Review Fix chats with Steven Campbell, lead vocalist and bass player of Avalanche, who lets us know how the band got together and what makes their sound unique.
Review Fix: How did the project start?
Steven Campbell: We started in Sydney at the beginning of last year when Veronica and Ryan decided to form a band. She had gone to school with his sister so that’s how she knew him, and his Dad owned a steel factory that they would rehearse in. Between them, they knew how to play every AC/DC song and would jam on a mix of blues, rock and metal songs every weekend. Eventually, Veronica brought me into the mix as they needed a lead vocalist. We went through a whole mess of bass players and rhythm guitarists until I took up bass and Veronica took over all guitar duties. We started playing our local pubs and clubs and any music venue in Sydney and out of town that would have us and started making a name for ourselves. We also spent a lot of time between gigs perfecting our setlist and original material, and recording 4 tracks for our debut EP Sent From Hell.
Review Fix: What’s your creative process like?
Campbell: It’s very collaborative. Usually one of us will come up with a riff or a title or some kind of idea and bring it in to rehearsal and then we’ll work on it with the rest of the band. Sometimes its very spontaneous and we can work out a whole song together on the spot at rehearsal, other times, me or Veronica will go home and work on it by ourselves and structure it in our own time and then bring it back to the band to complete, and were constantly trying to get it as close to perfect as possible. We just think if you go through the trouble of writing a song, why not try to make it the best song it can be?
Review Fix: What’s your standout song?
Campbell: Our standout song I guess would be Balls Deep, it’s the second single we released off our double EP and it just encapsulates so much about us, a fast paced song with a massive ending and lyrics centred around a sexual innuendo, it’s a true hard hitting song in our opinion.
Review Fix: How was it written?
Campbell: We wrote it from a guitar riff that I had from my last band that we didn’t end up using, which Veronica then turned into the main riff with a few different tweaks and structured it into the song. She gave me the title Balls Deep and then I went and wrote lyrics to it. Then we worked heaps with Ryan who helped us structure the buildup at the end to get to the level we all wanted it to end up being. Like most of our songs, it’s a mashup of ideas from all three of us that we structured into what you end up hearing.
Review Fix: What are your goals for 2019?
Campbell: We are releasing our debut double EP ‘Sent From Hell’ on May 1st, a mix of 4 studio recording and 4 multi-tracked live recordings, and were gigging relentlessly for the next few months to promote it. Beyond that our main goal for this year is to play a major Australian music festival and do a tour out of state.
Review Fix: How do you want your music to affect people?
Campbell: We just want people to have a good time when they listen us. That’s it.
Review Fix: What’s next?
Campbell: Were booked out with gigs until July for the EP release and are constantly booking more gigs so if you’re in Sydney be sure to catch us at one of our shows! You can also buy the EP on iTunes and bandcamp from May 1st or you can buy CDs directly from us thru Facebook, it will also be available to stream across all streaming services. Cheers and rock on!
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