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BLACKOUT: THE LOWDOWN  With the album 8 days away, people have been wondering just what is going on with UK rock band Arizona Blue, have they totally forgot that what could be the most defining moment of their career is just around the corner? Well, no, they seem to have been very busy (although they're not giving much away), we asked James Elliot & co for the rundown of the album, this is what they gave us in the first ever interview about the upcoming release.
Q: Well, June 4th isn’t far away at all now, your album will be coming out in less than two weeks, how are you feeling about this?James: I think we’re all both excited and nervous about this, incredibly proud of what we’ve made of course, but we feel some of the newer fans we have may see this as an album where we’ve gone too deep into our personal lives, which in hindsight we may have done on some songs, but a lot of these lyrics were escapes, I’ve had some dark days over the last couple of years, and these really helped me get it all out and really helped me move on from those places, so I think that people will appreciate the fact that I’ve put all my heart into these, and hopefully the lyrical content of the songs will not be too deep for some people to listen to, I know I’m not alone in most of these circumstances I write about, so to some people, it should be very relatable.Q: Over the last five years you’ve been known to throw curveballs in every direction, nobody knows where you’re going to go next musically, is this album any different?Lewis: In some aspects, but I think we’ve come to terms with the fact our fan base is getting far too large to keep on going from alternative rock to metal, to some indie stuff etc, I think the sound we have now is something we’re comfortable with but one thing we can never do is just write the same old stuff, we’ll still be experimenting with new elements from new genres, that’s who we are, and we’d be a boring band if we didn’t try something new, I think we can say that this current Alternative Rock with a Hardcore Punk twist is what we’ve been looking for the whole time this band has been together, so I can see that staying around.
Matt: I can personally say I’ve never been happier playing like this, but I’m afraid that it’s not as straight forward as people will think, there’s a couple of songs on this album that wouldn’t be out of place in our early days when we were playing alternative music, but at the same time we’ve just slightly put the hardcore elements in so the songs blend in on this record, it’s something people might have to listen to a fair few times before they get used to it, if reactions from the songs in the recent couple of months are anything to go by however, people will enjoy this record.Q: So is the album 100% fast paced, upbeat fury and aggression or can we expect the slow side of Arizona Blue to come through again?James: Funnily enough, we haven’t released a slow song since our first EP, we wrote a few slow songs in practices and never played them, and the one thing we said about the album is that we need a slow song, we need something that you could see a whole room holding their lighters in the air to, something calm, and that’s exactly what we’ve done to split the album in half, track #5 (So Far) is a really ambient, slow song that is quite unfamiliar ground to us, we’ve got some parts on the album that build up/slow down songs, but the only song that’s really 100% calm and slow is So Far.Q: The Kids Who Knew shows your hardcore side off more than any other songs you’ve ever done, can we expect this to come through as strong on other songs?James: I suppose so, but I mean we don’t want to slip into that position where we’re so heavy we’re classed as a metal band, because we’re really not, so we’ve made sure we haven’t gone that way, we are quite a heavy band, but I wouldn’t say we were metal, everything is so much easier to understand when you can hear the album. Q: So with the hype of the album opening new doors for you in the United States and Europe, as well as dramatically increased popularity in the UK, a lot of people have said you have forgotten your roots, as many bands before you have done before, they say you don’t remember where you’re from.James: I saw this on the internet the other day actually, and I was sat at my computer reading this blatant bullshit and I said to myself, we’ve forgotten where we’re from? Have we fuck. It goes for every single member of the band when I say that, we’ll never turn our backs on London or Cardiff, because those two cities are where it all began, and we’ve only every played four shows outside of the UK so far, it is true when they said we’ve got tours in the final stages of booking outside the UK, how they know that I don’t know, it must have been a lucky guess, these people are just idiots that don’t have a clue what they’re talking about, nobody should listen to them, it's true we want success worldwide, that's the dream, who doesn't want thousands of people every night singing your songs, relating to your lyrics, enjoying the music, the UK is out home and it always will be.
So with twists and turns throughout the album, it’s pretty fair to say that Arizona Blue are still up to their old tricks, but they’ve entered a comfort zone, will this move pay off? Make sure you pick up Blackout on June 4th to find out.
A review of Blackout, broke down track-by-track will be released this week.
Edited by user 28 May 2012 04:06:58(UTC)
| Reason: correction |
Arizona Blue are:
James Elliot - Vocals
Liam Miller - Guitar/Vocals
Dan Johnson - Guitar
Lewis Harley - Bass
Matt Cole - Drums
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