RELEASE FEATURE: Legions

27 August 2014 | 1:59 pm | Staff Writer
Originally Appeared In

Sydney's Legions have come a long way in their musical evolution since their inception. With the release of their latest 7" 'Apparition Songs' through Broken Hive Records this growth continues, and, put simply, the lads have gotten pretty heavy.

Sydney's Legions have come a long way in their musical evolution since their inception. With the release of their latest 7" 'Apparition Songs' (through Broken Hive Records) this growth continues, and, put simply, the lads have gotten pretty heavy.

Taking cues from the more metal side of things, the band’s vocalist, Josh Clayton is happy with the path they are travelling down, affirming it's one that was a mix of conscious effort and natural progression.

"On one hand it’s sort of just what happens when you’re growing up, we sorta just became more mature with the riff writing and the writing in general so in that, it’s a progression. At the same time I personally wanted to head in that direction as well, that was a conscious thing for me, I wanted us to sound different from other hardcore bands, I was a bit disenchanted from the way some of the younger hardcore bands were going so I wanted to make it a bit different, go for a heavier vibe without bowing to the typical metal cues," Clayton says.

The live response to the band's new release has been positive thus far too, having just completed a run of shows with Adelaide's The Weight, Legions have received a warm welcome to the development of their sound, and its translation to the live setting.

Don't miss a beat with our FREE daily newsletter

"We’ve had a couple of tracks out for like two months or something, and people have been feeling those pretty hard, I’m pretty impressed with the way it’s all gone down. Some of the reception we’ve got from people has been pretty amazing, we’re pretty proud of it. Our release show in Sydney was perfect really, its exactly what we wanted, it was a big party pretty much with all our friends, it was cool.”

As with most major cities in our country at the moment, Legions are experiencing a time of flourishing talent in their hometown and this is something that has worked to the band's favour in more ways than one. Not only are Legions able to play shows with a great host of local peers, but these peers help more than just in a live sense to support one another, these groups equally push each other to stay different and carve their own mark on their scene, which is something that Legions have, so far, done well.

"[Coming from Sydney] Kind of motivates us to be different, and it makes us want to work really hard, as there are some awesome hardcore bands in Sydney, but there’s not one we really want to sound like or anything. As much as we support the other bands, it gives us something to direct ourselves away from and create something different.”

Through their natural progression, their hometown influence and their musical aspirations for their band, Legions have hit the nail fairly well on the head with their latest release. To complement these factors even further, the band had full control over the recording of 'Apparition Songs' as well as its writing with guitarist Elliot behind the helm for the tracking and mixing.

"We’ve only ever recorded with Elliot, mainly out of convenience, but it also helps him, because he’s trying to get experience and stuff with recording and this gives him a chance to experiment and try different things. He’s been doing quite a few Hardcore releases now around NSW, a lot of new bands are hitting him up now, which is cool. He’s pretty much setup his house to record in, he only rents a little bit of gear and most of it’s his own now which is cool. It was mastered by Brad Boatright over in the States and he did a really good job with it as well," Clayton observes.

For the foreseeable future, Legions will be doing their darnedest to slog out as many shows as they can performing the songs from their latest release, but they are also looking forward to what the future will hold for them.

"While we were making the 7” all I could think about was what we were going to do next. So while waiting for the record to come out that was my main focus, but now that it's out and seeing the kind of response that it has [received], I’m kinda happy just playing shows and stuff for the minute. We’ve got a couple things lined up, working on a couple little shows around the place and trying to get to some places we wouldn’t normally get the chance to go to, but sooner rather than later we’ll try and get another record out, we’ve already got a whole bunch of riffs and stuff in the bank, ready to pull out whenever we wanna knuckle down and work on it, but it's not the sorta thing we’re worrying about too much.”

'Apparition Songs' is a confident and well evolved release for Legions, and it shows great promise for their future recorded efforts and potential riff-filled live performances. Legions are showing no signs of slowing down (maybe musically to flog you over the head with a mid paced, 90s death metal influenced pit riff, but otherwise, no) and it's a good time to be paying attention to one of Sydney's heaviest hardcore outputs in a good while. Listen to this record, go watch the band live, bang your head a little, trem pick whenever possible.

'Apparition Songs' is out now via Broken Hive Records.