Idle Ruin Are Locked And Load For Necrosonic Festival

‘We’ve had a lot of people asking, ‘when you’re coming back, when you’re coming back, when you’re coming back?’ Now’s the time! We’re back! We’re ready to kick some ass again!’

Liam Anthony the brainchild behind Idle Ruin proclaims on the eve of Necrosonic Festival in Brisbane later this month. After a few years tearing up European stages, the band arrive back home in Queensland, shaken off a few cobwebs and are ready to blow your minds as Liam brings us up to speed

‘We’ve just come back from Germany but that was with a different live lineup that I had. I’ve come back to Australia and Caleb is back. I don’t think he ever left. He’s always been part of Idle Ruin and that’s how I’ve always treated the band. No matter where I’ve gone in the world with this band, it’s always been Caleb, myself and Tim. But unfortunately, Tim has decided to hang up the bass permanently. So, we’ve got Dylan, who’s also doing double duties on the day with Hebrephrenique as well as us. He’s helped us out in the past before, so when we were looking for someone to help us out with Necrosonic, we didn’t think further than Dylan, we just simply messaged him and said, ‘Hey, do you want to do the gig? And he said, yes, I’ll be there anyway, so why not?’

While members have come and go, it’s always been Liam’s project, so now steeled back home, is there new music brewing?

‘We’ve been writing new songs, so we’re preparing for our next release, whether that will take shape as an EP or an album we’ve yet to decide. New Idle Ruin tunes are being written at the moment. We’ve just got the two shows this year booked, so Necrosonic and then we’re booked to do Steel Assassins in Sydney. So, we’re doing that and that’s all we have planned for the time being before we start going back to writing. But we are open to offers from Melbourne and Adelaide if they will take us this year!’

It’s the first time Idle Ruin will have played back home in over two years, so fans back home wouldn’t have seen how they grew and evolved their craft playing in places that could be considered the hotbed of hard and heavy metal.

‘We definitely seem to appeal more to the punk crowd in Germany and Berlin is a very, very big punk city. The first show we did was a mini festival called Thrash Talk that was with Grinpad from the Netherlands and Fatal Embrace, they’re sort of classic German thrash band. That was pretty cool. But we played a lot of punky and Grindcore oriented shows and originally I was in a bit of fear about how we were going to go, us being more of a death influenced sort of thrash metal band. But no, they lapped us up completely. They loved us and because they thought we were a travelling band from Australia, they treated us like headliners. Just understanding a little bit more about crossover appeal amongst different audiences and varied audiences has been something. I mean you’ll get some head bangers in the pit, but I think Australian audiences, I’m a little bit biassed with Australian audiences, I think they go a little harder.’

Necrosonic is the first show back and rehearsals have been going well.

‘As soon as (Caleb) heard that I was coming back home, he’s just been on the shredder, just switched on. So, I’ve had to basically get back in shape with drumming and we’ve had to get Dylan back up to speed with the songs and the new stuff that we’ll be playing. Oh spoiler. The stuff that he hasn’t played in the previous set that he helped out!’

Liam plays a duel role on stage as both drummer and singer, not Phil Collins or Ringo Starr because there are crushing metal riffs, stomping beats and more elaborate drum fills.

‘It’s just practice. The first few rehearsals I was doubting myself like, oh crap, have I left it too long? We haven’t got long until this show, but last night we had a jam with Dylan and we were going hard at it. It was amazing. We were all headbanging, getting right into it. I was throwing a few new improv fills and all that sort of stuff. If we can play as hard as we did in the rehearsal room last night, I think we got it down. Being a drummer/vocalist, there are sacrifices that have to be made. I often have to simplify my drumming just to accommodate my vocals. So, if you listen to our songs or even see us live, I’m not really doing anything complicated when I’m singing, it’s usually the instrumental breaks I’ll throw in something a little bit more technical because something’s got to give there.’

Necrosonic is actually a hometown gig for Idle Ruin and Liam is chomping at the bit to appear.

‘I think it’s amazing that Kento (Bartley) has brought back a few Aussie metal legends from the grave. I think he said there’s one particular Aussie metal band from the past that I think all of us would love to see reunite, but we don’t know if that’s ever going to happen. So, we’re going to do a cover. I’m not going to say who it is, so I’m going to leave that up to speculation. We’ll be debuting one new song and we’ll be playing another song that hasn’t been played live before and that special cover. So, these are the things that our fans can look forward to at Necrosonic.’

Interview By Iain McCallum

Catch Idle Ruin at Necrosonic Festival on Saturday August 23. Tickets and further information HERE…