Features / Music

“I feel like it’s competitive in Nashville. I don’t feel like Los Angeles is like that. I mean it is, but I don’t think with music. LA’s more based around the film industry so I kind of feel like I’m on the outskirts of that and I can just look in and observe and do my thing."

“So we just threw this thing together, but as soon as we started playing it just sounded complete, and Christine Wheeler played a little whistle and flute on the record; she’s from up in the Blue Mountains, so she sometimes gets with us when we play, so it’s a big band – eight of us – and we make a bit of a racket.”

“This is the first tour we’ve done without the orchestra; we’ve been touring with them for almost a year. It is great, but it’s also great to go back to this, because there’s a lot of communication that is impossible to have when you have thirteen people on stage."

"We want to hit people the right way, and hopefully make something that will move people.”

"We’re even talkin’ about the next album at the moment, which is very strange, but we seem to be in a good place. Whether there’s a bit of a backlog I’m not sure really, but whatever’s happened – either that or a sense of mortality – we want to get the ideas out of our heads."

"It is what it is in that moment, and all the great albums… Led Zeppelin, I’m such a great fan of Led Zeppelin, and you know, the tempos speed up and they slow down, and they do on our album as well."

“Not that this is our last record, but we always make records like they could be our last.”

“I think the new album’s sounding good. We just premiered a new song at a gig recently and it went down really well. It’s probably the heaviest song we’ve ever written.”

"The album’s done everything I’ve wanted it to do, pretty much. It’s gotten me some pretty good recognition, it’s sold lots of copies, and it’s exposed me to that festival scene, which was kind of the goal."

Melbourne’s Be’lakor are a local band worthy of respect. Having supported the likes of At the Gates and toured overseas as part of the respective Brutal Assault and Summer Breeze festivals, the group are gearing up for this weekend’s Sonic Forge Festival. Killyourstereo.com caught up with the band recently to discuss the year, plans for the future and Australian metal.

It’s 9:15 in the morning and PNAU's Peter Mayes is relaxing in the Sydney sunshine, “getting sunburnt seeing as I’m like, the whitest guy in the world”

"You have heroin?" he asked me. "No drugs" I responded, which obviously wasn't even true, as he sniffed at my panadol, demanded an explanation for a slightly embarrassing (but not heinous) prescription medicine, and sampled my vitamin C tablets.