MEB staffer Ridge Briel and friend Anthony Matthews (who helped write part of the interview) recently caught up with Rou Reynolds and Rory Clewlow of Enter Shikari to discuss the overall message that their music consists of, what people should be doing to make the world a better place, the meanings behind their symbols, and about their newest album A Flash Flood of Colour more in depth.

MEB: You guys are still relatively new in comparison to other bands that remotely sound like you. What has it been like constantly touring and headlining all over the world for the past five years?

Rou and Rory: Well, it’s tiring to say the least. [laughs] We’ve had some amazing experiences, been to places we wouldn’t normally go to, and played for more people than we ever thought we would be able to play for.

Compared to your other albums, A Flash Flood of Colour isn’t, as you’ve stated in previous interviews, as politically motivated as the others. Can you elaborate more on this technological stance you guys have mentioned before?

After our other albums were released, we were labeled as a political band. It kind of makes us angry because we feel that they’ve really missed the point we’re trying to make. With Flash Flood of Colour, we’re trying to push forth a psychological and scientific sort of agenda. Just basically trying to concentrate on giving people a new sort of perspective and thinking of things more objectively. In terms of technology, we’re just trying to make people realize the possibilities we have at our fingertips in the marvels of science to make a completely sustainable world where equality and peace can be a very real and obtainable thing. I saw this video the other day on a Canadian news channel about this guy who has found the cure for cancer. This simple and inexpensive medicine that has been around for decades basically kills the very cancer cells.

Yes I just saw that recently as well. It’s been making the rounds on Facebook  and Tumblr a lot.

It’s a really cheap and easy to make substance. His small-scale testing on rodents has been proven successful and he needs millions to put it to more broad-scale testing, but because the substance is so cheap and easy to make, the pharmaceutical companies don’t want to touch it because they feel they won’t make any money on saving millions of lives. It’s a big example of how technology and science can be held back by the greed of others.

You can view the video here (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z1ifXxbxhZc).

Because these days, people are in it just for the money and their own personal gain and not for the greater good of the people who are suffering. What is it that you want people to do and what message do you want them to take when they listen to your music?

The people’s perspectives is what about sums it up really. They can either listen to the lyrics or read the booklet and do their own research if they’re interested. The real first preliminary thing we want people to take from our music is a sense of unity that we are a biosphere planet and that this is the only planet we have. Everywhere, like in media, the first rule of governance is that they like to divide people to not realize that we are just one species. We all kind of want the same things in life but we really need to get back to progressing as a whole sense that manifests everyone in a positive way.

Is that what Common Dreads is about?

Yeah. That’s always been our main concern, of others trying to fight back against the device of nature and getting people to realize the strength we can have when united as one species.

So what made you guys kind of change from Take to the Skies to Common Dreads like that? The lyrics in Take to the Skies aren’t as political compared to Common Dreads.

Just the time in which they were written I guess. We were playing most of them for two or three years by the time we recorded that album as those lyrics were written when we were 16, 17 years old. We were still kind of forming our view of the world. Listening back, you can hear the embryonic stages of our band and our social views in songs like “No Sssweat.” Once we realized we had this pedestal that we were sort of pushed onto when the album came out, it kind of exploded, especially in Europe. We really felt this sort of responsibility of speaking about stuff that are quite urgent and important.

What do you feel, if there is one, is the difference between the fan base in Europe as compared to the fan base of the U.S.A.?

When in Europe, it’s a lot bigger as compared to over here, but it’s still getting there to that size. The way people act and the energy is quite similar. Japan is slightly different because, well, everything is slightly different in Japan.

So what exactly is the meaning behind the title A Flash Flood of Colour and the cover art that adorns it?

A flash flood of colour is what we want to inject into the world. Just a sense of positivity, variety, and diversity through our music. The upside-down triangle represents the opposite of society’s pyramid depiction of the classes. You have the lower class, which makes the majority of the world and therefore the biggest part of the triangle at the bottom, and the very few and rich who control what everyone else sees and does in their day-to-day life at the top. The power should belong to the majority of the people as they are the ones who hold up the triangle.

It’s too bad it didn’t have to do with the Triforce.

Ah yes, Zelda! [laughs]

So how did you guys all meet up together to form this band with such a powerful and meaningful message?

When we first started, that wasn’t really what we had in mind. We didn’t have any goals or aspirations, we just wanted to get together and play music. You could say it was a hobby that really got out of hand. Even now, that’s how it feels to us. As I was saying before, after we started getting that initial success, we started thinking “Wow, people are really starting to listen to us now.” So it kind of felt, not pressured, but just kind of moved into that form of using the music to shout and sing and talk about things that we feel need to be talked about instead of singing about breaking up with your girlfriend or having “tough” lyrics that are full of that faux revolutionism. To us, coming from a punk/hardcore scene, that type of music is built on absolute sincerity and honesty. You’re running around, you’re giving it everything you’ve got, and that’s what punk is all about. Passion and fighting against the oppressions. I guess it just felt kind of normal for us to do.

So is that what the song “Warm Smiles Do Not Make You Welcome Here” is about?

I guess that’s more specifically about… well yeah, more like the music scene and what people are listening to nowadays. How, especially recently, when you’re in a band that’s constantly touring like we have over the last few years, I’ve gotten to a point where I don’t really listen to metal or metalcore. I still like hardcore, but we get exposed to so many bands that sound exactly the same. It’s like there’s this willing to make a band and pick your favorite band and attempt to sound just like them and this mediocrity is just spreading through music and it’s like most bands that become successful don’t really push their music forward and certainly don’t excite us. But that could also be because we play music every day and that we have short attention spans and that we’ve become “elitists.” [laughs] It’s a stab at the media who don’t really help in any way and at the music channels that just play whatever they feel is popular and will keep their listeners happy. So you get this vicious circle of homogenized music and stations where that music just goes around and nothing progresses.

Because these days, especially on American radio stations, you can go to any channel and hear ten songs that sound exactly the same, even more so with contemporary hip-hop. It does get ridiculous about hearing some guy going to a club to pick up a girl to have sex and drinking Bacardi or something. It’s really refreshing to hear music from you guys with lyrics that have so much meaning behind them and actually have it mean something.

That’s the thing, I think if the media did actually support the more underground [bands] and evolve in music genres, not just from the punk side of things but also the electronica and classical stuff, that every single aspect of music would be accepted to a certain degree. But because we all grow up with a narrow view of music, it will seem strange when you hear a piece of music that doesn’t go with the whole “stick with what you know” sort of thinking. It goes back to that saying that it’s easier to sell something that people understand.

Do you think people are more receptive and open to new things over in the UK compared to America?

It’s certainly hard to get a proper gauge of that from album sales alone. The record company that released our first two albums signed us and literally did nothing with us. They hardly released the albums. We’ve sold more albums within the first week of Flash Flood than we have with our last two albums the whole time. Certainly, American radio seems a bit bleaker.

That I can definitely agree with.

Daytime radio in the UK is shit, but there are specialized shows in the evenings and some smaller radio stations as well that are pretty good. I hope to see this bleak sort of radio obsolete.

Personally, I’m a huge fan of SiKth. What was it like working with Dan Weller at the producing helm of your last two albums?

It was amazing. He actually did some of the guitars on Common Dreads. I remember when he first called me up, he was like “Hi, it’s Dan from SiKth.” I was a little bit starstruck to say the least. He grew up in the next town from us actually and we would go see his band and his friends’ bands all the time. He’s very much a part of our lives as an inspiration before Enter Shikari. He really has a great ear for good music. He’s essentially a fifth member of the band.

So tell me a little bit about Step It Up Clothing.

Step It Up Clothing can be described as ethical clothing. Using clothes to spread a message instead of just warmth or a random design. Each shirt actually means something. A percentage from the profits of a shirt goes toward whatever cause it supports. It’s fun, just some friends that do designs really. The online shop is down at the moment but it should be back up within a month or so.

So I know you guys are into the whole Zeitgeist movement. What message do you really want people to take from this and instill into their everyday lives?

It’s really hard to summarize that. The whole movement for us is just such a huge inspiration. It’s more education than I ever really received in the schooling system. There’s so many lectures and videos today that are all parts of what the movement stands for. It really steps outside of everything for people to look in and see what’s really going on.

Any last words for your fans and what people who haven’t seen you live yet can expect from your shows?

A lot of sweat, a lot of blood, ringing ears afterwards; people are really missing out. All of your senses will be destroyed. This tour’s been going great, I can’t really complain. Thanks to everyone who has supported us so far.

Looking For Alaska is also partaking in a game of musical chairs, rotating who plays what, who stays, and who goes. From day one they were equipped with two guitarists. Shortly after, they stumbled across the rest of the band and were set -until they lost their vocalist to California. After finally getting their hands on another singer, they were ready to go.

The original singer came back into the family and it was Looking For Alaska 1.0 again – sound familiar? Now, however, the tides have changed once again and they lost not only that vocalist, but also the bassist. So who makes up Looking For Alaska 2012? The band now consists of Calvin Lauber, Joshua Cannon and Chris Chamoun, the veteran guitarists and creators of the band, and Bailey Patterson on bass.

So how will this impact the band, if at all? “Any change in the sound that is happening right now is not necessarily intentional. It does sound different because there are different people involved…We’ve started over with the new material,” says former lead guitarist and current frontman Calvin Lauber. They decided to keep the name due to the majority of the remaining members being of the original lineup.

In their new single “Gainesville”, it is appropriately written “basically about change and how even if things change things can still work out even if they are different,” Lauber says. This is applicable to their audience as well as the band itself: new members, new sound, new plans – but still a successful band.

Lauber’s vocals add more of a The Dangerous Summer feel, differing from former vocalist Turner’s poppy vocals. The song gives off a vibe of dark pop punk, the dissonant key of guitars with the echoes and various effects placed throughout. The strings during the bridge add a melancholy emotion that is soon broken into by Lauber and Cannon’s vocals to sound angry and determined.

“Gainesville” shows that even though bands do go through inevitable change throughout their lifetimes, it is still possible to keep going and growing from those changes. Introducing the same Looking For Alaska – with a fresh start.

The band seemed to stumble a little while attempting to scale the lofty heights of HD with 2010’s Bears, Mayors, Scraps and Bones. Where HD saw vocalist Liam Cormier foaming at the mouth and seething with a sense of riotous injustice, BMSB saw him taking a turn down doom and gloom avenue. To say listening to the album left you feeling mildly depressed would be a severe understatement.

Enter DSOL and fans will be psyched to know that Cancer Bats are back to their best. The tracks immediately leap out at you because of the unmistakable similarities to HD, as embodied by album opener “R.A.T.S.”

If there’s one thing you can be certain of with the band, it’s of their forte in writing curb-stomping, skull-crushingly intense album openers. You can almost feel Cormier’s saliva landing on your face as he proclaims with unnerving confidence: “There’s a special place in hell for people like you / There’s a place in hell for all the shit that you’ve done / There’s a place in hell for every filthy rat.” Guitarist Scott Middleton keeps the album fresh with some rugged riffs that dart between groovy and sludgy. The line between a signature sound and laziness to innovate is a slim one however, and the familiarity of the fretwork on songs like “Bricks & Mortar” and “Old Blood” can cut a little too close.

The album’s production values are expectedly solid, given that this is the third time the band has worked with production affiliates Eric Ratz and Kenny Luong. It is chock full of meandering riffs, all-out death by snares and Cormier’s bitter declarations and threats. This is all fine and good, until you get the feeling that the songs on DSOL are a little more downbeat in contrast to the rebellious anthems they used to slam out.

What were once battle cries spurring listeners not to take shit from anyone have aged into more cynical and hedonistically bitter curses. Listeners could’ve sworn Cormier’s chants matched that of a gallant officer leading his men into battle on Hail Destroyer but on Dead Set on Living, one gets the sense he’s the sole survivor of a hellish ambush, telling bitter tales of revenge and rage yet dishing out none.

Unless you’re living under a rock or you’re one of those guys who finds music news from Metal Injection (that’s a thing, right?) and CMHWAK (look it up. Actually, don’t.), chances are you’ve been flooded with news about this year’s Glamour Kills Tour. After all, it features three of the most hyped up bands playing pop punk right now in The Story So Far, Transit and The Wonder Years. Rounding out the package is the insanely talented Evan Weiss’ Into It. Over It. and one of the best live shows around in Polar Bear Club.

At present, every single show has been sold out, including those in Canada, a traditionally weak market for this type of music. I was super bummed when I found out this tour would not be hitting my hometown of Montreal, but I was more than happy to make the two-hour bus ride to Ottawa to catch what would probably be the show of the year for me.

Without The Wonder Years, this show would still probably be one of my favourite shows of the year, if not the past few years. Seeing The Story So Far somehow play the crowd into a frenzy without actually moving onstage was a sight to behold. The band is currently one of the most hyped bands in the pop punk scene right now, and they’ve gone from playing basements to receiving, by many accounts, the second best reception on the tour behind the headliners.

Transit surprised me live, managing to bring energy throughout their set, even during their more mellow songs from their Rise Records debut, Listen and Forgive. Plus, seeing Joe Boynton smiling from the first chord to the last note of the set was really awesome. But the biggest surprise of the night was Polar Bear Club. My second time seeing them, I forgot how great they are live. Tight as the record, the band powered through their set while keeping the audience jumping the whole time. I was shocked at the crowd reception, and at the fact that I had a much tougher time holding my front row spot during their set than I did during The Story So Far’s. Jimmy Stadt is definitely one of the top frontmen in the game.

Now, while The Wonder Years are my favourite band and have been for nearly two years, I had mixed emotions during their set. From the recorded Ginsberg intro to the wall of boutique guitar cabinets to the weirdly placed barrier between the stage and the crowd (Get it together Ottawa, barriers suck), it was clear that this was not the same band that I saw this time last year in a Montreal club with 60 other people. Gone were the mic tosses and post-set hangouts by the stage. Gone was the struggle to help the band push the stage monitors back so kids could get up on stage. And this bummed me out. So much that after five songs, I decided to go sit at the bar and watch the rest of the set from the comfort of what appeared to be a couch (it was like, stuck into the wall and wasn’t very comfortable). But after a while I realized that it was pointless to waste my money and watch kids go crazy from afar.

And when I got back into the thick of the audience, that’s where it clicked. During the second to last song of the set, which happened to be the older “You’re Not Salinger, Get Over It,” something special happened. While there wasn’t any kind of mic toss during the classic “chin up, and we’ll drown a little slower” gang shout, I began to see kids raise their hands, putting one on top of the other. There I was, my hand between others, some belonging to a friend, and some to other dudes and girls, none of whom I had ever met. It was as if we were a sports team pumping each other up before a championship. There were complete strangers putting their arms around each other, screaming lyrics to each other, people putting others on their shoulders, kids hugging other kids, and just a general sense of community. After the show, I spoke to and laughed with about ten different people who I had never met, something the incredibly shy me would never dream of doing.

I had never seen anything like this at a show, regardless of how punk or underground it was. And at that moment, I realized that this show wasn’t about connecting with the band. It wasn’t about weather Soupy would target me out of the audience to sing a line or not. It wasn’t about being close to the band I and many others had watched grow so quickly. It wasn’t about stage dives, call-outs or mic tosses. It was about connecting with other people, members of the crowd who had all come to the same show at the same time to do the same thing. It was about having the most fun and celebrating music with complete strangers, having a sense of community with people who there’s a strong chance you will never see again.

The Wonder Years might not just be my band anymore, but I’m okay with that. They’re our band, and regardless of how big or how distant they become, the message is still the same. If any other band can bring people together the way this band did, I would say they did their job extremely well.

This is one of the few bands nowadays that has genuine crossover appeal, but that’s no surprise considering the variety of bands they’ve already played with ranges from Gallows to Fucked Up to The Gaslight Anthem. Sharks’ strongest asset is easily how versatile and likable they are, and No Gods truly showcases that.

This album genuinely gets better and better with each listen. “Patient Spider” is easily one of the best songs on the album, with “Arcane Effigies” not far behind. Both of these songs manage to be catchy and memorable without compromising their uniqueness, making them perfect to be played over and over. “Patient Spider” in particular shines both lyrically and instrumentally. From the catchy hooks to the intricate metaphors, this track pretty much has it all.

“Til the Wonders Rise” and “Matthew’s Baby” are both very catchy, with the former being the most poppy track on the album. “Dawn Soft Light” is another strong track with an extremely infectious hook, much like “What Entails” which is great from the start and is rather reminiscent of early Third Eye Blind.

Overall, No Gods is full of track after track of upbeat, lighthearted, fun anthems that came right in time for the warm weather. With jams like “Luck,” I can’t help but picture myself blasting this album with my windows down while driving to the beach. The album truly doesn’t miss a beat and has that summer-breezy likability that you just can’t deny.

In the past, Sharks have shined as a very accessible punk band; with No Gods, they have become even more accessible and shed that punk label even more. If anything, they sound like a fusion of ’70s punk and modern pop punk. And, yes, this album sounds more poppy than their previous releases. But they have huge potential and huge crossover appeal, so it’s easy to imagine there will be huge things in their future. With a debut like this, I can’t wait to see what’s still in store for Sharks.

Fast forward to 2012. The band’s peak popularity is a few years behind them, and the band has matured into old punk dudes themselves. And with age comes a fork in the road. Do you write music to stay relevant, or do you write music to stay rad? Luckily for fans, Less Than Jake has opted to stay rad, and their newest EP, Season’s Greetings From Less Than Jake, is a testament to that. Recorded in bassist Roger Manganelli’s basement, Season’s Greetings is the companion, or as the band calls it, the “salt” to their 2011 EP, Greetings From Less Than Jake’s pepper. Released in the wee months of 2012, listeners should not be fooled: this is not a “winter album”. Present is the band’s signature jumpy power chords and pickitup-pickitup ska rhythms over summery horns. This in an album to skateboard to. Or to walk around and drink sodas to.

Seasons Greetings is a fun record at heart. It doesn’t match up to past classics like Losing Steak or Anthem, but it doesn’t seem like that was the point of the record anyways. There’s nothing groundbreaking here, or anything that will propel the band into the spotlight. What Less Than Jake did here, was do what they know best and write five fun songs that fit neatly into their catalogue. Leadoff track “The New Auld Lang Syne” edges out the four other tracks as the most memorable song. It’s starts out with a rolling pop punk groove with upbeat horns which almost say “this is a fun song, start smiling, nerd”. It then turns into a ska section, followed by an ever-so-catchy chorus. After all, isn’t that the LTJ blueprint?

The next four songs follow more or less the same pattern, and at times are hardly distinguishable. And that’s not a necessarily bad thing, considering how this band’s weaker material is better than most band’s A-list material. Season’s Greetings From Less Than Jake won’t garner the fan a larger fanbase, or be remembered as a classic Less Than Jake record, but it is what it is: it’s a fun record, fans will love it, kids will dig it, and it’ll serve as pretty sweet filler on anyone’s “top 100 Less Than Jake songs” playlist (because everyone has one… right?).

From hearing front man Nick Worthington’s voice crack as he shrieks and hollers, to surviving the cacophony created by the pounding drums brawling with the buzz saw guitar riffs, you’ll be more than likely to feel like you’ve just survived the heaving, sweating and intense mosh-pit pulsating of the band’s live shows. “I’ve Been Trying To Leave” barely reigns in the band’s newfound Southern twang, as Worthington’s rough vocals questions listeners repeatedly, “when will it end?” If anything, this track is the indestructible skeleton to the bat out of hell that is the EP, the antidote to anything other than rage and antipathy.

“Dead Until Dark” and “Southern Blue” are interesting tracks on their own, with intense drum work and jagged riffs but it’s when “Keep Them Shut” plays that we truly see Dead Swans distance themselves from the same-ish sound that bogs down many a punk band.

The snare kicks in under Worthington’s desperate yelp, and the dirty, dirty riffs add to the ever-mutating song, from a slow, almost non-starter, to an emotional rant and back to nothingness. Fans of the hardcore bands of yesteryear need no longer pine for their good old days. Dead Swans are back, with an EP that hits twice as hard than their meandering and bland full-length, Sleepwalkers.

Writing a 16 song album is something probably too ambitious for even seasoned vets of the trade. But for kids who at the time couldn’t even get into a bar? Crazy. While this album does have its flaws, which is to be expected from an album which sounds like it was recorded live in a bathroom with a single microphone, there isn’t really one filler track on this. Nor are there any tracks who necessarily sound similar. Yes, there are the classic pop punk jams like “All My Friends” and “Colorblind”, but those songs are leagues away from “Ants In My Pants”, which almost sounds like it should be played in a smokey basement jazz hole.

And really, the mix of pissed off pop punk and weirdo, quirk-rock (which is also pissed off, actually) is what defines Baseball. Bemis hasn’t quite found his groove and style as a songwriter, and as a result, these songs span the genre spectrum. And that’s not necessarily a bad thing, and in Baseball‘s case, it’s a very good thing. One of the most solid, and unfortunately most forgotten song on the album is “Showdown In P-Town”. This song sums up the general mood of Baseball, starting off with a quirky, jumpy riff before building into  grinding pop punk powerchords. And of course, Bemis’ signature pissed off lyrics tie the whole thing together. This writer’s favourite line on this album: “All that you can do is call me gay/Sorry, I don’t swing that way/even if I did, I’d still take a crowbar to your brand new car”. There isn’t many awkward kids who went through high school without getting called gay by a cool kid who’s definitely more attractive, suave, and probably smarter than them. Oh, and with more girlfriends. You silly gay.

There is not one bad track on this quite underrated, pop punk/rock/indie/jazz/whatevercore/acoustic? album.  It’s a breath of fresh air. It’s something new. It’s something creative. But most of all, it’s the start of something really great. And it would only get better.

Older readers might recall Chicago natives August Premier back from their days as a member of the quickly growing Fueled By Ramen roster. Now, recently reunited, August Premier are set to release their new album on Pacific Ridge Records. I recently sat down (behind my computer) with Mickey Molinari and Chris Rogner to discuss the band’s reformation, their future and being in a band with the same guys for over a decade. While you read, look above and check out their new track “Worlds Away,” featuring Tim Rogner from Allister, exclusively on Mind Equals Blown.

MEB: With being in a band comes a million different problems. What was the motivation to get back together and brush the dust off of August Premier?

Mickey Molinari: The timing just felt right. Chris [Rogner, vocalist/guitarist] gave me a call and asked if I would want to do it again. Obviously I said yes. I had been in a bunch of bands since August Premier and nothing to me ever felt right. The guys in August Premier are some of my oldest friends and I can’t say no to playing music with them.

In respect to how you see yourselves as a band, how you go about writing music and how you balance music and “real life,” what’s changed since the early days of August Premier?

Mickey: I think we see ourselves as a rock band, nothing more nothing less. We have never aimed to sound or be like anyone else. Chris and Danny [Halminiak, guitarist/vocalist] do the majority of the writing, one of them will present an idea or an almost finished song to the band and we go from there. The balance between “real life” and music is something everyone in a band deals with. We find if you care enough, you make it work; after all we do play music in “real life” (laughs). Things have and haven’t changed since 2003, Danny and myself had kids and Mark [Halminiak, bassist] got married and other than people working full time, things are pretty much where they left off. We are still the same guys doing what we love to do, making music.

Being on a stacked Fueled By Ramen roster in the label’s mid-’00 heyday and being on a smaller label like Pacific Ridge must be worlds apart. Tell us about a few of the most important differences between the two.

Mickey: It’s not as different as one might think. When we signed with FBR in 2002 they were still a fairly unknown label. The guys who worked there were so good to us. They were truly into our band and got what we wanted to do musically. It was still very much a DIY label. They gave us a budget to record and handled some press for us; booking shows and tours were still on us. We loved having the name behind us because they were a label we really respected and felt it gave us some credibility. It was shortly after we signed that they blew up as a label and we felt kinda buried, which happens to labels – focus shifts to who has all the attention.

With a smaller label like Pac Ridge there is a lot more focus on the label working with bands. I met Wayne [Stadler] (Pac Ridge Owner) after we signed with FBR and have remained in contact with him since. When AP decided to give it another go there was no one else I wanted to work with; his dedication to the bands he works with is almost unheard of. He really wants to make your vision come to life, from the music to the artwork to how you are promoted. There is a lot less pressure coming from Wayne than we had with FBR. Labels always give the feel that at the base of everything it’s all about numbers and money (nothing wrong with that) but with Pac Ridge you always get the feel that it’s music first, business second. We couldn’t be any happier working with them.

Happy Miserable is scheduled to come out on March 27th. How will it sound compared to your older material?

Mickey: Happy Miserable I think is the perfect example of what we see ourselves as a band that I think we could never quite make happen on the previous records. When we first started writing we shared a practice space with another band and nothing seemed to feel right. So we ended up in Chris’ brother’s garage and something just clicked with the writing. It brought this new life to the songs and the feel of the music. I also have to give credit to Matt Allison [producer] for seeing what we needed in a recording and delivering something better than we ever imagined.

How do you guys go about writing an August Premier record? Do the lyrics come first, followed by the rest? Are songs pieced together over long periods of time? Do you guys sit down and decide “today, we’re going to write this record” or does it come naturally?

Chris Rogner: It’s a little of everything I suppose. When we first set a date to get into the studio, that’s when it really sank in that we needed to sit down and write/finish writing this record. There were ideas that we already had and a few full songs we already had done, but that was when we realized we needed to buckle down and finish it. For me personally, I almost always have ideas for songs but I never really finish them on my own. Usually it’s always a melody idea with a few lines that come to me at first and I go from there. I like to bring in my ideas and structure it as a band, and let the lyrics come when they do. I don’t like to force lyrics out. Danny on the other hand will generally work on songs on his own and bring it in to the band when it’s mostly complete. There are other songs where Danny and I will show each other an idea and he’ll help finish mine or vice versa. So I guess there’s not one specific way to do it. Some songs take a while to finish. Others are done in an hour. It just depends on the song.

How did you guys get hooked up with Matt Allison? His resume reads like a who’s who of ’00-era punk; how was the experience?

Chris: My brother Tim and I had this birthday idea for our dad to take him to a studio and re-record a few songs that his band wrote and recorded when he was our age. We ended up going to Atlas cause Tim had worked with Matt a few times before and I had always wanted to. We brought Mickey in to play drums on it. We were only in there for two days, but Mickey and I ended up talking to Matt about AP and how we had always wanted to work with him. He seemed really into the idea of recording our band (which we were really fucking stoked about), and as soon as we got word from Wayne that he’d put out our album, we called Matt and set the dates. It was awesome recording with him. He’s recorded some of my all-time favorite albums, so it was a real privilege to get the opportunity. I could probably go on for hours about how great an experience it was and how good he is, but his records speak for themselves. Just an overall good guy. Oh, and Justin [Yates] is a rad dude too.

Pop punk and pop rock are the in-things right now. How do you guys see yourselves in the grand scheme of things? What sets you apart from other similar bands?

Mickey: I’m not really sure how we fit in with things these days. I feel maybe we are the old guys. We aren’t into gimmicks, we aren’t big on fashion, we don’t have backing tracks or stage props. We have always been the same – writing music we love to play, and [let] what happens happen. Hell we recorded most of this record live (bass, drums and guitar) without a click track. When we first started the band we never even thought we would get to record anything let alone sign to a label like FBR and we never thought we would be doing this now.

After the album drops, what are you guys going to be up to for the remainder of the year?

Mickey: We plan to play a bunch of shows around the Midwest, just one step at a time. I can’t say what will happen for the whole year; we just take it as it comes.

What keeps you guys motivated to go out on tour year after year?

Mickey: For me I love to travel, seeing new places, meeting new people, eating different foods. Nothing beats road trips with good friends playing music.

Best tour memory?

Mickey: So many. I will never forget randomly meeting Rikki Rockett at The Warehouse in Lacrosse, WI. He was checking out some clothes in the store beneath the venue, super random.

Cities with the most August Premier love?

Mickey: I think it will always be Chicago.

Best restaurants you’ve visited on tour?

Mickey: Stubb’s in Austin, TX

Any last words for your fans?

Mickey: Thanks for your support even when we weren’t a band. I hope you all enjoy the new record.

Beginning right where they left off with anger-filled lyrics and furious vocal delivery, “Vengeance is Mine” brings back the glory days of the old school hardcore scene before the kids filled it with breakdowns and de-tuned their guitars to drop D. The drumming brings you in and after a punk bass line, they go into the angst-filled, heavy and fast-paced songs that they are best known for. With heavy breakdowns on the chorus and a couple guitar solos, they bring the rawness that has been missing from the scene. It’s time to put the children in their place.

The first single off the album, “Reborn” was the fans’ initial assurance that Biohazard have returned to the days when they were in their prime and to establish one of the best comebacks of the year. Thankfully they (almost) got rid of the nu-metal influences entirely for at least a few songs and opted for the old school, in-your-face style that put them on the map in the first place. A standout song in their entire catalog, everything about “Reborn” is good: the lyrics (From suffering reborn/ No compassion, no control/ Only black inside my soul), the music, which retains the old school approach yet has enough elements within the structure to make it unique, and the slowed down and heavy verse line that ends with an impressive metal guitar solo seals the deal.

Going for a heavier and more metal approach, “Killing Me” begins with a nu-metal kind of intro into spoken vocals with the instruments doing nothing but backing them up. It’s more minimalistic compared to the rest of the album, but not really all that bad. It has a strong early 2000′s nostalgic metal feeling that was common among bands like Staind and Crossfade, but of course more angry than those bands’ heartfelt or depressive vocal style.

Still continuing along the metal path, “Countdown Doom” doesn’t deviate too much from the same songwriting style as “Killing Me.” There is a little bit of rapping and I frown upon that as I am more of a fan of the hardcore, but for fans of that style of Biohazard, you will not be disappointed. The lyrics make it worth your while even if you don’t like nu-metal. I can say it’s some of the best nu-metal I’ve heard in the past five years though, so at least that’s good.

This album has a variety of songs that can appeal to just about anyone. The lyrical connections are very prevalent and that is what really sets a band’s work apart from the rest. This is almost like the album that showcases Biohazard in every section of their illustrious career, with each song like a snapshot into the past. Think of this album as a career spanning best-of album, with every song being brand new.