Paint The Sky - Interview

Brandon is lucky enough to get an interview with upcoming Leeds Hardcore group, Paint The Sky. At the moment the band are unsigned, but given their growing fanbase, good work ethic, awesome sound, we don‘t think it‘ll be long till a “label" approaches them.

We’ve seen quite a few bands with similar names, how did you come by that name, and how hard is it these days to come up with an original one (and were there any funny ones you nearly used or considered)?

Bryn - As an upcoming band we really wanted something easy for people to remember and easy to chant.

Cam - As soon as the guys told me about the name I immediately took a liking to it, as time went on I found more of a related meaning to it. To ‘Paint The Sky’ is a good concept for us. At the end of the day it’s simple. The sky is the limit, and if we are painting it hopefully we can make a footprint on the music industry.

A lot of the members of Paint The Sky have come from other bands, can you tell us how you all met, and what it was like working altogether for the first time?

Bryn - We all found each other through the internet, decided to meet in a bar and it came clear we all wanted to move in the same direction musically.

Cam - I was the last member to join, I replied to an ad they put out and sent me some demo’s to write lyrics over. As soon as I heard the demos, I loved the ideas and we took it from there.

Can you tell us who inspired you to start playing, and who your influences are?

Bryn - When I first started playing guitar, I was listening to classic rock bands like AC/DC. That was the start. As time went on I started listening to heavier music and going down to local shows to see bands like Bring me, penknifelovelife and centurion. That was ages ago like. My music taste for hardcore/screamo has grown from there really I guess.

Cam - I started really getting into nu-metal music in the late 90’s- early 2000’s. My real inspirations back ten were bands like ‘Linkin Park’ and ‘Papa Roach’. I started writing music and playing guitar when I was 12, and here we are today.

A lot of bands are now doing a lot more for themselves in putting their material on the internet for people to get access to, has the record labels influence reduced (We notice that you‘re unsigned, were you looking to get a distribution deal or a record deal)?

Cam - Definitely, what band wouldn‘t?

Bryn - Obviously we all want to hopefully one day make a career out of this. We are going to be searching for a label but we aren‘t going to just take the first thing we get offered. We need to wait till the time is right.

Cam - Our current EP is 100% free to download. So there is no rush towards a label as of yet. The next record might be a different story. For now though we just want as many people as possible to hear about music.

Bryn - If I am totally honest. There are too many ‘indie labels' around atm which aren‘t labels at all. They are just facebook pages what some kid has made at home and called themselves a record label. Don‘t get me wrong there are some decent small labels around at the moment but a lot of them just focus on a few of their best bands and then they have tonnes of bands which are just going nowhere. If/when we sign to a label we are going to choose someone who we think suits us and will actually help us get somewhere. We have been looking into certain labels and we know who could benefit us. Whether these labels will be interested in us, we will have to wait and see.

Has the internet made it easier for bands to get a following, or has it had the reverse effect whereby there are so many bands out there that can be found that it‘s hard to stand out from the crowd?

Cam - I think the internet has made a massive and irreversible impact on the music industry. It’s done some great things for a lot of bands trying to get known by using things like MySpace and Facebook, unfortunately I believe it has adversely affected how special music is as there is a lot of competition these days.

Bryn - Yer, Facebook has been a great opportunity for us to connect musically not just with our friends, but with people from different parts of the world. It‘s not all about social network sites though. Plenty of shows and touring actually pays off. As long as you make sure your always active and touring whenever and wherever you can, people will take notice eventually if your a decent band. Take TOBU for example. Nobody gave a s*** out us for ages. Then once people saw us live the opinion changes a lot. I belive this band has just as much potential to get anywhere as a lot of other bands rising atm because we give it our all at every show whether we are playing to 10 people or 100.

Talking about standing out from the crowd are there any other new upcoming bands that you‘ve been listening to lately that you‘ve liked?

Cam - We have been listening to a band called ‘Woe is me’, check them out. We also played in Newcastle last night with a band called ‘Verona’, their set blew me away.

Bryn - ARCHETYPE everyone should go check them out. They are good friends of ours and a really good band. Also, I recently came across another Newcastle band called ‘My Extraordinary'. They are amazing. Bit like 30 Seconds To Mars. Not metal, very radio friendly. The best small band I have heard in a very long time. I‘m not even kidding. Look them up.

We really liked the fact you posted your song lyrics on your own website which spared us from those awful sites that desperately want to sell you ringtones, just wondering who’s idea was that, and are there plans to perhaps post Guitar tabs on there too?

Cam - It was actually people that we have been talking to started asking for them to be put online, so we put them on there.

Who did the Facebook post in Norwegian? Do they speak it or did you cheat and use Google Translate? :-)

Bryn - I did. It was kind of a fun idea but also if they have had time to check out the music and download it, I can take a minute to say thank you in their language. Yes we used google translate. I wish I was smart enough to speak other languages haha

The band obviously takes up a lot of your time, but outside of that what do you get up to (We ask this question because we‘ve found out a lot of guitarists turn out to be brilliant photographers or something, like Jerry Horton from Papa Roach)?

Bryn - It does take up a lot of time but its time very well spent... I work in an Aussie bar haha

Cam - I have worked in Bars and banks

Bryn - Also our other guitarist works in Tesco part time and bassist works for Domino‘s! Not all that exciting. We couldn‘t give a chimps sack though. This band is all we care about.

Cam - True. Couldn‘t give a Parrots Pecker! haha. I would put everything behind for this band and risk ending up with a dead end job if it all fell through. This is the most important thing in my life and everyone else‘s in the band and as cheesey as it sounds. This is just the start of it.

To find out more about Paint the Sky you can visit their Facebook page here: http://www.facebook.com/Painttheskyofficial

Interview by Brandon