Memphis May Fire are on a whirlwind
tour of the UK and Europe and Slam Dunk Festival is slap bang in the middle of
it all. The Texas
We managed to catch up with Kellen and
Jake pre show to chat about the new material, dueting with Nicki Minaj and kebab
mob tattoos!
Heya! You had a headline show at Underworld to
kick off the tour – how was it?
KELLEN [McGregor, guitar]- Yeah, it was awesome, it was so hot though.
JAKE [Garland
A nice warm up for the Slam Dunk dates?
KELLEN- It was definitely a shock [laughing]
What do you like most about coming over
to the UK
KELLEN- The Donner!
JAKE- Ah yeah, the kebab! We all have kebab tattoos [both
get out said kebab tattoos].
KELLEN- Oh yeah, you’ve got to be part of the kebab mob
[laughing].
JAKE- We got them last time we were over, but not in the UK Switzerland UK
KELLEN- Although it’s still hard to understand them
sometimes, like in Australia Scotland
There was a bit of a gap of between “Sleepwalking”
and “The Hollow”, and then off the back of the success of “The Hollow” you
released “Challenger” the next year, which has done incredibly well too. Does
that add pressure or does it spur you on for the next record?
KELLEN- There’s pressure but it’s definitely not a conscious
thing. We’ve always been a band that will write what we write and if you like
it then you like it. We just go for it.
 |
Speaking of the next record – you
tweeted saying the stuff you’d already written already was set to beat "Challenger"- can you give anything away? What can fans expect?
JAKE- Yeah, for sure. We have like ten songs done at the
moment and they’re good. We don’t know when it’s going to come out but we’re
going to record in September so maybe this time next year, maybe earlier.
KELLEN- It’s definitely going to be more up and down.
“Challenger” had a similar tone throughout the whole thing, just because of the
specific things we were writing about. But on the next album each song will
sound different from the next.
JAKE- There will be a super fast song and then a really slow
one and then a couple on the bouncy tempo that we like to write in. I like that
though, because there will be songs that people can have a favourite. In
“Challenger” it’s hard to pick because only “Miles Away” is really the
different sounding one.
You guys have had a few line-up changes
– do you feel stronger than ever?
JAKE- Oh yeah. Kellen’s the only original founding member from
back in the day. How many members would you say you’ve gone through?
KELLEN- We’ve gone through two drummers, you’re the third,
three bass players, two guitarists and we’ve had two singers. Crazy.
JAKE- This line-up is awesome though.
You’ve worked with Kellin from Sleeping
With Sirens and Danny from Asking Alexandria-
JAKE- It’s hard with Matty [Mullins, vocals] not being here
KELLEN- He would definitely want that dude, we were saying it
the other day…
JAKE- From Blindside yeah, Christian Lindskog, that’s one
of his favourite bands of all time. He hopes to get in touch with him, not to
even do a guest thing I think, he just really wants to meet and chat with him.
We want to get someone really different
KELLEN- I’d like to have a female vocalist, that would be
cool, but I don’t know who
JAKE- Nicki Minaj? [laughing].
And what’s next for you guys?
JAKE- Warped Tour, main stage all summer long, then we’ll
be recording and then probably another winter tour. I hope we can come back
here too.
https://www.facebook.com/MemphisMayFire
To read our live review of Slam Dunk North 2013 [including Memphis May Fire's set] CLICK HERE
