AN INTERVIEW WITH UNDER

UNDER are an Avant Garde Doom Metal trio from Stockport, Greater Manchester and I was lucky enough to interview them right after they played a magnificent set at Rebellion, Manchester, where we talked sex, Swans and death!

(KEY = FRENCHIE, ANDY, MAYO, MATT)

FRENCHIE: How did you all come together to form Under?

MAYO: Jesus Christ, we met about 8 years ago

MATT: In college me and Mayo met...

MAYO: ...And it all kicked off from there, we had sex with each other first of all, and then the music came after!

MATT: We met Andy through a friend in university...

ANDY: I came upon this sexual relationship late in the game, but I liked it!

MATT: There's always room for more!

Under is a slightly ambiguous name, what does Under signify to you?

Feeling rough as shit from smoking too much weed!

Exactly! Being Under!

It was better than fucking Reaper Van or whatever!

Manchester's Doom & Sludge scene seems to be packed with talented bands... How do feel Under stands out from the pack?

Absolutely the best!

100% top of the mountain!
Fair play!
But in seriousness... Boss Keloid, Barbarian Hermit, Riggots, The Hyena Kill, Thing... Andy's other band, piles of sick bands... PIST! All our mates!

So basically you don't stand out?!
No, honestly we don't, there's tonnes and tonnes of awesome bands!

I find your sound to be very creepy and sinister, was that an element you consciously brought into your music?

We're all into avant garde stuff and noise...

Mr. Bungle and that kind of thing... It just naturally ended up sounding like that, there wasn't any intention there, it just happens.
I think we're creepy and sinister people ya know!
Spend a night with us, then you'll know! You'll be in on the sex games!

All 3 of you perform vocals which has become a bit of a trademark. was this something you had in mind from the start?

YES! Yep! Absolutely!
When my old band broke up, I just did vocals and the bass player left, and me and Andy had this specific idea of just being a 3 piece where we all do vocals.
Well, the original idea was to be like a punk band, we wanted to be fast like Dead Kennedys, and it just didn't end up happening.
You failed!

Yeah we fucked up somewhere!

Who is the primary lyricist, and where do these lyrics come from?

Mainly me, Andy's written a couple which are excellent... I don't know, I try to be emotive in a general way, but still try and be relatable...

I find them quite abstract and hard to delve into.

Yeah... It's kind of histrionic, misery and shit... Just nonsense!

What are your main music influences outside of Metal?

Swans and Radiohead I'd say are the two biggest non Metal influences we have.
Me and Mayo are into Mr. Bungle and Primus and stuff like that...
Experimental music.
Loads of Jazz as well.

Melt Banana.

We really love noise and shit!

What really inspires you outside of music, whether it be art, films, video games etc.?

Too many video games!

Mayo is the man for video games!

DARK SOULS! DARK SOULS!!!

You've been playing a lot of new songs live, can you shed any light on what your next release will be?

We're working on an album, but it's taking fucking ages! We've still got a lot of work to do on it, but the plan is to go back into the studio when we finish putting out the album because we already have an EP worth of new tunes after that. Mayo does all the producing and stuff, so it's a heavy load, but we think he can handle it.

Is there anything else in Under's future?

A possible tour, death...

That's too far into the future!

We have a suicide pact!

And finally... The most important question: If any of you caught your mum watching porn, would you watch it to see what she was into?

YEAH! Absolutely! Knowledge is power!

I did walk in on my parents fucking one time when I was a kid... I was in there for like 5 seconds horrified, and that image never left my mind ever!

What porn would you hope your mum would be watching?

Animal porn!

A bit of incest can go in there! Keep it in the family!

Let's end it on a dark note!

A very dark note! Let's all go hang ourselves!

YAY!!!

*photo taken from a previous Under gig at Rebellion as I stupidly forgot to take photos!

Thanks to UNDER for taking the time to chat!

July 3rd 2016 @ Rebellion Manchester.