speaker 1: there and go, oh, what should we do to sound
- 6:16Speaker 1: like this?
- 6:17Speaker 2: It doesn't work like that for me.
- 6:18Speaker 1: It's mainly like what it's always been in terms of
- 6:22Speaker 1: how I'll write the song. So I'll come in with
- 6:23Speaker 1: a basic outline of you know, the song and what
- 6:27Speaker 1: I think, you know, how it should be, and then
- 6:29Speaker 1: it's worked on so that the rest of the band
- 6:32Speaker 1: has input on how you know, parts of it. For example,
- 6:37Speaker 1: in this last well this recording here, we'd gone in
- 6:41Speaker 1: and put those down, those tracks down, and then decided
- 6:44Speaker 1: in the studio we needed more there, like bits and pieces.
- 6:47Speaker 2: So it's kind of like.
- 6:49Speaker 1: That in the sense that listen to it and go, oh,
- 6:53Speaker 1: could have been done better like this, and you then
- 6:56Speaker 1: do it. And unfortunately this time it was kind of
- 6:58Speaker 1: part of it was in the studio, which is what
- 7:00Speaker 1: you don't really want when you're time. So but that's
- 7:05Speaker 1: what you know, that's how it kind of evolves. So
- 7:07Speaker 1: that's what I mean by that.
- 7:09Speaker 2: I don't like to reproduce the same song over and
- 7:12Speaker 2: over again.
- 7:13Speaker 1: Like some bands, you know, they hit that formula and
- 7:16Speaker 1: they just do that, and for me, it's like, no,
- 7:18Speaker 1: I want to keep people guessing as to where where
- 7:22Speaker 1: it's going.
- 7:23Speaker 3: Yeah, So a lot of those lines like how does
- 7:25Speaker 3: Satans coock different musically to your debut self titled debut album.
- 7:30Speaker 4: This one's This one's a far more consistent album overall,
- 7:35Speaker 4: but the first one. I wasn't in the band for
- 7:37Speaker 4: the first one, but I was a fan and I
- 7:39Speaker 4: listened to it a fair bit, and they were all
- 7:41Speaker 4: great songs, and it was a great album. But from
- 7:46Speaker 4: like a booking and promoting sort of perspective, it was
- 7:49Speaker 4: hard to sort of, I guess, label it or categorize
- 7:55Speaker 4: it like that. The songs differed vastly because they was
- 7:59Speaker 4: sort of from vastly different backgrounds when they were written.
- 8:03Speaker 4: Whereas this album it's pretty much consistent from start to finish.
- 8:07Speaker 2: Yeah, that it sort of ends the same way it starts.
- 8:11Speaker 1: Yeah, And I think, yeah, Nick's right, like we needed
- 8:14Speaker 1: to when we're doing a bit of an evaluation of
- 8:19Speaker 1: which where we were and where we wanted to kind
- 8:21Speaker 1: of go and head in terms of musical direction, Like always,
- 8:25Speaker 1: all of us have been into heavy music forever, Like
- 8:29Speaker 1: it's not something new, but what is new is that
- 8:32Speaker 1: the progression part of it, That is that that's the
- 8:35Speaker 1: challenge part of it, you know, forcing yourself to play
- 8:39Speaker 1: things that you know you haven't played before, or the
- 8:42Speaker 1: construct being different to what it was before. So for
- 8:45Speaker 1: this time, if you compare the first record and had
- 8:47Speaker 1: more of a more of a krusty punk feel in
- 8:50Speaker 1: some songs and others were heavy as fuck. So it's
- 8:53Speaker 1: kind of like, where do we want to go with this?
- 8:55Speaker 1: We kind of need to sort of be on board
- 8:57Speaker 1: with it, and we did have some issues in terms
- 9:01Speaker 1: of direction within the band and.
- 9:04Speaker 2: Therefore some personnel changes. Also.
- 9:06Speaker 1: Having said that, people know that Steve passed away, which
- 9:10Speaker 1: you know is not none of us who expecting that,
- 9:13Speaker 1: but there was a bit of conflict in terms of
- 9:16Speaker 1: where we were kind of going. Where Steve wanted to
- 9:18Speaker 1: do more of the same, whereas I'm like pushing him
- 9:20Speaker 1: to sort of, you know, move on.
- 9:22Speaker 2: And you know, challenge himself.
- 9:24Speaker 1: But he was not in a physical, norm i think,
- 9:28Speaker 1: mental state to be able to actually do that, to
- 9:31Speaker 1: be honest and sadly, when he did leave the band,
- 9:34Speaker 1: we you know, we got the news not several months
- 9:38Speaker 1: later that he'd passed, but not to be unexpected but
- 9:41Speaker 1: also unexpected. So in terms of the band and that
- 9:44Speaker 1: songwriting and the direction, it is more solidified in terms
- 9:49Speaker 1: of where we're going, and that is because of the
- 9:52Speaker 1: challenge you know, we kind of like drop down again.
- 9:56Speaker 1: We'd already been in drop tuning for since the first day,
- 9:59Speaker 1: but this one it warranted even more. So, you know,
- 10:05Speaker 1: that heaviness we wanted to really because live, if you've
- 10:08Speaker 1: ever seen us live, you would know that what's live
- 10:13Speaker 1: And most bands would say this, I'd say, you know,
- 10:16Speaker 1: the live performance is far more brutal than you're ever
- 10:19Speaker 1: going to really capture on record, and sometimes it's the
- 10:22Speaker 1: other way around, but for us, it's always.
- 10:23Speaker 2: Been like that, and so it's forever trying to chase that, like,
- 10:27Speaker 2: which is.
- 10:28Speaker 1: You know, how can we best represent you know, the
- 10:31Speaker 1: heaviness of the band capture that you know in a
- 10:36Speaker 1: moment in time, because essentially what every band does when
- 10:38Speaker 1: they record a moment in time, that's what it is.
- 10:42Speaker 1: So moving through there were some changes to our tuning
- 10:47Speaker 1: or some changes to ye just the way you know,
- 10:51Speaker 1: I constructed the songs, et cetera, et cetera.
- 10:53Speaker 2: So that's how you.
- 10:55Speaker 1: Know, it kind of progressed and how it's kind of
- 10:57Speaker 1: evolved from that point.
- 10:59Speaker 3: A a bit further to that, like your music blends
- 11:03Speaker 3: many forms of metal. Your draws from death metal, black extreme,
- 11:07Speaker 3: there's black and metal. There's black beats.
- 11:08Speaker 4: In there, right.
- 11:09Speaker 3: Is it difficult to get the balance right in the
- 11:12Speaker 3: creative process because it's a lot you bring it together there?
- 11:16Speaker 1: Yeah, it is, But I think it's a culmination of
- 11:21Speaker 1: you know, like everybody, you listen to a whole bunch
- 11:23Speaker 1: of things, and I do all the time. And when
- 11:27Speaker 1: you write, it's hard because you don't want to go, oh, well,
- 11:30Speaker 1: that sounds like this band or that sounds like that band.
- 11:33Speaker 1: But when you do write subconsciously, I think you do
- 11:38Speaker 1: draw on your influences. So I mean, I listen to
- 11:41Speaker 1: all all forms of metal, including death call, which people
- 11:46Speaker 1: really you know, it seems to have a bad reputation.
- 11:49Speaker 1: I like, you know, different bands in the different genres.
- 11:52Speaker 1: So for me, I'm not a gatekeeper. I don't like
- 11:55Speaker 1: that attitude of people say, oh, that's not purely black,
- 11:57Speaker 1: and that's not purely death metal, and that's not purely whatever.
- 12:01Speaker 2: I don't care like For me.
- 12:03Speaker 1: Music shouldn't have boundaries, and with respect to that, so
- 12:05Speaker 1: I try to you know, when I write, it's it's
- 12:10Speaker 1: concerned effort to try and you try and be original
- 12:15Speaker 1: in the way it's put together. And if you look
- 12:17Speaker 1: at a lot of the bands that have you know, overseas, Japan, everywhere.
- 12:22Speaker 1: Actually there's a lot more blending of those metal styles,
- 12:26Speaker 1: and I think that's actually a good thing because it
- 12:28Speaker 1: means the genre moves on and you're not listening to
- 12:32Speaker 1: the same old you know, format or style all the time. So,
- 12:38Speaker 1: and I'll say this all the time, I mean, who
- 12:40Speaker 1: needs another Slayer? We have Slayer for example, I don't,
- 12:44Speaker 1: you know, as much as I love all of that,
- 12:47Speaker 1: there's so many bands, for example, that sound like Slayer,
- 12:50Speaker 1: And that's great for them if that's what they want
- 12:52Speaker 1: to do. For me, it's never been about fitting into
- 12:56Speaker 1: any particular style or my mindset all process of metal
- 13:03Speaker 1: for me, you know, my taste in.
- 13:06Speaker 2: Metal are pretty actually broad.
- 13:08Speaker 4: So that's a pretty honest sounding record in the sense
- 13:13Speaker 4: that everybody who played on it has brought, you know,
- 13:17Speaker 4: a bit of who they are as well, and and
- 13:21Speaker 4: everybody's playing you know, what they do best really, so yeah,
- 13:26Speaker 4: there's a bit of everyone in there, and that's probably
- 13:28Speaker 4: why it's you know, there's there's so many sounds because
- 13:30Speaker 4: you know, we're all old bastards and we've all listened
- 13:35Speaker 4: to a lot of music. But but yeah, you can
- 13:39Speaker 4: if people know the individuals and the band, you can
- 13:42Speaker 4: sort of recognize the contribution.
- 13:45Speaker 1: Yeah, and I think, you know, with Nick coming from
- 13:48Speaker 1: very much a black metal sort of background in terms
- 13:50Speaker 1: of he's playing and bands, I know you could talk
- 13:53Speaker 1: about that, but I mean there's that different, definite flavor.
- 13:56Speaker 2: Mind you that the song construct is what it was
- 13:59Speaker 2: and always has always been, But there's.
- 14:02Speaker 1: No denying that the style of person any person brings
- 14:05Speaker 1: into the band is going to influence its overall flavor.
- 14:09Speaker 1: So when we recorded Satan's com it was pretty much
- 14:13Speaker 1: all the rhythm was kind of done and bits and
- 14:15Speaker 1: pieces were done. And so when Nick turned up because
- 14:19Speaker 1: he was in Brisbane.
- 14:21Speaker 4: I came in and the record had been recorded basically,
- 14:26Speaker 4: and yeah, they were just waiting for me to lay
- 14:27Speaker 4: down my solos and stuff and slap those down. But yeah,
- 14:33Speaker 4: I played vastly differently to the way Steve used to play,
- 14:37Speaker 4: and you know, what he did was great on the
- 14:40Speaker 4: last record, But yeah, I've got just a more chaotic
- 14:46Speaker 4: sense of lead guitar.
- 14:48Speaker 1: I think.
- 14:50Speaker 4: Yeah, I just wanted to bring to it all those
- 14:52Speaker 4: things that just sort of really got me going. And
- 14:56Speaker 4: when I was sort of learning music and a young
- 14:58Speaker 4: pella getting into it. You hear those crazy fucking leads
- 15:01Speaker 4: that you know Slayer and decide we're doing and shit,
- 15:04Speaker 4: and you just go, oh fuck, yeah. So you just
- 15:06Speaker 4: try and grab all the stuff that you love the
- 15:08Speaker 4: most and the stuff that you know sort of impressed
- 15:10Speaker 4: you the most, and see if you can just sort
- 15:12Speaker 4: of pass it down through through the fucking generations.
- 15:15Speaker 2: Yeah.
- 15:15Speaker 1: And I think from if you listen to Piss and
- 15:18Speaker 1: Purges is a good example of Nick's work. When you
- 15:21Speaker 1: first like put that down, that chaotic sort of and
- 15:25Speaker 1: it's so contras that's first song is very contrasting in
- 15:29Speaker 1: it's really chunky, chunky first bit, and then you've got
- 15:32Speaker 1: this chaos that kind of ensues in the second part
- 15:36Speaker 1: where Nick does his That's an example of his input
- 15:40Speaker 1: and also the chaos, which is really like, I love
- 15:44Speaker 1: the fact that it's so contrasting. For me, it epitomizes
- 15:49Speaker 1: what I stand for in terms of, you know, the
- 15:52Speaker 1: way a song should be, should keep people guessing, and
- 15:55Speaker 1: also you know the style like Nick mentioned, and all
- 16:00Speaker 1: of the positioning of the leading parts more or less
- 16:03Speaker 1: were was his decision, next decision in terms of how
- 16:07Speaker 1: it should sound and what it should be, and it
- 16:10Speaker 1: is a lot more chaotic and or but when I
- 16:16Speaker 1: say Codd, not in chaotic, not in a bad way,
- 16:18Speaker 1: but in a good way, in the sense that I
- 16:20Speaker 1: don't think his lead breaks are not typical of you know,
- 16:26Speaker 1: what we were doing, nor I think I don't you know,
- 16:31Speaker 1: like a NIX.
- 16:31Speaker 4: That's said, though more than one occasion I was asked
- 16:34Speaker 4: to dial it back a little bit.
- 16:38Speaker 2: Mind you.
- 16:39Speaker 1: So we had we had a few the issue because
- 16:42Speaker 1: it is quite in your face actually, So yeah.
- 16:48Speaker 4: Everybody sort of brings their own sort of flavor, flavor
- 16:52Speaker 4: to the album. I guess, yeah.
- 16:55Speaker 3: Nice. Nice. Now you've got a space the outrun of
- 16:57Speaker 3: shows coming up to with two in Perth incept You've
- 17:00Speaker 3: got three in and around Melbourne October, yep, hambur and Sydney.
- 17:04Speaker 2: And so like. So they are part of this.
- 17:05Speaker 1: So we're going to be officially launching the CD in
- 17:12Speaker 1: pers the first date of the tour, and that is
- 17:15Speaker 1: in September to two days I think it's seventeen eighteenth,
- 17:19Speaker 1: And basically that will be that will Ages show. That's
- 17:22Speaker 1: where that's where where it starts, and then from there
- 17:26Speaker 1: we did Melbourne shows. We've got one at the Bendi
- 17:29Speaker 1: one in Bendigo and they will also be launchers, et cetera.
- 17:34Speaker 1: We're going to go to Tazzi Sydney obviously probably Brisbane
- 17:40Speaker 1: again and do all of that. So we have I'm
- 17:45Speaker 1: going to put up all of it. I freaking lose
- 17:47Speaker 1: track of everything. I actually asked Michael who manages us
- 17:52Speaker 1: from like Ruse, actually yeah, so to can you put
- 17:57Speaker 1: something together because I'm losing track of everything, which I
- 18:00Speaker 1: I am actually so yeah. So that's where it starts.
- 18:04Speaker 1: It starts from you as of September and goes on
- 18:08Speaker 1: through there.
- 18:08Speaker 3: Where's the best place for people to find out more
- 18:10Speaker 3: information and find out what dates?
- 18:12Speaker 2: Yep?
- 18:13Speaker 1: So on the socials, we have our Facebook and Instagram profiles,
- 18:20Speaker 1: we have band camp page where you know, occasionally things
- 18:23Speaker 1: pop up, but the best place is probably the obvious ones,
- 18:26Speaker 1: which is Facebook and Instagram to keep an update on,
- 18:31Speaker 1: you know, keep track of what's going on. Like me,
- 18:34Speaker 1: I have a look at my own post and.
- 18:36Speaker 3: That's what a brostaurer I'm supposed to be. Tonight, guys,
- 18:41Speaker 3: we'll say very much the time being to place the.
- 18:42Speaker 2: Chat with this awesome best of luck with it all.
- 18:49Speaker 3: We'll touch you when you come to Brazil,