Life Lessons - The Albums That Inspired Us

We've been having a lot of people, interviewers, friends and fans, ask us what our musical influences were when we recorded Life Lessons. It's such a hard question to answer. The 5 of us all listen to different things, we all draw inspiration from different places. But, there are a number of songs and albums that I know we all share a love for, and know that we drew influence from whilst writing and recording this album. These are some of the albums that inspired me and some of the band when we were recording. But mainly me. This is my blog ain't it, if those guys wanna write about what influenced them they can start their own blog. Ahem. Sorry. I'll carry on.

The Ghost Inside - Get What You Give

Musically, we wanted to create something that was like The Ghost Inside but with a more metalcore edge. We wanted to production to sound similar to this record, as punchy and as huge as this record, as clean cut and defined as this record but still with a hint of rawness. I think we all collectively think of this as one of the defining albums within the genre, and this was an enormous influence on us both as we were writing and recording.

Underoath - Define The Great Line

My favourite album of all time. Hands down. Everything that they do on this record, the builds, the dynamics, the riffs, the melodies, the way the album paces along, everything is flawless. They are such a tight and clever band, but have such a rawness, an almost unpolished feel to them, and that completely adds to the punch of the album, adding a sense of unpredictability. I wanted to take parts of all that and implement it into our album, and there are hints of it running throughout.

Killswitch Engage - The End Of Heartache

One of the most perfect metalcore albums from that era. I think a lot of people, not just us, have this album on a pedastal as being one of the best, if not THE best metalcore album of all time. It has everything. Changes in pace, riffs for days, punishing vocals and soaring melodies, all accompanied by solid production and an almost perfectionist delivery. Killswitch Engage are one of our all time favourite bands, to say they had no influence on our writing would be a flat out lie. We grew up listening to them and learning their songs, our writing style has indirectly been shaped by them.

Unearth - The Oncoming Storm

Much like The End Of Heartache, this was another of the perfect albums from that era. A lot heavier and more unrelenting than Killswitch Engage, but just as riffy and technical if not more so, with breakdowns appearing all over the shop and with blistering leads where necessary. A lot of the breakdowns on this album were approached with a "what would Unearth do?" kind of vibe, and a lot of the breakdowns we feel turned out great as a result of that.

While She Sleeps - Brainwashed

One of the few torches keeping British metalcore alight, While She Sleeps made an absolute corker of an album with Brainwashed. The punishing pace, harsh vocals and raw punchy guitars were expertly balanced alongside enormous anthemic singalongs, exquisite melodies and harmonies and tasteful guitar decoration. We look up to While She Sleeps as an example of how to work hard and knuckle down, how to not give up and push for better things.

A Day To Remember - Homesick

The album that broke A Day To Remember is arguably their best, and that blend of catchy infectious pop punk and hard hitting metal isn't done half as well by anybody else. The perfect example of a metal pop band, structuring songs like pop songs with strong verses and memorable hook laden choruses, this album is essentially a masterclass in how to blend genres. We knew we wanted to put more singing in this album, and we knew we wanted to structure the songs better, and this album was the perfect example of how that's done.

Gideon - Calloused

We referenced this album a LOT when it came to the mixing process. The way all the instruments blend together and burst through the speakers makes the already heavy riffs sound even heavier. Everything has so much weight behind it, and none of the weight gets lost. You can hear every single instrument. We wanted that same impact from our recording.

Architects - Lost Forever//Lost Together

This album was nothing short of monumental when it first came out. Architects are a band we've all been following and paying attention to for years, but this was probably the heaviest and most brutally honest they'd been so far in their career. Both lyrically and musically, this was an album that really set Architects apart from the crowd. Adam is an enormous fan of Sam Carter, and the way he delivered his vocals on Lost Forever//Lost Together was a big inspiration to how he delivered his. Musically it was a huge inspiration too, pushing us to be creative and not do what everybody else is doing.

Bring Me The Horizon - Sempiternal

Similar to A Day To Remember, this album was a masterclass in song writing, but also at how to write structured commercial songs without wandering too far away from the sound you're known for. This was a perfect transitionary album for them, bridging the gap from the heavier side of them to the side we now know about from That's The Spirit. This was a great reference for us, for how to progress forwards without straying too far from the sound we'd already established. We also looked at how our songs would sound when performed live after seeing Bring Me The Horizon perform songs off this album in Cardiff, which greatly helped our writing and recording process.

Stray From The Path - Rising Sun

Stray are a very unique band, and almost nothing like us. They're like a blend of Rage Against The Machine and Every Time I Die. Basically they're Rage Against The Machine but even more angry and the world. Their drummer is an absolute powerhouse, and some of the drum parts on Life Lessons were inspired by a lot of the drum parts on this record. Not drums you'd predict, not drums you'd expect, but musically impressive and often unexpected drums.




Let me know if you can hear any of the above in the record! A couple of album reviews that we've had have picked up on a few of these influences, some have compared us to some cool other bands we didn't even spot. Just the simple fact that it's being listened to is amazing, so I'm beyond happy with anything we get compared to. Even if you compare us to 5 Seconds Of Summer. I don't know why you'd make that comparison, but I'd appreciate it all the same.

Regardless of whether you can pick any of these out or not, thank you so much for checking out the album, it means the absolute world to us.

Thank you for reading.


D.S
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Having An Album Out Is Weird

So, it's been a very hectic, strange, exciting, overwhelming, exhausting and eye opening few days. For many reasons. Pretty much from Friday last week onwards, I haven't stopped. I've been busy sorting things out, getting things in order, preparing for the future, travelling, playing shows, doing interviews, working, and trying to get my head in order. All of this has revolved around releasing my bands debut album. And releasing it has been completely different to what I expected.

All of last week, I can honestly say that the approach to releasing the album didn't really feel special. We'd been sat on it for a while, and I almost felt numb I guess? I just wanted the material to be out there, and I thought that once it was it'd just feel like one less thing to focus on. No real internal release, no weight off my shoulders, just another thing that happened during my week. I was very wrong. As soon as it hit midnight and I realised it was out, I emotionally crumbled. The sheer realisation that something we'd worked so hard on was finally in the public domain completely flooded my senses and I didn't really know what to do with myself. I almost had an outer body experience where all the weight within me just lifted. I felt like I was floating. I can't really explain it any other way that I felt completely weightless, carefree. I was just hovering in that realisation. And it was very overwhelming. Messages from friends started to appear in my inbox, all complimentary, all saying something along the lines of "you should be proud". I honestly don't think I've ever had this much support and praise from anybody about anything I've done in my life, and I didn't really know what to do with all of this. I still don't. It all feels very alien. Nothing I've done with my life has felt like this before.

I managed to eventually get some sleep, and I woke up to more complimentary messages. People sharing screenshots of their Spotify app playing our album, people taking pictures of their album pre-orders that had turned up on their doorstep. And then I started getting messages about Gonvena. I wasn't ready for these messages. For those unaware, Gonvena is a track on the album that I wrote about my mums death. The name comes from two things. The first is a place in Cornwall we visited a few times when I was growing up. The second is the name of my Granddad's house, the house my mum grew up in. My Granddad has outlived two wives and his daughter, he's had various types of cancer and survived them all, he's an incredible and inspiring human being. But it's all taken it's toll and he's now quite frail, and had to move out of his beloved house. Naming the song Gonvena was my way of keeping mum and my Granddad together. I'd been listening to this song for months, but this was new to everybody else, and it's now impossible for me to listen to. The way I feel about my mum passing appears to have been portrayed in the song, and the support and praise I've had for that in particular has been a lot to take in. I was not expecting a response like this at all. From Friday onwards I've done a lot of crying and I'm not ashamed to say that. When it comes to my feelings, I am a bottler. I push everything real far down so no one can see I'm struggling. Releasing this album and, in particular that song, has allowed me to let everything go and feel a little.

I'm still receiving messages today. We played Macmillan Festival on Saturday, a festival I hold particularly close to me, and we were receiving compliments and praise whilst there too. We got played on Kerrang! Radio last week, and Alex Baker was very complimentary towards us. We're in this months issue of Rock Sound. A lot of things are happening at the minute and my brain and body don't really know what to do with it all. I can't explain what I've been feeling for these last few days in any way other than overwhelming. It really has been. I just expected a few "hey the album is cool" from some friends, but what we've actually had has been much more than that, and I honestly can't say thank you enough. This band over the last few months has been incredibly difficult to be a part of. There have been a lot of internal struggles that you haven't seen, a lot of arguments and disagreements, a lot of stress, loss of drive, frustration, depression. But everything we've heard, read and seen since the release has made everything worth it, and in all honesty it's probably saved us. So thank you.

Come and say hello to us at a show. We've got a brand new set to share with y'all.

Thank you for listening to us, thank you for watching us, thank you for talking to us, thank you for everything. Thank you for reading this.

D.S

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