ONE ON ONE: AN INTERVIEW WITH DURENDAL!

I’M GOING TO ASK YOU FIRST, HOW IS IT YOU SAY THE BAND NAME?

Will: Durendal!

SO THERE WE GO, WE’RE HERE WITH DURENDAL. DO YOU MIND INTRODUCING YOURSELF?

Will: Yeah, so I'm Will, I'm on vocals.

Carl: I’m Carl, I'm one of the guitarists.

Harris: I'm Harris, I'm on drums.

SO YOU JUST HAD A REALLY PACKED SET TODAY AT THE GUILLOTINE STAGE / EBGBs. HOW DO YOU THINK IT WENT? ARE YOU HAPPY WITH IT?

Will: Very warm, very packed. I think I didn’t really expect it to be as rammed as it was. It was a really awesome reception. We’ve not been to Liverpool before, this is very early on for us. So to have such a warm reception straight out the gate has been really nice. So yeah, awesome.

Carl: Three hour drive home as well man, that's some shit, that's horrible.

ARE YOU DRIVING HOME TONIGHT?

Harris: Yeah, it's alright though.

Will: It's alright.

Carl: Not with his driving!

SO LIKE YOU SAID, IT WAS A REALLY PACKED VENUE, I THINK THEY STOPPED PEOPLE GOING IN AT ONE POINT, SO THEY HIT CAPACITY IN THERE.

Carl: What’s the capacity in there?

60-70 MAYBE. IT WAS PACKED, AND WELL DESERVED, YOU HAD A LOT OF PEOPLE THAT WERE SINGING ALONG. THERE WERE A LOT OF PEOPLE IN THERE THAT KNEW THE WORDS!

Will: Surprisingly, yeah. Again, we've only been a band for a couple of months now. We dropped our EP back in May so again, for people to know the words this early on it's like really humbling and really lovely to see that sort of stuff so yeah, I'm excited to just keep going and hopefully get that same sort of reception elsewhere.

IT’S BEEN QUITE A BIG DAY FOR YOU, AT MIDNIGHT YOU HAD A NEW SINGLE COME OUT, ‘BY THE SWORD’ ON YOUR LABELS COMPILATION ‘THE COMING STRIFE’. YOU’VE GOT A LOT OF REALLY GOOD BANDS ON THAT LABEL, IS THERE ANYONE THAT YOU’RE REALLY HAPPY TO BE AMONGST ON THERE?

Carl: Cauldron!

Will: Yeah, Cauldron, Long Goodbye. God, who else? Dandelion as well. A lot of really awesome UK bands and a lot of really amazing overseas bands as well. You've got bands from Europe, Japan, America. But in particular, Long Goodbye and Dandelion who showed us love right from the start with our first few shows. But again, every band we're really honoured to be a part of and we're just happy to see the traction that it's already got and again, it's only been a few hours so we'll see how it goes. But yeah, it's been an amazing reception so far

AS WELL AS THAT, YOUR DEBUT EP CAME OUT IN MAY, ‘MONUMENT’. HOW WAS THE RECEPTION FOR THAT? IT SEEMS TO BE MONUMENTAL FOR YOU!

Will: Yeah we weren't really sure how it was gonna come together. We dropped a single and then we dropped another one and then we were approached by Oli at The Coming Strife who wanted to work with us and instantly it was like 100% yes we want to do this with you and it’s just absolutely elevated the reception with that. I think we’ve come at a very good time for this sort of genre. Especially in the UK, there’s an amazing crop of bands that we're lucky to be a part of a scene with and it's just, I think everything’s just come together quite nicely and it’s good to sort of bring back a really classic sound, especially like with bands that we all grew up listening to. It’s a genre that we love so to be able to sort of like bring in that new era with so many other bands it's really cool and yeah the receptions just been amazing with it so anything more than what we could have expected

IT REALLY HAS BEEN RECIEVED SO WELL ANYONE WOULD THINK THAT YOU CAN GO IN LONGER THAN SIX MONTHS! AS YOU SAY, THERE’S BEEN QUITE A REVIVAL IN OLD-SCHOOL METALCORE AT THE MOMENT. YOU’VE GOT YOURSELVES, CAULDRON AT THE FOREFRONT. BUT OTHER THAN YOUR FELLOW LABEL-MATES, WHO ELSE WOULD YOU SAY SHOULD BE HAVING A LIGHT SHONE UPON THEM?

Carl: Balmora would be my answer even more so than they’re already getting.

Harris: I mean they’re just blowing up aren’t they Balmora. There's a lot of American overseas bands that I really like. The Ethera record, so it’s like the bands that I know a lot, they’re not a band anymore, but big them up pretty much. Since My Beloved, a lot of them youth era bands that are a bit of an influence but also like, I’m glad that metalcore is back up again and running.

THE GOOD TYPE OF METALCORE AS WELL!

Carl: We want crabcore mate that’s what we want

IS THIS YOUR LAST FESTIVAL OF THE SEASON?

Will: So we've got two more festivals coming up so we have a festival in our hometown in Leicester called crowded so we're the only sort of band thats like so much of the metalcore genre that's playing out there so it's gonna be a bit of like a wild card set for us but it's a hometown show so I'm hoping that it's gonna be a good one and then, we've also got a festival in Luton called Castle Fest as well. Again, there's a good mixture of bands but we're hoping to sort of like bring the metalcore variety to it but yeah we've got a few shows over the next few weeks but we're kicking off that sort of like the crop of shows from today onwards. This has really set the bar. So we'll just see how all the other ones do.

HOPEFULLY ALL OF THE OTHER ONES COME TO THE SAME STANDARDS AS TODAY. OBVIOUSLY YOU HAD A REALLY AMAZING SET. IT WAS SO WARM IN THERE!

Harris: Every time I've played at a venue in Liverpool, it’s always been so sweaty. Do you know the venue Outpost? That venue has always been a sweatbox every time I've played there.

YOU’VE HAD THE SINGLE COME OUT TODAY, WHAT’S NEXT FOR YOU GUYS?

Will: We're really sort of like just spit balling ideas at the moment. We're always constantly like these two are always constantly writing stuff. It seems like we're just like having like a crop of songs pop up every few days.

Carl: We just get drunk and write the things we want.

Will: It's the method. It's the way of doing things. We're just going to take a couple of weeks off and just hopefully sit down and brainstorm and get focused with some new songs. Hopefully some that are as impactful as what we've already put out and hopefully we'll see what goes from there. There's infinite ideas of what we can do next. So, hopefully next year is going to be a big one for us. But yeah, watch this space really.

HAVE YOU HAD A MOMENT TO JUST CHILL OUT AND LOOK AT EVERYTHING YOU’VE DONE SINCE THE RELEASE?

Carl: No!

Will: Honestly, no. I think because we’re all in other acts as well. It’s just constantly music music music all the time. It’s been a mile a minute but its what we’re prepared for. It's all been positive sort of stuff at the moment so it's more than what we could ask for.

I’M REALLY GLAD THAT I GOT TO SEE YOU TODAY! IT VERY MUCH SEEMED LIKE ON OF THE MOST HYPED SETS OF THE FESTIVAL, EVERYONE WANTED TO BE THERE.

Carl: You should have listened to us; you have a month mate!

Will: Big improvement.

ARE YOU HEADING STRAIGHT OFF OR ARE YOU HOPING TO STICK AROUND?

Will: Going to stick around, support some of our friends. Just enjoy Liverpool.

ANYONE IN PATICULAR?

Will: Obviously we've got to support I mean some of us are watching Long Goodbye right now. We're going to stick around for Cauldron as well. So many incredible bands. Heriot, SeeYouSpaceCowboy as well. The list goes on. There's just too many to name, hopefully stick around as long as we can.

THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR TAKING THE TIME TO SPEAK TO ME TODAY, AND HOPEFULLY NEXT TIME YOU’RE A BIT HIGHT UP ON THE BILL. MAIN STAGE?

Will: We’ll see, no pressure!

Carl: What time did we play? About 5? Perfect time for me. Don't get back at 2 in the morning. I can go to sleep!

WELL IF YOU KEEP GOING THE WAY THAT YOU ARE YOU’LL BE ON THIS STAGE!

Harris: I'm happy doing that.

THANK YOU SO MUCH GUYS!

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