RISE UP TOUR
www.riserecords.com
Featuring triple headliners:
MEMPHIS MAY FIRE
www.memphismayfire.com
The music of Memphis May Fire is the sound of hope and compassion, delivered by a dedicated group of men striving for something greater than the world around them. Memphis May Fire is a clarion call to those who insist on bettering themselves, their loved ones and the conditions afflicting the world. It’s not about divisive politics, it’s not about polarizing debate – it’s about the transcendent power of love through heavy rock.
The body of work Memphis May Fire has crafted over their last three albums, together with producer and collaborator Cameron Mizell (Sleeping With Sirens, The Word Alive), represent…s a creative achievement beyond even what the band’s formidable success would suggest. Sure, Unconditional arrived at #1 on Billboard’s Rock, Independent and Hard Music charts, but that was just the mainstream icing on a cake that was lovingly baked by fans around the world who’ve discovered Memphis May Fire in the live setting, from satellite radio, from social media and from each other.
These five guys are like family to over a million fans following Memphis May Fire on Facebook, the tens of thousands who rushed out to put this year’s Unconditional at #4 in the Billboard 200, the dedicated diehards who empty the magazine rack whenever the group graces the cover of Big Cheese, Alternative Press, Outburn, etc. and the early believers who made Challenger the highest selling debut ever for Rise Records to that point when it was released in 2012. YouTube clips like “Sleepless Nights,” “Miles Away,” “The Sinner,” and “Vices” together represent more than 20 million views.
The unity of shared purpose is palpable at a Memphis May Fire show, whether songs like “No Ordinary Love,” “Beneath the Skin” or “Losing Sight” are blasting from the Warped Tour’s main stage or emanating from the speakers at one of the packed clubs the band makes their nightly home. Cares cast aside, problems pushed to the forefront, the visceral connection between artist and audience is alive and audible with each sing-a-long chant. Melodic mood swingers like “Speechless” and “Need to Be” demonstrate the full capacity and scope of what Memphis May Fire is capable of doing, winning them spots on major radio festivals like Welcome to Rockville and Carolina Rebellion as their heavier side secures fests such as Download and With Full Force.
An organic and incremental growth has propelled Memphis May Fire ever since they followed their underground 2009 debut album with 2011’s The Hollow, a modern metalcore masterpiece that led into the broadened musical horizons of their commercial breakthrough, Challenger, and the 2014 Album of the Year contender Unconditional.
Plenty of Memphis May Fire’s contemporaries have fans that profess their adoration, gratitude & even spiritual connection to the power of music, but few groups embrace the full responsibility inherent within those reactions the way Memphis May Fire has, acknowledging that something bigger than rock n’ roll has taken hold. Make no mistake, Memphis May Fire deliver hard rock anthems steeped in modern subculture and the best of radio rock, but their purpose continues to evolve into something greatly bigger than themselves, with no limit as to what they can achieve.
THE DEVIL WEARS PRADA
www.tdwpband.com
Dayton, Ohio Christian metalcore act the Devil Wears Prada took their name from the novel and movie, but rebranded it to fit their anti-materialistic ethics. Formed in 2005, the band consisted of singer and lyricist Mike Hranica (who handled the death growl vocals), guitarist and vocalist Jeremy DePoyster (who performed the clean vocals), guitarist Chris Rubey, bassist Andy Trick, keyboardist James Baney, and drummer Daniel Williams (Hranica and Rubey also had an experimental grindcore side project band called xGUMBYx). This lineup recorded the 2005 EP Patterns of a Horizon, which was self-released with individual hand-painted covers. Signing to Victory Records’ positive-themed subsidiary Rise, the Devil Wears Prada released Dear Love: A Beautiful Discord in the summer of 2006. After selling more than 30,000 units of their debut, they went back to the studio and began plugging away on 2007’s Plagues. With Roots Above and Branches Below followed two years later. They followed it with a concept EP about the apocalypse titled Zombie in 2010. Both of these latter releases debuted in the Billboard Top Ten; the band was also a star live attraction, headlining — and selling out — its own tours for three years running. In the summer of 2011, they headlined the Vans Warped Tour as a precursor to the release of their fourth album, Dead Throne, which was produced by Killswitch Engage’s Adam Dutkiewicz and released in September of that year. The group’s first live album, Dead&Alive, followed in 2012. The Devil Wears Prada began sessions for their fifth proper album in early 2013, working with producers Matt Goldman (Underoath) and Dutkiewicz again in an executive role. The results, 8:18, appeared on Roadrunner in September 2013. After the departure of founding guitarist Rubey in early 2015, the band recorded the Space EP, which was released in August 2015.
SILVERSTEIN
www.silversteinmusic.com
It takes numbers to craft a movement out of sound. It takes numbers, and it takes throat, calloused fingers, worn out joints, and a sea of voices singing along. It takes numbers, and it takes work. It takes playing basements and community centres as much as it takes stages, and festivals. It takes years of dedication, sincerity, and community. And yet, only a few artists are so honoured as to become synonymous with their era. Since 2000, Silverstein has kept its roots firmly planted in the terrain of post- hardcore. Sixteen years later, the genre is impossible to talk about without mentioning this seminal group.
Well over a decade of performances, of writing, and recording has afforded the group time to evolve and push forward, and Silverstein have taken the whole scene on this ride with them. To speak about the differences— whether musical, lyrical, or tonal— between When Broken Is Easily Fixed and their latest effort, I Am Alive In Everything I Touch, speaks about the differences in post-hardcore at large then and now. Since the release of When Broken, Silverstein have continued to reimagine their sound, and the genre with it. 2016’s I Am Alive is a monument to their career. The record takes its listener on a tour bus driven odyssey that is all too familiar to a group used to packing its life in suitcase and hitting the road. Distant milestones, and the homeward reach help to carve out a concept that could have only been pulled off by a band with such a cultivated relationship with the terrain of North American alternative music. And though the record ends back home in Toronto, ON, you can be sure that the group doesn’t intend to let the dust settle on their suitcases just yet.
As they’ve done so many times in the past, Silverstein are hard at work in the studio and on the road this year. Their shows continue to fill rooms with energy and life, and their records continue to reach eager ears. Their music continues to marry aggression and melody in a way that only Silverstein seems able to. And their dedication to their craft is more evident than ever before. Sixteen years and their outlook hasn’t changed: more days on the road, more songs, more work, more fans, more music, more friends. The numbers grow with everything they touch.
Plus special guests:
LIKE MOTHS TO FLAMES
www.facebook.com/likemoths
LIKE MOTHS TO FLAMES have set the underground music scene ablaze in just a few short years, thanks to a decidedly unique, fresh and original take on an otherwise well-worn genre. Stomping sing-a-long anthems, pulverizing metal chaos and crystal clear/soaring shiny pop dance together with delicious freedom within the band’s sound. Bring Me The Horizon, Devil Wears Prada and Miss May I are some of the only bands doing it at the same level of intensity, precision and passion as Like Moths To Flames, who have taken their rightful place alongside their scene counterparts while steadily maneuvering a career that is uniquely their own.
Upon the band’s arrival, fans quickly became as passionate about the group’s songs as the young men who composed them. When We Don’t Exist took the early promise of the group’s debut EP, Sweet Talker, and expanded upon all of its ideas. When We Don’t Exist is broader, catchier and more fired up than the vast majority of the likeminded genre records being downloaded, streamed and otherwise consumed around the world. One listen to the group’s output is all the evidence one needs to understand why the Like Moths To Flames has dominated on the road on The AP Tour with Miss May I and The Ghost Inside, the Scream It Like You Mean It Tour with We Came As Romans and Attack Attack! or supporting groups like DRUGS. The two newer songs on the deluxe edition – “Learn Your Place” and “Shapeshifter” – inch even further toward that proverbial “next level,” looking toward the future.
Vigilant fans of the metalcore sound were well aware of vocalist Chris Roetter before the band began. Like Moths To Flames is the culmination of all of his travels, experience and relationships from the years he spent fronting Emarosa and Agraceful. The rest of the band cut their teeth in smaller acts as well. Guitarist Eli Ford was formerly in My Ticket Home. Drummer Greg Diamond came from The Air I Breathe, while bassist/backing vocalist Aaron Evans (who started LMTF with Roetter) and lead guitarist Zach Huston played in TerraFirma together.
“Aaron and I were in bands that had seen the bad side of the music business,” Roetter explains of the group’s formation. “This time around, we wanted to make sure that we were playing music that we had a good time with. We wrote music that we liked that we knew that we would like to play live. We knew we wanted to go out and have fun we want to do it our way, however we wanted.”
The band found their footing with their debut EP and then really developed their sound with their first full-length, which is chock full of angry bile and exposition reflective of a singer with plenty to get off his chest.
Like Moths To Flames embarked on the “A Metal Christmas” tour to support their inaugural EP on Rise Records, together with Texas In July and A Hero A Fake. After a lineup reshuffle that resulted in the current incarnation save for the drummer position (which shifted shortly thereafter), the band recorded their first full album, which was released in November, 2011. In the following January, they hit the road on the S.I.N. Tour with D.R.U.G.S., Hit the Lights and Sparks The Rescue. Next they found themselves back on tour with their friends in Texas In July. Next came the summer’s Scream It Like You Mean It Tour. The year wrapped up with Like Moths To Flames joining The AP Tour.
In an era of verse/chorus/verse screaming and singing, Like Moths To Flames aims for a more organic blend of the two styles that serves the song rather than a formula. Even as people continue to discover When We Don’t Exist, Like Moths To Flames are putting their eyes toward the bigger prize of album number two, which the band intends to make even “darker” and “more eerie.”
Spending ten months out of the year on the road, the group is fully committed to making music their long-term lifestyle. At the end of the day, the band’s raison d’etre is simple. “I want to be able to connect with people through writing songs,” Roetter says. “That’s something that I’ve been able to do since I was younger and that’s something that I want to continue to do. We want to be able to meet fans and people and play our music. More time out on the road playing shows for more people is going keep lighting the fire under the band to keep it going.”
FRIDAY 09 DECEMBER
THEKLA BRISTOL
The Grove, Bristol BS1 4RB
Doors 6:00pm
Ages 14+
Advance tickets available from:
www.alttickets.com
www.gigantic.com
www.bristolticketshop.co.uk
