Here we go again… Last year we covered every band on the Hobgoblin New Blood and Jagermeister stages in the run-up to Bloodstock 2015. This year, we’re going one better and aim to have interviews from all the bands on those two stages as well as all of those on the SOPHIE stage prior to the event kicking off on August 11th. That’s almost 100 interviews to get online for you lucky people over the course of the next couple of weeks. I bloody love this job, but you lot owe me a beer at Catton Hall, right?
Thanks to all the bands who’ve taken the time to respond!
Brutai – SOPHIE stage, Friday
Frontman Felix provides the answers…
Simple things first – where are you guys from?
We’re mainly based in London. Myself, Henry and Alex have been in London all our lives. Mathieu is originally from but moved to London a few years ago and our bass player Christian is based in Reading
How did you meet?
The band was started by myself and Henry. We used to jam at school to all the classics such as Metallica and Megadeth during music lessons and breaks. As chance has it Alex was also in the same form class and we all have fairly similar tastes in music and a real appreciation for big choruses and huge vocal melodies. A few came and went but we finally settled on the current line up around a year ago.
Alex had been writing a little bit previously with us but both him and Mat ed about 2 years ago. Mat chased our manager down the street after hearing the band needed a drummer and recognizing her and it was a fairly straight forward decision that he was the guy to bring a different groove and style to the music. A year ago Christian started by filling in and doing us a favour at Tech-Fest and it just clicked – we all just got on so well.
How long have you been playing together as a band?
I’d probably say that although we’ve been under the name Brutai for a number of years we’ve probably only started to become a more “serious” band from 2012 when we started writing our debut EP. That’s when the music took a more serious direction.
Where does the name of the band come from?
It actually came from the similarity to the word Brutal. When we first started writing music in school our music probably was classed under more of a brutal style. It was heavier and less melodic, but as our sound progressed over the years we’d grown accustomed to the name and really love it, even if our music now is a lot less “brutal”.
What are your influences – individually or as a band?
I think we all have individual music tastes that cater to our own sound. Myself personally I’m quite a big lover of 70’s/80’s pop music as well as soul music too. I think that’s why you’ll find a bit more catchy and hooky choruses in our music. Henry for example is really into his electronic music which is why you may find cool electronic sounds on our record.
Describe your music. What makes you unique?
I think what makes our music unique is the amount of different influences we bring to the table whilst still having our own identity as a band. Journalists have a hard time pigeon-holing us, to put us under a certain category and that is what I think makes us unique. We’re certainly a metal band but it’s the subgenres that many people have found hard to put us in category wise. We’ve also been told we sound like bands at completely different ends of the spectrum for example: We were recently described as a mixture of The Pet Shop Boys and Pantera, and I love that as I really enjoy both of them.
What’s your live show like – why should the baying hordes troop over to the stage you’re playing to watch you?
If you enjoy big riffs, big grooves and big choruses then you’ll love our set for sure! We give 100% every show no matter how big or how small. Expect super high energy too and plenty of crowd interaction as it’s important to encourage the audience to enjoy the show along with us. Very much like one big party!
When/how did you find out you’d been selected to play at Bloodstock?
We were invited to play the festival and it was very much down to the tenacity of our manager emailing and being in with the organisers. We’d released our single “Deep” and had some amazing press and coverage from it and Bloodstock took notice! We found out ourselves over email as soon as our manager got the news. There were a few beers to celebrate later that night!
What sort of setlist can we expect?
You can expect a mixture of new and older material. New tracks from the album and plenty of tracks from our EP. It’s important to have a balance of both as we want to keep our fans happy with playing older material as well as giving them new music to enjoy
Which main stage band do you most hope you’re not clashing with so you can see them play?
100% Gojira! One of my favourite bands in the world and would seriously consider not playing our own show to go and watch them! I wouldn’t really… I’d just be upset if we didn’t have the chance to watch them.
What are you working on at the moment?
We’re working on a new single release in the coming weeks and also the business side of our album. It’s all well and finished and we’re so proud of how it’s sounding! Just need to sort logistics of a release date and other business related stuff. Looking for a release towards the end of the year, well in time for our UK tour in January with Devil You Know, Westfield Massacre and Wearing Scars.
What’s the wildest thing you’ve seen or done on tour?
I’m not sure about wildest but definitely most stupid thing I ever did on tour was urinating on the streets in Glasgow and then getting stopped by police and fined on the spot! Not my most proud moment but at least it made everyone else laugh and we had a story to tell.
What advice would you give to a young band just starting out today?
I’d probably say that if you want to take it seriously you have to treat your band very much like a business. Having great music is the most important thing, but if you don’t have everything else in check you won’t get very far. Invest smartly, budget wisely and make sure you dedicate enough time and energy into it. Especially if you’re juggling a full time job whilst in a band. It’s kind a necessary evil especially starting out as a young band because you’ll need to invest your own money at the beginning to take things further to the next step. Lastly I’d say be professional and be easy to work with, as no one wants to help a dick-head.
If you could be part of any 3-band line-up who else would you have on the bill? One band above you and one below – a chance to plug a smaller, unsigned act!
Quite a tricky one as I’d still class Brutai somewhat as a smaller band, but I’ll tell you about a couple of new releases from two really new bands that I have high hopes for. Really loving the new release from a band called Novena with Secondary Genesis really great prog metal there! Also a band worth a mention is For The Oracle and their release Kind Child, again very great heavy prog rock. I expect big things from those bands so I’d say they’d be great to tour with as a “smaller” band.
With bands bigger than us I’d really love a tour package with ourselves and a band called Vola. They’ve recently signed to Mascot Label and their album Inmazes is simply stunning! Have not stopped listening to it! I’m also in love with the most recent Fightstar record… It’s not a band I’ve been into at all, until they released Behind The Devils Back. It’s just got everything I look for in music, likewise with Vola and what Brutai aim for when writing. Big riffs, great electronic sounds and atmospherics and huge choruses and great use of vocal harmonies. To tour with those two bands would be a dream as I feel we’d all complement each other sound-wise
What stage / time are you playing at Bloodstock (if you have your slot yet!)
We’re playing on the Sophie Lancaster stage on Friday the 12th but we’re unaware of the official time unfortunately… We’re presuming we’ll be on in the early afternoon though!
