Antiskeptic: Lots In Common.

Antiskeptic play the Gabba Hotel on Friday and the Lions Den Café on Sunday.

“We're a Melbourne based three-piece new school rock band or whatever you want to call us,” starts Antiskeptic singer and guitarist Andrew Kitchen. “We've got punk roots but the musical direction of the band at this time is very much moving away from our pun origins. There's still a little bit of punk going on, on the new album but we moving into more of a rock direction. You've just got to keep evolving and you got to keep yourself interested. We're finding ourselves that we just want to branch out more.”

Does that mean you'll be playing different types of shows other than gigs in the punk vein that you've already done, like the Warped tour and shows with Unwritten Law, Lucky 7 and Millencolin?

“Yeah, I hope so. I'd like to become the type of band that we can transcend genre with the shows we play, so the band can continue to grow and multiply it's fan base rather than just playing to the same people all the time.”

Your new CD is called Memoirs Of A Common Man, what makes a man common?

“Everyday life, just being... I guess we were just thinking of all these album names and we were very conscious of the fact that we're just everyday guys writing music that we love and we just wanted to capture that by creating a sort of fictitious character from which the album name came from. Just like 'hey these are memoirs from a common man’. I'm the songwriter for the band and I thought of the name for the album. Just being real with people, honest and expressing yourself.”

What are you out to achieve with this album?

“We're out to establish ourself in the scene. I'd like people to use our band name along side the likes of Bodyjar, For Amusement Only, The Mad Dash; the bands that people talk about and that people know. What I'd like to achieve with the band on a personal level I basically wanted to be in a band that I could have full musical outlet where the other guys in the band were really willing to try things. I wanted to be in a band where my song writing wasn't hampered in any way. I'm no Beethoven but I've been playing guitar for the last 15 years and I feel with the other guys in the band they really compliment where I'm at. That's what every songwriter wants; to be in a band where you don't have to water down your ideas.”