Jack the Giant Killer

Hard working Adelaide metal-core band Jack The Giant Killer have been kind enough to spare some time with us before their launch show this Friday at Fowlers Live

For the sake of the internet could you please state you name and role in Jack the Giant Killer?

My name's Andrew and I play drums

How would you describe the bands sound to someone who has never heard you before?

I commonly use the term 'progressive metal/hardcore'

"The Drowning King" is JTGK's first full release aside from two previous demos. How did you find your time in the illustrious Capitalsound Studios here in Adelaide and who took care of the mastering procedure?

Capitalsound Studios have an amazing set up with heaps of gear, needless to say we had no trouble getting the job done. I think one of the biggest contributing factors was bringing in our own engineer, Kyle Bloksgaard. The guy is one of the best dudes in Adelaide to work with and done an AMAZING job at pulling the sounds we were after.

We sent the final mix off to New Jersey to be mastered by Alan Douches at West West Side Studios. Alan's considerably well known for mastering artists such as Architects, The Dillinger Escape Plan, Everytime I Die, A Day To Remember and heaps more (Including Aerosmith haha). Everyone at WWS were a pleasure doing business with and we couldn't be more pleased with the result.

Could you please explain some of the lyrical concepts discussed on the EP and how it ties in with the artwork?

Well, I can't say for sure since I didn't write the lyrics and in my opinion Nick is a brilliant lyricist so there's normally more to his words than meet the eye but from what I can tell, the lyrics mainly relate to the suicide of his father, the end of a long term relationship and the feeling of hopelessness due to modern living.

As for artwork concepts, the art itself (especially the cover) directly relates to the layout of a common 'king' playing card. The rest of the CD layout has other concepts taken from the lyrics but I can't really say what was going through Josh's head when he drew everything up

ps: Check out http://www.joshuaandrewbelanger.com/

How can punters outside of South Australia get a hold of "The Drowning King"?

As of February 25th you'll be able to buy it from our online merch store (http://jackthegiantkiller.bigcartel.com/) and hopefully not long after that we'll land some Australia wide independent distro.

The band has just started streaming the entire EP via myspace to great acclaim. What made you choose this option as opposed to streaming it via the increasingly popular facebook Bandpage?

Well, I'm personally not ready to turn my back on MySpace just yet, especially since they've spent a good part of the last 12 months making dramatic changes to suit artists. Although I was considerably disappointed with the brutal compression applied to our audio once uploaded. The reason we chose not to upload the entire CD via Soundcloud / Roots BandPage on Facebook is that I was pretty sure if you had enough smarts you could trace the high-res files back to a location where they were all downloadable.

I know all of you (bar Jacob) are from Whyalla. How difficult was the adjustment to playing shows in a Capital city as opposed to a smaller rural town?

Not very, we'd played a few decent shows in Adelaide already, if anything it was somewhat of a step down. Shows in Whyalla were every few months so they always had good turnouts, and they were still a relatively new thing so it wasn't cool to not think they were cool yet. Not to mention that line ups constantly consisted of established bands like I Killed The Prom Queen, Parkway Drive, The Jonestown Syndicate, Through Closed Eyes etc.

The EP flows exceptionally well from start to finish which i thought was fantastic, did this come out in the studio or did you have an idea of how the songs would run into each other before hand ?

I think we always had it in mind but it directly came about after we settled on the final mix and had to specify song sequencing before sending it off to get mastered.

Favourite show?

Personally, our first show back after a short break up at Riot. It was packed, everyone (band members included) were considerably drunk and it was just total chaos throughout the whole venue. Suss this video from the show I'm talking about here (sorry the sound is disgusting).

Essential releases for the road?

Eh, I can't really speak for everyone but I'd imagine plenty of Meshuggah, Deftones, Norma Jean, and La Dispute to name a few of our favourites off the top of my head.

Best 3 ways to kill time in the tour van?

Sleep, music and talk absolute nonsense.

Thoughts on the current influx of Keyboards in mosh bands?

Your all faggots. (except Benjamin Rusanoff)

Blondes or Brunettes?

Redheads.

Will we ever see the return of This Drowning Misery?

No.

What lies in store for Jack the Giant Killer for the rest of 2011?

Start writing a full length release, tour as much as we can and play some big local shows.

Any final words, thanks or shout outs you'd like to mention?

Meh? thanks to everyone that's helped us get this far, it's been tough and isn't getting any easier. There's plenty of you and you all know who you are!