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Justin Broadrick from GODFLESH

10/12/2014

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Godflesh are widely renowned as having played a major role in the development of the Industrial metal movement. Hailing from Birmingham in England, the two piece will play their brutal, relentless and unforgiving brand of sonic mayhem on these shores for the first time as part of the 2015 Soundwave Festival. They will join both Fear Factory and Ministry in what could only be described as a dream come true for fans of the genre. Vocalist/Guitarist Justin Broadrick took some time out to talk to Live Music Adelaide about their new album, breaking up, getting back together and he even hinted at some sidewave shows.

Godflesh disbanded in 2002 following a really traumatic period in Justins life. He was suffering through a break up both personally, with the ending of a long term relationship and professionally with original bassist and founding member G.C. Green leaving the band. I asked how hard was it for him to pull all the pieces back together from a personal perspective and how the eventual demise of Godflesh came about. “We immediately set about touring the album “Hymns”, you know it was all wrong, it wasn’t Godflesh anymore. It was a good band but it wasn’t Godflesh. So it all just accumulated and went bad, it went to shit basically. Unfortunately I was going through a lot of real bad personal problems at the time as well, I was really thankful that I had something ongoing. Forming Jesu out of the ashes of Godflesh and having that material to work on during such a painful period was really the only creative outlet that I had of expressing a lot of the pain I was going through at the time. I certainly needed to express it because I think without any form of expression I would have been in such a throe of depression that I would have found very little way out of it”. 

With all of that behind him we fast forward 12 years, the original line up is back intact and the brand new album “A World Lit By Fire” has just been released. The frontman explained how the writing process came about after the bands extended hiatus. "I first started writing new material about halfway through 2011, so really what we wanted to do was play shows and perform to the best of our abilities and play the early material, that is the most inspiring to us you know. We didn’t need the inspiration but I felt like I just wanted to perform the material I loved most and what I loved most about Godflesh to get us back, get the ball rolling again you know. That lead into the compositional process in a really fluid way then, once I started writing it was never-ending really in a way the inspiration. I had to really hold the reins in the end to stop myself because I could probably write seven albums in one go now, which is great. You know I dried up back in the day, before we split up I was drying up. Whereas now it’s a bottomless well, I’m clearly very excited to get back into that compositional process, I really wanted to get back to it you know. Towards the end of the 2000’s with my project “Jesu” it definitely felt like I’d done more than I’d set out to do with that project and I was definitely missing the whole Godflesh process.”

When I broached the topic of how well the new album has been received by both the fans and the media alike, Justin was ecstatic about the initial reaction they had been afforded “I mean we’ve been stunned, when we finished this album we were really proud of this record. We still feel and we did feel as soon as we’d finished it that this was one of the best records we’d made in over 20 years. It’s up there with the classics for us, with the first three albums we made you know. The last great album we feel we made as Godflesh was the “Selfless” album in 1994 and we feel this is up there with that if not better. It’s up there with our best records, we made it for ourselves first and foremost, we just didn’t know, and we made it in such a vacuum. We recorded this in our own studio, I wrote it in my own studio, we produced it ourselves, we even engineer these records ourselves. So we had no other input whatsoever, not at any stage and this is on my own record label. So it’s not like we’ve got A&R people or people surrounding us going yeh man, that’s the fucking best album you’ve ever done, we had no one around us telling us anything. So it’s made in such a vacuum that by the time we finish the record and get it out we have no idea how this is going to be received. So we’ve been bowled over with the responses it's ridiculous actually. It couldn’t be any more positive, which makes us feel like god, well we have obviously made a record that has made an impact, it’s a real shot in the arm you know, it’s mad." 


Godflesh’s first trip to Australia will be for the biggest heavy music festival of the calendar, Soundwave. They will be playing alongside some of the bands that helped them shape the genre. His reaction to this reunion on the other side of the world was “Yes it’s incredible, it’s absolutely incredible. I mean these are people I have toured with, people I have known for years as well and on the flip side it’s great to see Mayhem as well, great black metal. The vocalist from Mayhem, Attila has been a very close friend of mine for a number of years as well you know. It’s going to be quite a big family of us.”

To my question on whether he had been given any insight of what to expect when they hit the stage in Australia, his response way “I’ve only spoken to people who have worked tech over there or have been over there as visitors but a lot of people have just said that it is an amazing experience. What I hear is really positive things, so we’re really excited, were just as excited to play some sideshows you know.”

The Godflesh singer/guitarist’s parting messages to their Australian fans was “I just couldn’t be more excited to play to people who have been either waiting years to see us or even people who have come to it in the last couple of years, last year, last month who just want to see this band. It will be an absolute pleasure to play to an Australian audience and I just hope people lose their shit to us.”


Interview by Mike Trandafil
 

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The Color Morale are next on the Soundwave hitlist... Check em out!

10/12/2014

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There is 8 days to go before The Color Morale set off on tour in the UK and Europe, and front man Garret Rapp is taking the time to talk to LMA about the excitement of being invited to play Soundwave Festival in 2015, the reinforcement of hope,  what keeps him going and what The Color Morale are about as a band…

Congratulations on being part of the Soundwave tour next year. How excited were you when you heard the news?

Yeah, very excited. Australia is probably our favourite place that we’ve been to as a band, and to be able to come back over with one of the biggest and most respected festivals in music is a pretty cool opportunity.

'Hold On Pain Ends' has been out here for about a month and has already hit no 28 in the US Top 200. How has the fan feed back been?

It’s been great. We’ve grown quite a bit as a band since the last release. I’ve already seen dozens and dozens of tattoos and heard tonnes of stories and connections of how the lyrical content has touched people. Its been very successful already. A lot of people view success on a pay scale, a record sales quota, but for me I measure success in a different way with our band. The level of connection tells me at this point that it’s been very very successful.

How much do your fans stories and experiences impact the writing of your songs?

Completely. 'Know Hope' was a record that I get very personal about. It came from a very urgent detrimental time of my life and I made it a goal through that entire record cycle to be at the merch table, to keep my ear to the ground at all times and really listen and observe what kids are going through and struggling with. In doing so, it kind of laid the foundation in what I chose to write Hold On Pain Ends about. It was a record that deals with very harsh topics. Anything from suicide to eating disorders to self-harm. Very straightforward, very urgent subject matter.

Its amazing that you can reach out to people the way you do. Would you say that was the driving force as a band?

Absolutely. That’s been the purpose of our band since day one. The purpose of what we do our entire career as a band. When I was a kid I never had anyone giving me positive feedback in life, so for me, this is something I’ve created that I need personally you know. A lot of kids will look up to you as a band, a singer, a front man and ironically at the same time, I look up to them as they look up to me. I think I need them a lot more than they need me.

I found it touching and relatable how Know Hope came about and also know how hard it is in my mind to flip negativity to positivity. Is it something you have to keep reminding yourself as well, or do you think the message has sunk in as deep with you as it has your audience?

I think so. I think it’s a reminder every day. It’s a topic of conversation I have with kids. I wrote a lyric that says you can stay in a positive life with a negative mind. They are both energy and it shouldn’t matter which one you choose to subscribe to. Some people call it god and the devil, some people call it sobriety or addiction. For me, I apply myself every day with a negative outlook, to get something positive from it.

You like to have a lot of fun on stage also. What are some of the highlights people can expect to see coming to your show at Soundwave?

If you haven’t seen a band that doesn’t plan anything, I don’t have a dialogue that I read out, or a prompter. Our band doesn’t synchronise anything, its just kind of a very raw authentic musical connection. The things I say between songs are how I feel in the moment. Its just about bringing how we feel in the moment. For me, I can't not operate that way.

How would you introduce yourself to fans that haven’t heard the color morale before?

Whatever it is you’re struggling with or going through or whatever it is you want to celebrate, put on our record and I promise you that on a scale of what we go through daily, positively or negatively, we explore the boundaries of that with our music. By all means, put us in your stereo and go stand in front of the speakers and blast it!


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Jimmy The Robot talks Soundwave 2015

10/11/2014

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In 2010 Mr and Mrs. Goodman first kissed their son Jimmy The Robot goodbye as he and his Super-Friends The Aquabats set off on their first adventure Downunder to play Soundwave Festival.

After falling in love with our country (and our Moreton Bay Bugs), Jimmy and his super friends are coming back our way for Soundwave 2014.

We spoke to him about touring, TV, detachable robot parts, stage antics and of course, Soundwave Festival. See for yourself why we cant wait for The Aquabats to take the stage next year…


How excited are you to be coming back to Australia again and under the soundwave banner like 2010?

I’m very excited. I had a fantastic time last time and am super stoked to be coming back especially the fact that it’s our winter here and your summer there.

What kind of feedback did you get from us aussies after your first visit here?

It was all very positive. We were really excited. As well as playing the regular festival dates, the sidewave shows and pub dates we played with reel big fish went really well and we saw plenty of followers that picked up on us after we played there, and the tv show aired in Australia, we have done really well and hope to expand on it when we come again.

How did the Aquabats get steered towards television?

We tried and tried for years and finally someone said lets make it. It was always a kind of goal for us. We are a very visual band and made lots of videos. Not just music videos, sometimes just shorts of us messing around, goofing off trying to entertain everybody. It was always something we wanted to do and we tried a couple times making different pilots and finally we found someone that said “ok, lets make a whole season”, so yeah, someone finally believed in us.

Do you think your television efforts has boosted the bands popularity here in Australia?

I think it helps. They are shows that kids will easily gravitate to but also that parents who sit with their kids can also enjoy. We try to put material in there that the adults get, so its not just kids frivolous action. We are having a laugh as well so it’s not just candy but also some substance. Hopefully all the generations can be into it.

 You guys seem to have a great time on stage. What would you say are your favourite things about playing live?

Playing live, you get that instant reaction from the crowd. If you do something and they like it, they let you know immediately, and also for something they don’t like. We love filming shows, but playing live is something we definitely look forward to doing. With the tv show, you don’t get any feedback for months sometimes so its definitely a cool thing about playing live. Something we love about playing live.

Have you ever thought about filming your shows in front of a live audience?

The way the show is set up, it would be a little tricky. I mean we always have people around but everything has been on location except for a handful of video shots in front of a green screen or something like that. The majority of the time we are off and running you know, which would be hard to keep an audience up with. In fact, for a pilot we did do a segment of a show from a live concert where we interacted with the crowd and had them there and we kind of like ok, well throw it to this video segment which would have the narrative that would go in between live performances and what not. That didn’t wind up in the show for the regular season but that was an experiment that we really enjoyed.

What is your favourite memory from soundwave 2010?

That was the first time we had ever been to Australia so everything we saw was brand new. The concerts were fantastic. We also went down to the Sydney fish markets and had Morton Bay Bugs which was awesome. Everywhere we went we got some awesome food and everybody we met was fantastic, everybody was on the same page and onboard so we really had a good time. We felt at home immediately. It’s not entirely different from California but it was fun to see the little differences. We were super stoked and on our sideshows we played, the fans knew our songs which was awesome and it was a great deal of fun and I can’t wait to come back.

Do you find its more fun being on a festival line up rather that headlining your own shows?

I think so. It certainly helped us out a lot being in a country for the first time. We got to play in front of lots of people who maybe didn’t know a whole lot about us, which is great. They don’t have to commit to a whole night of a band they don’t really know, but are able to walk by casually and hopefully stick around and be entertained and what not. To try to break into somewhere you have never been, its fantastic. Playing the sideshows with reel big fish was great. They brought their fans and I think we brought ours and I think our fan bases overlap quite a lot so it helped us a whole lot.

How do Mr and Mrs. Goodman go with you travelling overseas and being so far away?

My parents? (laughs) they’re good for it they’re happy for us to get out there and experience the world you know. That’s the whole point. They thought I had abandoned them but it was really more about remembering your roots and also about exploring everything the world has to offer. Australia is a nice chapter to add to that experience.

You have detachable robot body parts. Does that impress the ladies anymore than a normal man would?

I haven’t tried that out so I couldn’t speak from experience but I cant imagine it would hurt.

What advice would you give any up and coming bands trying to break into the music industry?

Fortunately for us, we had some success early on. We had a little bit of a different thing. Not the same old band which allowed us to form a pretty steady and sturdy fan base. We put out a couple of records, had a little success on the radio and this was in the 90’s you know, when mtv made a big difference in the world of music. Now it’s all on the Internet. Mtv doesn’t even play music anymore so we use the Internet a whole lot to keep our fans informed about what we are doing. Giving them new material and if it wasn’t for the fan base we had we would have ended a long time ago. I guess I would say to be true to yourself for a start and make something that you believe in and hopefully other people will believe in that as well and anytime you get low, self esteem wise or musically or whatever, you’ve got to lean on the fans because they’ll give back to you and that will give you the strength to keep moving on forward you know. We would have given up years ago if we didn’t have people lifting us up all the time like” we need more material, we love you guys” you know. They fed us and hopefully we can feed them.

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