Latest / HEAVY Music Interviews / Above & Beyond With MATT BRANDYBERRY Of FROM ASHES TO NEW

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Above & Beyond With MATT BRANDYBERRY Of FROM ASHES TO NEW · HEAVY Music Interviews

• 0:27
  Hey man, what's up? Matt Bee from Ashes to New is the band
• 0:30
  and Yeah, got the deluxe coming out on a two days. It seems
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  beautiful, Matt. Thanks for joining us this morning. Yeah, thanks for
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  having me. Ways, bro, So from Ashton, you are releasing Blackout
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  Deluxe on June to seventh, which is the original twelve songs from last year's
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  album plus six bonus tracks, mate, So you still get the same excitement
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  and releasing the deluxe album like this is what you did when the album first
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  came out. I think you know we've done We've done some delight in the
• 1:00
  past, and I'm not sure that I've had the same excitement levels. But
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  I would say for this one, yes, because there is a track that
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  is not released yet and it's something that our fans are from when not expected.
• 1:11
  Yeah, So Blackout has been out since did a lot of twenty eight
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  last year? Mate, say, did fans respund to the album the way
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  you expected they would? I think it was above what I was expecting.
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  Like it's been, It's been phenomenal. Our ticket sales are at all the
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  time high merch vi ip album everything. I mean, we're cruising, man,
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  things are going good and so in this modern age of music, brother
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  like, things are a lot different to how they used to be obviously,
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  So how do you measure the success of an album this mon Nay? Is
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  it Spotify? Strange? Is it? How do you do it? Yeah?
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  I think it's overall streaming, but I mean some of that doesn't matter,
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  I don't think, because I think that you'll see like an artist or
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  a band that streams really high, but then they don't. They don't have
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  anyone at their shows. And sometimes you can see the exact opposite where you're
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  like, oh man, that band doesn't really scream and you almost think that
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  no one would go see them. In the next thing, you know,
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  their shows are sold out everywhere. So I think to know that if your
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  stuff is working or what you're doing is working, is that you know,
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  are people kind of it's kind of like all encompassing. Are people wearing your
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  merch? Are they listening to your music? Are they going to your shows?
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  Are they you know? Are your social media numbers growing? Like?
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  What? You know? It's kind of all of it together. Because there's
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  only the six bonus tracks on the deluxe album, Mate, I want to
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  run through them one by one, including the one that you said, it's
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  been a surprise fans a bit. So we'll run through them one by one
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  and tell us a bit more about the songs and why why you're chosing for
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  the deluxe So you've got Bai barely breathing. Yeah, yeah, well that
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  was originally a track. There's some remixes on here, and that's one of
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  the remixes that was originally a track on the initial Blackout release. And we
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  did a feature with Chrissy Constante against the Current, and you know, we
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  had always imagined that song to have a female guest vocal, and the original
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  track didn't have it. So we were just happy that we were able to
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  get her on there and kind of bring to life what we in initially had
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  thought to do in the beginning. And you got one Foot in the Grave
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  with Aaron pauling from by Some Men, Yeah, an unreleased track. We
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  knew that we wanted Aaron on a track. Love of Mice and Men.
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  Been a big fan of them for years. Also Aaron's old band, Jamie's
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  Elsewhere, love those guys. So I've always been a big fan of what
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  Aaron does and we're just happy to get him on a track. Initially it
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  was supposed to be kind of like another remix idea, but I was okay,
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  man, we got this one in the can, and I think that
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  we could really get him in here and it could be something cool and something
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  the fans haven't heard yet. So wanted to do it. Made it happen,
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  and I lived before I'm dead. That's one, man, That's the
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  one. That's one everyone's got to listen to and find out for themselves.
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  It's way different my first real singing approach. So I'm curious to see what
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  people are going to really think of that. Can you tell us why you
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  decided to do or like a promise singing a price? On this one?
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  Lance made me do it, he really did. He forced me into it.
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  I didn't want to do it. He kept saying, you gotta do
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  it, you gotta do it, you gotta do it. And I did
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  it, and I'm really proud of it. I know that everyone around us
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  is really proud of it. So I'm excited to see what fans think.
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  Oh and did you say that's going to be released as single or is that
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  just going to be part of the album. I'm not quite sure what they're
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  doing. With get Honestly, you know, I think I think the singles
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  are determined by how I think a lot of times they're determined with how well
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  song does really, So we'll see what the fans think of it and if
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  it becomes a single, then sick and if not, I'm still proud of
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  it doesn't matter to me. So you got a monster in me again another
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  album track. But I have been a gigantic fan of yellow Wolf for very
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  many years and I've been trying to get him to be a part of something
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  that we've done. And again, we didn't have the opportunity of putting on
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  the original the original album track. But you know, when they come and
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  say, hey, yellow Wolf wants to be a part of a song,
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  what song do you want to put him on? You give him your best
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  rap song that you've got and let him do his thing. So I'm really
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  happy to have yellow Wolf as a part of this. Uh this the lux
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  right. The next one is the Sullivan King remix of Nightmare. Caught me
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  off guard. Didn't even know what was happening. I had no clue.
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  Man. I got an email. I was like, hey, what do
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  you think of the Sullivan King remix? And I listened to him, I
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  was like, yeah, this is so sick. So yeah, I know
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  we had no clue, but it was a pleasant surprise. And the dude
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  crushes everything he does, so it's it's a killer remix of the track,
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  and it's the biggest track from the record, so it's killer remakes it the
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  biggest track. Nice. And then you got an acoustic version of Hate Me
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  Too. Yep, I had to. It's that song, man. I
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  had to give people the acoustic treatment, man, give them a different vibe
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  on on that that big radio hit. So so yeah, I mean it's
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  fun. We kept it. We kept it moody, and we kept it
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  energetic and kind of just dialed back the instruments a little bit and did our
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  rendition of what we thought that song was just sound like acoustic. Oh so,
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  do you guys write a lot of the songs acoustically first and turn of
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  electric? Or they are they all written like the way they played? Pretty
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  much? Yeah, I think they're all written kind of the way they're played.
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  I don't think we've ever really done anything acoustic, except for maybe chre
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  progression and humsome melodies or something like that. When everything's kind of like,
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  you know, we figure out what kind of what kind of key were the
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  key we wanted to be or the bpm we wanted to be in the idea,
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  and then we kind of scat some stuff down and kind of build it
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  like legos so but it never really ever starts from acoustics. Sometimes from acoustic,
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  maybe a little bit piano maybe a little bit, but they all start
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  different ways. Yeah. Now you said, like, most of these songs
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  that are coming up on the on the deluxe version, we're written before,
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  Like is that something you decide like did you know firstly? Did you know
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  at the start you're going to be put a deluxe album out? So that's
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  why you put some of these tracks aside? Or if not, how do
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  you decide which one is again to go on a deluxe version? Yeah,
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  I mean I think that there's always an assumption you're going to do in a
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  deluxe version. We've done it, like I said, a couple of times
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  now, but I mean, you know, contractually it's always they go,
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  hey, this many songs, this is how many songs that go on a
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  record, and then this many songs received for B sides. Typically Dark Contract's
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  fourteen songs and then eleven go on the record and three songs and B sides.
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  We couldn't choose what eleven to put on the initial record release, so
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  we put twelve and then that left us with two songs. But typically what
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  you do is is you kind of pick some of your like worst songs and
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  like kind of let them sit back as B sides. But we strategically picked
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  these ones because we thought that they were fresh, different vibes, something that
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  might be able to rejuvenate, you know, kind of like when you're in
• 8:20
  the in between process, right, it's kind of where we're at, like
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  we released the album last summer for coming up on this summer, and then
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  we don't really have an idea is when the next record comes out. So
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  you want to breathe life back into your art to people who may not have
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  heard it, and we thought that these songs would be a really good opportunity
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  to do that. So we strategically sat on these songs and waited to see
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  what we would do with it now as a band mate, like we were
• 8:45
  talking about the incredible success of Blackout, Like as a band, when you
• 8:48
  come into the next cycle to write an album, like how checking is it
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  to sort of rehash that formula with it, you know, in your little
• 8:56
  twist, because you know that work last time. Well, I mean I
• 9:01
  think that that's what a lot of really successful bands do. I mean,
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  I can I could probably name ten two off the top of my head from
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  the era before me, and then my era would be like ac DC and
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  Disturbed. But I mean, I think that like a lot of bands do
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  that where they write the same style of song. Its because what the fans
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  want, and that's also what they're good at. So I think that when
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  you venture too far outside of that zone, fans start to get confused.
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  You know, they bought into your product for specific reasons, so when you
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  start to changing on them, they're like, what's going on? They get
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  confused. And I'm not saying that's all fans, because some fans do like
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  the variety and the change, but like, you know, I think that
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  subconsciously, we fall in love with something because that's what it is, and
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  then when you change it, it's a little weird. So we went through
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  that, like the first album did really well for us, and not that
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  the second and third albums didn't do well, but we did change our sound
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  a little bit and it did leave our fans a little bit confused, and
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  that's why Blackout was more of a return to our original sounds, because we're
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  like, Okay, we're go back to what really kind of kicked this thing
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  off and uh and kind of chase that again. So I don't think that
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  there's really any pressure to do it. I think that honestly. You know,
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  an evolution is great, and you should always have an evolution to your
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  sound, but you should never forget where you came from. They very well
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  said. Now, I'm not sure if I've got the dice art here or
• 10:18
  not, but you guys have just finished the Blackout Chopa or recent or disabache.
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  I'm on it in the middle of a baby there we are. So
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  but once that's gone, you will we'll you We would have done a whole
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  hate of tour and like a heap of it lately. So he's planning on
• 10:35
  doing more after that, or he's gonna take a bit of a rest.
• 10:37
  Oh, we're going back out this fall. Man, We're gonna be off
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  for the summer. We got some some festival dates this summer. We're gonna
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  hammer out and then some writing and you know, working on this record.
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  The next record, which I have no idea when that's coming out, but
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  we're working on it, and then uh yeah, and then we're gonna,
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  you know, go back out in the end August, and that's gonna run
• 11:01
  till who knows when at this point. But we've got one tour announced and
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  we're working on putting some others together. I mean, we're workhorses, man.
• 11:09
  We tour. That's what we do. It's it's a it's a love
• 11:13
  hate relationship, but uh, you know, you love, you'll love the
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  first few weeks you's like, yeah, I'm back out here doing this thing.
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  And then then you know, it's kind of the same as thing when
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  you're at home. You're like we're finally home, and then you're there for
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  a while and you're like, I need to tour. Then you get out
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  on the road and need to like I need to go home. So it
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  keeps life interesting for sure. And as a siving mentioned in the plans as
• 11:35
  yet, I so it's not it's not mentioned in any plans that we have
• 11:41
  set in stone. But I did have a call a few days ago with
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  our team and they said that they were talking about trying to work some things
• 11:50
  out to get to Australia. So it's on my bucket list, it has
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  been. Everyone asks what country do you want to tour? And that's the
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  one. I mean all of them, but that's the one the top of
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  my list. Never been there and can't wait to be there. And I
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  know that we will be eventually, just not sure when. Yeah, from
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  my well, thanks very much for you time today, Brad. The Deluxe
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  sorry Blackout Deluxe is out June seven, which isn't far away now, and
• 12:13
  she's a cracker from it. I've heard so best of Blackmount and I hope
• 12:16
  everyone enjoys your singing. Awesome man, I hope so too appreciate it is.
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  Brad will catch up a shall I wish I could wear your songs.
• 13:01
  You could relate to but with she put me through them, kind of afraid
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  to you push on the play with me like it's a way too. Let's
• 13:07
  get from the reality that everyone hates you, no one can break proof and
• 13:11
  know what you want to do is a faith truth lying through. Yet you
• 13:13
  think you would sell us a faith news open. Everyone will play your games
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  and embrace you, but all we want to do is find a way to
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  escape. You never escape up side wide inside your crowds. It's a long
• 13:35
  way down from here. It's a long way town from here. Not time
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  why side laugh inside up it's a long way town for man, it's a
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  long way in town from her. Then you go again, know what's making
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  the worst and f you push away your friends and you're always the first to
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  quit besulting you. Hey, there nothing but turns me Linco trying to pretend
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  that your life hasn't turn the shit? How don't you but being a person,
• 14:01
  they said, he can never reflect you when you're making it hurt like
• 14:03
  this. Karma is a bitch. It's what you deserve. Again, if
• 14:05
  you made the fire, then I think you should probably so your track sound
• 14:20
  inside and crass white tail from here. It's a long wait tail from ben
• 14:28
  shot inside side. It's a little white tail from bed. There's a long
• 14:35
  white tail from here. Sad so jump outside sage chap size so yeah,
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  so jock s shut up side A long way side inside your crowd side.
• 15:11
  It's a long way town from here. It's a long wake town from here.
• 15:16
  Young sides are why shut upsides that live inside down side It's a long
• 15:20
  wait town from here. It's a long wake town from here. It's a
• 15:31
  long wait tail from here. It's a long way town from here. It's
• 15:39
  a long wait town from here. It's a long wait town from here.