It’s that time of year where we set out to interview as many of the Sophie, New Blood, and Jager bands as we can in the lead-up to one of the most anticipated festivals of the year, Bloodstock. Answering our questions here are Words That Burn who play the New Blood Stage on Sunday.
Simple things first – where are you guys from?
We’re from Dundalk, Carrickmacross and Kingscourt – all in Ireland’s north east.
How long have you been playing together as a band?
We started in 2011 and have gone through a number of line up changes. The four of us have been playing now for 6 years give or take.
Where does the name of the band come from?
It comes from a book of poetry my Dad had in the family house. He is a big fan of poetry and showed me this compilation book one evening. I thought the name was pretty cool for a band so I “borrowed” it!
Describe your music. What makes you unique?
We’ve been defined numerous times as “alt-metal” or “alt metalcore”… but we don’t really pigeon-hole ourselves to any subgenre really. I think that can influence the listener or even how your write. I guess what makes us unique is the age gap in the band. We’ve got two guys in their 20s and early 30s, and two guys in their 40s – so musically we come from different backgrounds and influences, which we explore in our sound.
What’s your live show like? Why are people going to watch you instead of another band?
Live is where it’s at for us… Being in the studio and writing is excellent, but performing live is where you can really shine. Our shows are energetic as fuck. We leave everything we have on the stage. We hope the audience feels like they’ve went through a the same catharsis we experience after a show!
Have you been to Bloodstock before? What did you think?
Our bass player, Ger, took his eldest son Neil to the last Bloodstock mainly to see Parkway Drive but came back raving about so many bands we wouldn’t necessarily listen to!! He was blown away by how amazing it was!
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Which M2tM region did you win, or did you come through other channels?
Unfortunately the M2tM was fucked up here due to covid but we were fortunate enough to get the gig through our manager, Oran O’Beirne (Overdrive.ie).
Can you put into 10 words or fewer how it felt when you realised you were heading to Bloodstock?
OH SHIT WE REALLY HAVE TO PRACTICE OUR SONGS!!!
What sort of setlist can we expect?
It’s 30 minutes of out heaviest tracks. Four tracks from our last album Pyres and two tracks from our new album. We’ll be debuting our latest single “Den of Lions” at Bloodstock!
Which other bands do you most hope you’re not squished up next to so you can see them play?
Hopefully none of the other Irish bands (The Crawling, Bailer, Strangle Wire, Elder Druid, Grey Stag) cos we really want to see them on the big stages.
What are you working on at the moment?
We’ve recently completed our newest album (title pending), produced by the amazing Josh Schroeder (king 810, Lorna Shore, Tallah which we are so excited about. By the time this comes out we will have just released our latest single “Den of Lions” exclusively on our youtube channel.
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What’s the wildest thing you’ve seen or done at a live show?
The most bizzare was watching a local band playing and the guitar player was buck naked almost the entire show. What was weird about it was the audience we acting like there wasn’t a fully naked man flopping his bits around everywhere…… I thought I maybe had too many tequilas and imagined it. Turns out it wasn’t out of the ordinary for them and the crowd was just desensitised to it!! lol
What drink do you throw back to get yourself fired up before going on stage?
God, I try to leave the drinking until just before we go on – cos I’ve had a few too many before gigs in the past and it didn’t go well!! So maybe a couple of beers or a shot of tequila!!
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