Hellions

Formed from the ashes of Sydney band, The Bride, Hellions take everything they had in previous bands and give it a new context. Having already toured relentlessly in the short amount of time since their formation, the group have just released debut album, 'Die Young' to a positive reception. Drummer Anthony Caruso took some time to chat to us about the release and touring with the 'hardest partying' metalcore band around.

Given that Hellions is still relatively new to the scene, how would you describe yourself to the uninitiated in five words?

Five words, holy s**t. (laughs). F**k, that’s really hard dude (laughs). Eclectic, fun….emotional…..uhh...

How about we leave it at that?

Yeah (laughs). I’m not even sure about emotional. (laughs)

All right, it’s pretty well known that Hellions came after the demise of The Bride. Do you want to run us through the transition between the two bands?

Basically, when The Bride called it quits, the three remaining members, being myself, Dre, and Gremlin, pretty much weren’t ready to stop playing music, and to stop writing music. Being the main songwriters of The Bride, [we] came up with the idea of Hellions, and I guess it just kind of snowballed from there.

We found our guitarist, Lewis Usher, a really good freind who was like, “I wanna get in on this s**t” after we showed him a few songs, and then after House Vs Hurricane called it quits as well, Dylan, who played bass for them, was really keen to join. So that’s more or less how it started. I feel like it happened really quickly, but yeah, that’s it.

What is it, in your own words, that sets Hellions apart from The Bride?

I guess, the songwriting is really similar. We wrote The Bride’s album as well. I think it’s alot more cohesive though. It’s very eclectic, as The Bride’s was, [but Hellions] is just a lot more cohesive. I think it has a better vibe to it as well. Everything seems a lot more comfortable, and a lot more in place. We’ve learnt a lot from our previous bands, and we’ve put a lot of that, and a lot of our mistakes and what we’ve learnt from them into this, and I think that’s what separates it. Everything is a lot more thought out than anything else we’ve done.

You guys have just kicked off a club tour in support of your new album, Die Young. How was the first show in Sydney?

It was great, man. The response was awesome. The record wasn’t out until today, but it was streaming online, and it was cool to see people that knew words to some of the songs that had realistically only been out for a few hours. We had a lot of fun playing that show.

Joining you on your first show of the tour last night was The Plot In You and Fit For A King, did you get much a chance to hang out with those guys?

Not too much. We spoke a little bit, but it was a big night for everyone involved, and there was a lot of people there. It was a lot of fun, but yeah, we didn’t get too much of a chance to hang out with them, which sucks a bit, because they all seemed like really great dudes.

The common trend among most bands in the scene is to release an EP and then tour on the back of that for a while. What was it that made you guys choose to go ahead with a full album rather than an EP?

We actually originally planned to do an EP and do things that way, but when we were writing, we were so excited to do something new, and something different, and songs just kept pumping out. Before we knew it, we had like, 8 or 9 songs, and just thought, “we might as well just write a couple more and do an album.” So that’s how that kind of came about.

How was it working with the guys from UNFD again for the album?

It was cool. They were excited as well about working on something new as well as us. Having worked with them before as well, we all kind of knew each other, and we were all pretty open with each other, and it was really pleasant. (laughs)

On top of that, you worked with Adrian from Northlane, who are also on UNFD, on the lead single of the album, ‘Infamita.’ What was the relationship like when working with him?

We’ve known Adrian since we were kids. We all grew up in the same area, went to the same parties, all at one stage been in bands together. (laughs) It was kind of a no-brainer really. When we were talking about guests for the record, we were like, “Well, Adrian’s a bro. Let’s ask if he wants to be on a song!”

We really appreciate that he took the time out to help us with that, given that you know, Northlane are basically busy all the time at the moment. He still came and did the vocals though, and was still in the film clip, and it was really great to hang with him when we were working on all of this. It was just really awesome.

Who would you say were the biggest influences musically for you guys on Die Young?

We all listen to a huge variety of music. I think, in particular, bands like Rage Against The Machine or letlive. Even bands like My Chemical Romance, and even some hip hop artists. There was such a broad range of artists that influenced the songs which was really cool. We didn’t really set any boundaries for ourselves, which helped a lot with keeping it all interesting I guess.

In August you guys did your first national tour with Hellions as a support act for Attila, who have a reputation as one of the hardest partying bands in the metalcore scene. How was that?

(laughs) That was great but I don’t know if they party as hard as they make out. (laughs) Let’s just say we gave them a run for their money there, we’ll put it that way. That was a really fun tour, though. They were great, and we’re really good mates with those guys now. Hopefully we’ll have a chance to hang out with them again sometime.

In particular, you played two shows as a part of Loud Fest in Brisbane and Sydney on that tour. How did you find being a part of the lineup for that?

Loud Fest was really fun. We had a lot of friends on the bill. The crowds were really awesome, and really responsive, especially considering that we only had two songs out. We were blown away by the responses we were getting.

Sydney was an interesting one. We had a bit of a problem making it back in time, since we played a club show the night before in Brisbane, and we ended up not getting back in time to play our set. Luckily enough for us, our dudes in Hand Of Mercy and Confession were willing to cut their sets by a couple of minutes, so we got to come on at the end of Hand of Mercy’s set and play a couple of songs, which was a lot of fun.

So, as well as playing in Hellions, both you and Gremlin are full time members of Sydney pop punk band Heroes For Hire. How do you go about balancing both bands? Do you find that there’s any tension there?

We actually have the same management and booking agents, so we just sort of work around each other. For Matt and I, it’s hard. We’re always broke. (laughs) We’re always touring. If Hellions isn’t doing something, Heroes is doing something. At the moment, Heroes is writing some new music and it’s working out really well.

Both bands are really close friends as well. If we’re doing a Heroes tour, most of the dudes in Hellions are coming along anyway just to have a good time and to hang out and vice versa.

So having formed less than half a year ago, you’ve already toured the country once, released your first full length album, which you’re now doing your own tour of the east coast for, with another tour of the entire country around the corner with Dream On, Dreamer. Do you guys plan on slowing down at all soon? What’s in the pipeline for Hellions after that tour?

Definitely no slowing down. We want to get to as many places as we can. I think a lot of touring is on the cards and hopefully we can even get overseas. Hopefully release a few more songs, not too far down the track and just relentlessly touring. If we’re going to do it, we’re gonna do it. Might as well go hard at it while we can. (laughs) Before we get too old and jaded.

A few quick ones to finish up; Favourite album of 2013?

Oh, so far I’m gonna have to say, the letlive. record. 'The Blackest Beautiful' is probably one of the coolest releases I’ve heard so far. I think I speak for most of the band as well. It’s on very high rotation. Our friends in Bare Bones released a very cool EP recently and that’s up there.

Least favourite?

Oh, that’s a hard one. Far out.

You know what? I can’t give you an answer to that. (laughs)

Feel free to draw on time with The Bride or Heroes for this one. Most embarrassing tour story?

Embarrassing. This actually happened a really long time ago with The Bride, when we were just kids. We played a show and hadn’t really practiced too much because we were young and dumb and would rather hang out with our friends. It was one of our first headline shows and we actually got an encore, which we weren’t prepared for at all. So we went up and tried to play a song we hadn’t practiced for about six months. Our guitarist ended up just walking off stage and I reckon that was the most embarrassing moment of the tour.

If you could share the stage with any band or artist, who would it be?

I’m gonna say Slipknot. I think that would be f**king awesome. Their live show is insane and to be able to play with them would just be sick.

Any final words before we finish up?

Make sure you check out the album. It dropped today and we’re really proud of how it turned out, and we hope you guys like it as much as we do!

Hellions' new record ‘Die Young’ is out now through UNFD.