When we last heard from the West Country based quartet, it was April of 2014, and Red Seas Fire had just unleashed Confrontation, the follow up to 2013’s Exposition. Since then, the band continued pushing themselves ahead through self-imposed challenges to ensure that their last instalment of their now three year spanning ‘Mise En Scène’ project was the most devastating work of all. Largely home-produced and recorded (with a little help from their friends), ‘Resolution’ truly finds Red Seas Fire as masters of their manifest destiny, each element of their richly textured sound dense with peaks, troughs and, well, riffs…. Did we mention the riifs? Having recently released EP Resolution for free download, we asked members Pete, Robin and Jake to answer the A-Z interview…
A Song Which Made You Want To Make Music:
PETE: Blink 182 – All The Small Things | JAKE: Level 42 – Mr Pink. | ROBIN: King Crimson – VROOOM
Best Album Ever Written:
PETE: Converge – You Fail Me | JAKE: Monuments – Gnosis | ROBIN: Steel Panther – Feel the Steel
Craziest Moment You’ve Experienced In The Band:
PETE: We played a show in a tiny venue in Bristol recently, and midway through our new single Blood Bank Jon decided to jump up on the bar, and just in the spur of the moment I went and stood in front of him so he could climb on my shoulders, which he did, and we spent a lot of the rest of the song wandering around like that.
JAKE: After my first show with the band, in Cheltenham, we ended up in a happy hardcore club night until 5am. I was 17 at the time so definitely wasn’t meant to be there, surreal for sure.
ROBIN: I thought it was Pete “hulking” his way out of a bathroom stall in Malta after the locked jammed and he was sure he would miss the show.
Deepest Lyrics One Of Your Songs Features:
ROBIN: There’s a part on one of the songs on the new EP that I wrote just after the death of my grandma, so to me that’s probably has the deepest meaning.
Easiest Song You Wrote:
PETE: The easiest to write was Skye, just one hour long writing sesh and it was done, easiest to play is Turner and Hooch, just that one riff getting pummeled into your head.
Favourite Show You’ve Ever Played:
PETE: The most recent show we played actually, at The Hairy Dog in Derby. The turnout wasn’t huge or anything but I think that was just the best performance we’ve ever put on and was so much fun as a result.
JAKE: Euroblast 2014 in Cologne, Germany. We weren’t expecting much of a crowd as RSF has never played there before and our set was clashing with a couple of other great, much more well known bands, but when we turned around to play the room was rammed full and just went off! I ended up doing some damage to my heel at this show during the last song when I did a real big stamp just a bit too hard on an uneven surface.
ROBIN: Pretty much any show I get to crowd surf at is a winner.
Guest You’d Most Like To Feature On Your Record:
PETE: No joke I’ve always felt Nicki Minaj would make a great addition to the riffs | JAKE: Ariana GRobinnde. No explanation needed | ROBIN: Michael Bolton
Happiest Moment In You’ve Experienced In The Band:
PETE: When we got confirmed for our upcoming show with Periphery on April 1st. Smiles for days.
JAKE: I’ve had a few times playing our song ‘The Mistakes We Make’ live where I can’t stop smiling and just feel super happy.
ROBIN: Seeing a whole room bouncing up and down with you is one of the best feelings ever. Period.
Interesting Fact About One Of Your Members:
PETE: Jake can sleep anywhere, anytime, no matter the situation.
JAKE: Pete likes to sit in a cinema until the end of the credits of every film he watches, something about it being respectful.
Jokes You Have In The Band:
PETE: “Ting ting”, which involves inappropriate body touching between band members, that’s all you need to know
JAKE: “Nickeh, kess meh” | ROBIN: “Yu want a bacon sarnie?”
Kicking Off Your Set Is Best With Which Song:
PETE: Tyrants is the song we’ve been kicking off every set for the past year with, it’s just got the right balance of heavy riffage and energy.
ROBIN: We haven’t really opened with anything other than Tyrants for a long time, it works pretty well. If it ain’t broke don’t fix it, right?
Longest Distance You’ve Travelled To Play A Show:
PETE: When we went to Nygårdsjøen in northern Norway, I think in a straight line from my house that’s 2100 miles.
JAKE: I wasn’t in the band then, so for me it’s Euroblast in Germany again, which is something like 450 miles.
Most Inspiring Musician You’ve Ever Experienced:
PETE: Guthrie Govan, just his whole approach to guitar and music is something to aspire to have.
JAKE: Jon Gomm, I have a hard time understanding how he writes this stuff and pulls it off live.
New Band You’d Recommend:
PETE: Svalbard, I reckon they’re about to blow up, amazing hardcore band from Bristol.
JAKE: Glass Ocean, really cool indie rock sort of band from Australia.
Opening For This Band Would Be Ideal:
PETE: Periphery, which is convenient since we’re going to be doing that on April 1st in London!
JAKE: Monuments!
ROBIN: Linkin Park
Place You’d Most Like To Tour:
PETE: North America, it’s just such a varied landscape and it’d be great to get to see it all from a van window.
JAKE: Yeah America and Canada, it’s a different culture surrounding the music out there and it would be amazing to experience that.
Quote That You’d Like To Pass On To Readers:
PETE: “How’d you get the beans above the frank” – Something About Mary, 1998.
Reason For The Title Of Your Recent/Forthcoming Release:
PETE: It’s the last EP in a series we’ve called the Mise En Scène series, which film students will get. The first two were called Exposition and Confrontation, so the last is called Resolution.
See Us Live At:
Apr 1st – London, Islington Academy w/Periphery
May 15th – CRobinwley, Black Dog w/ Death Remains, I Cried Wolf tour
May 16th – Oxford, The Wheatsheaf w/ Death Remains, I Cried Wolf tour
May 17th – Leeds, Milos. w/ Death Remains, I Cried Wolf tour
The Old Days Of Music Were Better Than Those Current, do you agree:
PETE: I don’t totally agree, even though most of the music I listen to is between five and fifteen years old. I think that given the ease of home recording there’s a lot more good music being made out there today, just that there’s also a lot more shite to wade through the find it.
Unusual Merchandise:
PETE: Not unusual, but I want bands to start doing pin badges again, we had some for a while but ran out and haven’t yet got any more done.
ROBIN: I heard that Rammstein released a special edition dildo set for one of their albums, you don’t see that often!
Variations You’d Like To Do On Any Of Your Songs:
PETE: I’m big into electronic remixes of songs, nothing too shameless and obvious, nice and subtle.
ROBIN: I’d love to hear some kind of piano arragement, always dead in to that stuff.
What Bands Have You Seen Live and Regretted:
PETE: The Rasmus, just, fuck, so ashamed.
ROBIN: Watched The Cribs at Leeds Fest once, piss poor.
X-Rays or any other treatments needed for band related injuries:
PETE: Not really band related as such, but back at music school I fell and hurt myself badly right before an assessed performance, I did the performance sat on a piano stool and then headed to hospital, turned out I had broken my leg and dislocated my ankle pretty bad, and now I have metal work screwed into my fibular.
You could have written any song in history, which would you pick:
PETE: Boys of Summer by Don Henley.
ROBIN: R Kelly – Remix Ignition
Zoo animal that best describes the personality of your band:
PETE: Bear, big and powerful and yet you just want to cuddle up to it at your own risk.
ROBIN: Wanna be a cub?
Watch the video for single ‘Blood Bank’ here:
Resolution is Out Now! Buy it at www.redseasfire.com