Aversions Crown
Brisbane’s aliencore monsters AVERSIONS CROWN have released their brutal new album Xenocide which is out now through Nuclear Blast Entertainment. Across The Ocean spoke with Mick Jeffrey (guitarist) and it does sound like 2017 will be a massive year for the band as they plan to take on Europe and the States.
Congratulations on the album, this must be the exciting time being able to talk about the album?
Absolutely, we’re definitely excited to see the reaction from fans when the album comes out.
Do you think it would be so much hard work to put in making an album and then all the promotion?
There is a fair bit that goes in to it but we’ve done it before so it isn’t really a surprise. Sometimes you do forget the hours you do put in to it and then you look back and think shit we’ve done so much work here. It’s all part of it I guess.
Did you have a clear plan about how you wanted the album to pan out and the sound that you were going for?
Yeah, we definitely had more of idea this time compared to previously. There were things that we wanted to put in place before we actually started tracking this time which I think really helped us out and shaped the sound. We figured out who we wanted to mix the album and all that before we started tracking the album this time. We wanted to work with Mark Lewis and we were in contact with him. Having him on board before we even started tracking it he was guiding us through that process and the tones we needed. It made it easier for everyone involved when we got to the next stage. I think we learnt a bit from doing the last couple of albums and I think we worked it a little bit smarter this time and were able to cut a few corners which we didn’t do last time.
Is that mostly financial and time pressures?
Nah, it was more like things last time just dragged on and took longer than they should have. We learnt from doing that not necessarily doing it the wrong way but more like we wanted to do things in an effective way. Obviously that saves you time and money and we got a booming result in the end.
Is it hard letting go of a song once it reaches a certain point?
Yeah, you do have to cut it off at some point. This time we had the songs a lot more worked out before we got to the studio this time, so we did have a bit more of an idea in our head of the final product. This meant we were able to let the songs go and once we set out and done what we wanted to do, we felt comfortable with that.
Do the songs take a life of their own in the studio? Is there much scope to change things up?
They definitely come to life in the studio, I think they can come to life a lot more if you do have them pretty well structured up before you get in there. Once you’re in the middle of tracking it all you’re not thinking too much about writing the song because it is already done so there are other things you can try then to give the song a life of its own. I think we played around a lot more with than we ever had before.
Is there a hidden meaning behind the album title Xenocide?
That album titled summed up everything that we thought that we had in our heads from the sound of the music to the lyrics to the artwork and imagery to the overall brutality and heaviness of everything. The title refers to the extinction of an alien species and that was where our head was at with everything. We all gravitated towards that title when we had a few different options on the table. That was the one we all felt this is us.
Do you do the artwork yourself?
With the artwork we sort out artists that we are fans of their work. We found this guy in Japan and I’m not going to try and pronounce his name. He did the artwork for our first album Servitude and we still look back at that artwork he created and still blows our mind a bit. We thought it would be cool to get back in touch with him again to see if he would be keen to work with us again. We presented him with some information, not too much, but just some lyrical ideas and themes and a vague picture of what we were going for just to see what he would come with.
What does the rest of 2017 look like for Aversions Crown?
It’s tough touring Australia as there’s only a certain demographic of people that are going to be in to our music. We can’t just keep doing laps around the country so that’s why we have already branched out and been to Europe five times now. The plan is for a lot of touring this year and once the album is out we’ll get around as Australia as it has been a little while. We’re also hoping to get back to Europe and the States this time as well, we’re hoping this is the year we can make it happen.
Aversions Crown new album Xenocide is out now. Keep an eye for live dates near you soon.
Whether it is rummaging through vinyl at record stores such as Clarity and Title finding hidden gems to scouring the internet to find that album by the next big thing or chasing bands to get that elusive autograph and photo his passion is music all the way.
- Aversions Crown - January 27, 2017
- Sick Of It All - January 19, 2017
- Refused - January 11, 2017
