Hailing from Bridgent/Newport these post-hardcore lads have seen a recent rise in popularity. Even back at home I was faced with young family member wearing their glorious shirt with soap star Dot Cotton giving the rock horns.
It turns out their music is just as great as their shirts. We caught up with When We Were Wolves at the start of the year.
When did you form your band? What inspired the band to make music together?
We started jamming together in July 2011 but id say we have been taking this seriously since June 2012. We have all been in bands before some of us in the same band together, after leaving our old projects we kind of all met each other and it all just fell into place, we all clicked straight away and all share the same passion for music.
What have you got going on at the moment? And what does the band plan to achieve this year?
At the moment we are pushing the EP hard, we want to get it out to as many people as we can and its been a really strong start to the year! We had a 4K review in Kerrang which was awesome and they also put us as one of their new bands to watch in 2013, we just want to keep the buzz going so were pushing it to as many places as possible. We cant say too much but we have a few tours booked already, which we are really excited to announce and we have some huge support slots coming up through the year so 2013 is looking very busy for us! This year is all about getting our name out there, we have built a name for ourselves locally so we just need to build on that again now and take the next step. Last year we were still recording and organising a lot so we didn’t really get much chance to get outside of Wales but this year we are ready and we are hitting all of the UK and we are going to be hitting it hard!
We’ve noticed a lot of interest in the band recently, especially since the release of your music video – how are you dealing with your recent popularity?
It’s very overwhelming, we have never really had anything out there that people can listen to so for people to just hear our name is cool enough. For people to get behind us and push our band as much as they have has been incredible
Do you see it influencing your music in a new direction?
No, it’s hard not to get sidetracked and pulled towards a certain direction, especially with certain genres being very big at the moment, we have experimented with our style of writing and it just wasn’t us and we knew we weren’t being true to ourselves so we’re just sticking to how we do things, write what we like and as long as we are 100% happy with it then that’s all that matters.
Who’s been the biggest musical influence to the band?
That is a very difficult question to answer as we all have a wide variety of influences. If we had to choose 1 common influence I think it would be While She Sleeps. Those guys are achieving big things at the moment and writing songs that have everything in them we are aiming for. They have songs that are both heavy and melodic but you can always tell it’s them when you are listening.
Best experience in the business?
Our EP show for sure! There was a bit of a buzz about it but we didn’t expect to pack it out! The show its self was mental people brought inflatable’s, dived of PAs and just went mental it was crazy! We hit full capacity in the venue which I think is about 300 people so it was so nice to have the support, when our intro come on people started to cheer and I turned to our drummer and nearly started crying. We’ve never had that reaction before (get the violin!), so huge thank you to everyone who made it down to that we are so grateful.
Tell our readers an interesting fact about the band?
We use the same practice room as the guys in Bullet For My Valentine and Funeral For A Friend.
What’s the last album you bought?
Breathe In Life by a band called Betraying The Martyrs. I had seen them live along side Motionless In White, While She Sleeps and Asking Alexandria and they really blew me away so I was eager to hear what they were like recorded because they had a huge live sounds and I was not disappointed!
Hardest thing about the current business?
The hardest thing now is getting your band noticed. There are so many great bands around these days that everyone is constantly fighting for peoples attention, just getting people to have the time to check out what you are doing is difficult.
Most embarrassing clothing item owned by you or a band mate?
I own a One Direction top – it was a present from my great nan, I suppose she heard I was in a band and got the wrong idea. I wear the shit out of it when she’s around but that’s about it haha.
Any lastly, one question we ask everyone – If you could go back to any era, which would it be?
It would be cool to go back to the 70s. Things were a lot more care free in those days.
Discover When We Were Wolves on Facebook –
https://www.facebook.com/whenwewerewolves1
