Bats Out Of Hell

Right now, Liam Cormier has every right to be in a jovial and talkative mood. The sun is beating on his skin in the English capital, he's travelling the world with his best friends, and he's taking to massive stages as the frontman for one of the most exciting and relentless bands currently doing the circuit. The Cormier-led Cancer Bats have done it on their own terms for close on a decade, and it seems that with every release the quartet not only maintain their own sonic quality, but build on and inevitably smash it.

Their fourth album, Dead Set On Living, is rock solid cover-to-cover, and has drawn praise from every corner of the punk and metal community. Even hipster tastemakers NME were applauding the record, with the headline for the band's 7/10 review reading “Balls out, riot-inducing metal madness”. Cormier lets out a chuckle when asked if he agreed with the sentiment, but beneath it you get a sense that he's already seen plenty of blood spilt to these tunes and he knows he's going to see a lot more.

“I don't know if it will induce a riot, but definitely a circle pit is the goal,” he says warmly. “We just tried to make the best Bats record that we could, that was our vibe. We're definitely stoked on where we are at as a band and the people that we've come to meet over the years who love partying with the Cancer Bats, so instead of trying to be anything else [we thought] let's just make the best Bats record to keep that party going. If other people find out about it then I'm stoked, but we know what our fans like and what our friends want to party to, so let's just keep that rolling.”

And rolling it has been. The reaction to the album was immediate amongst their rabid fanbase, a reality that's delighted Cormier. “It's rad that the record's been out now for months because kids know the words and are asking for specific songs, whether we have to play Bricks And Mortar, Drunken Physics or Bastards! y'know. It's cool to see that vibe, where people are actually that psyched, like 'Oh, I need to find one of the dudes to make sure that they'll play my jam from the record' – that's awesome.

“It's super cool to have that, when from the outset it was just about having fun, y'know what I mean? Like, let's just write jams that we're stoked on and stick to our guns in that respect, and to have all that feedback from kids who are like 'Oh, I love Hail Destroyer, this is the best, this still has those vibes,' or they'll love Birthing The Giant, like old Cancer Bats fans in Canada who hadn't seen us since 2005 and they've just picked up the new record, that's unreal. Knowing that people still want to hang out and still be a part of the band is such a cool feeling.”

Starting in earnest roughly 18 months ago, the Ontario four-piece quickly got a feeling that they were onto something special during an outdoor summer concert in their hometown. Cormier returns to the memory and talks about it as a crystallising moment for the band in terms of being on the right path for the LP.

“When we were starting just putting down some demos and working on everything, we were really lucky that some friends of ours were putting on a really cool little DIY festival in their neighbourhood in Toronto. And we played this show, we played a whole bunch of new songs, and it was just great to see that vibe already working out. People had only just heard the songs but everyone was partying super hard, and it was cool to have that feedback right before we went in the studio, just knowing that, alright, we didn't fuck it up, people were amped. It was like a high-five right before we recorded.”

Prior to the making of the 11-track release, Cormier had said that the album was going to be uplifting and optimistic in themes throughout. To a degree he's followed those statements up, the lyrics of Old Blood and closer, New World Alliance, attesting to that. However, when Cormier's best friend found himself in hospital following a brutal beat down in Toronto, the singer took stock and accepted that with the good comes the bad, and vice versa. He understood that through the ups and downs there are all sorts of things to fuel the fire – that's when the record really started to gather steam.

“Before I even wrote Dead Set I was making a huge point, like, 'I'm going to write the most positive record ever; this is what's going to go down.' Then as I was writing the album, a lot of stuff, like real life stuff, took over and it was just sort of, 'Well, not everything is the most positive.' There are certain negative things that happen and there are some times that you need to let off that steam, so it was nice to have that balance and to have that come as a natural progression and not have that be forced, where I wasn't bullshitting any fans and making out that my life is perfect. For me it's one of the most honest albums in terms of literally what I was going through at that time and how I used this record to really get through that.”

The body of work doesn't sound so much like a statement as a promise; a new outlook. And it found its identity in the same hospital bed where Cormier's friend had lain. “He actually coined that term,” he explains. “He was like, 'Y'know what? I'm dead set on living, I'm not fucking around anymore.' And that was such a huge thing for all of us and we really got behind it.”

Honest is a good term to summarise Dead Set On Living. Real is better. And after 15 minutes talking to Cormier, those same words spring to mind. There is so little ego here it's humbling, and it's this street-level attitude that has allowed Cancer Bats to build a loyal following in every corner of the globe. But there's no time to get sentimental. There are hundreds of shows still in the pipeline and loads more places to visit – including Australia. The band will play the 2013 Soundwave festival, after postponing a trip down under in June. Cancer Bats are doing nothing if not practicing what they preach. “Just thinking about being as old as we are and to still want to be touring hard and being in a band and doing what we love, it's just like 'Yes, man,' making that point that we're dead set on living from now on.”

Cancer Bats will be playing Soundwave 2013:

Saturday 23 February - Brisbane
Sunday 24February - Sydney
Friday 1 March - Melbourne
Saturday 2 March - Adelaide
Monday 4 March - Perth