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Interview: Joel and Matt of Endless Heights

Following the release of 2018 game changing full length ‘Vicious Pleasure’, I was able to catch up with both Joel (vocals) and Matt (bass) to chat about all things Endless Heights. The recent album has earned great success and has shown how the last ten years of being in a band has paid off. In this chat, I exclusively find out the band’s highest and lowest points as I caught up with them in a pub in Manchester, in the UK while on tour supporting Casey & Rarity.

ME: It’s been 10 years since the birth of Endless Heights, what made you want to start this band in the first place?

Joel: I think, like, going to local shows made me want to play in a band. I actually performed for Opera Australia as a child, like full on, costumes, make-up, dancing in the Sydney Opera House and then became friends with the guys in Endless Heights where we started going to local hardcore shows. All of a sudden, you didn’t need to be a fully trained singer to be able to share your heart with people. For me, since that moment i was like ‘we’ve gotta do this’.

ME: At when point in your career have you sat down and thought, yeah, we can do this for the rest of our lives, if that point has even come yet?

Joel: Yeah, the rest of our lives is a big one. I reckon though that we got serious about it, I feel like we’ve come full circle a few times, with wanting more from playing in a band. I mean, we’ve always just been best friends wanting to play music together, but for the most part we just want to hang around as best mates and see as much of the world as we can by playing in a band. When we wrote Vicious Pleasure…

Matt: It was kind of just a make or break point.

Joel: Yeah, exactly. Kind of like, oh crap, this is good enough for us to really run with it again and it made me want it all again.

Matt: there was almost a breaking point before we done the record. Everyone’s got their own lives and everyones doing their own things and we weren’t sure if the band was gonna keep going or if we could keep up the momentum and then we wrote Vicious Pleasure and we were like ‘fuck yeah we can do this’.

Joel: Yeah, we kind of feel like we need to merit that record with you know, the push it deserves.

ME: Yeah, a sick record by the way. Especially ‘Run’. ‘Run’ is my favourite track off the record.

Joel: Hey, you never know, we might be playing it tonight!

ME: Whats the biggest and best thing thats happened to you all since being in this band?

Joel: That is a very hard question.

Matt: For me, its being able to travel the world with my five best mates. Getting to see all these crazy new things like back in 2014 we went to South – East Asia and we played in these remote locations that bands would hardly ever travel to. Like, we went to West Sumatra and rode motorbikes through the jungles and to the beach and like

Joel: Secret beaches!

matt: It was just absolutely wild and its not something that I would have ever done if…

Joel: You would never be able to get there without the connection through music and I think its all the same for me. The sense of adventure that the five of us have enjoyed from this vehicle that is a band is just so out of this world. Our driver for this tour took us to Cesky Krumlov in Czech Republic, like this tiny little village thats like an ancient city, which is preserved, a heritage listed city or something like that. He like introduced us to all his mates and we stayed at his mums house and we just became good friends and he really showed us the in’s and out’s of the place that you would just never get as a tourist or whatever. You’re not gonna meet people in a hostel like that ya know? that to me is the ultimate luxury of playing passionate, alternative music.

ME: And, on the opposite side, what the biggest challenge you guys have faced so far while being a part of Endless Heights? Has there ever been a point when you’ve thought ‘oh, no, I don’t want to do this anymore?

Joel: I think its normal to have those thoughts. For us, for us we are all very multi-talented and passionate people with a lot of interests outside of the band. Like, Matt’s got his own business, a few of us work in corporate IT and Jem is like a flute teacher. We do such a mix of passions and pursuits.

Matt: So the biggest challenge is balancing all that with the band.

Joel: Yeah, balancing that with the band when living in Sydney isn’t an easy thing and because we have so much history, we’ve been friends for ten years but i’ve known Matt since I was four years old, we really love and respect each others lives. So, whenever the band starts to intrude on that we almost, like at times its been difficult to deal with that, ya know? I feel like it would be easier if it was just this new band but we’re a family we’re not a business which is the strongest thing about us but can be really tricky on times.

ME: There’s a lot of great heavy music coming out of Australia at the moment, what are your personal favourites? Except for yourselves obviously.

Matt: We’ve made some good friends in Ocean Grove.

Joel: Sam from Ocean Grove Mixed Vicious Pleasure, the drummer, and mastered it. And our friends in Ill Natured from Newcastle in Australia just released the most insane record. A band people will hear of soon called Wreath from Sydney, they’re about to release the heaviest record we’ve ever heard.

ME: Should I be scared?

Joel: You should be terrified!

Matt: We’re also good mates with Northlane and stuff like that, we did a tour with them a couple of years ago, they’re killing it obviously. But i mean, theres so many to name, but they’re the main ones for us.

ME: So, what song are you most looking forward to playing tonight and what part of your set has gone down the best with the audience here in the UK?

Joel: Go on Matt, what do you reckon?

Matt: I really enjoy playing the new songs off the record. I mean, theres a point in the set where I don’t even play, and its one of my favourite things to watch. And then we come on and play a neatly fucking track called Run.

ME: Yes!

Joel: Yeah so from that record we play Paralyse, and i think that from the feedback we’ve been getting overnight is really…

Matt: And that crazy change in dynamic from super soft to like the heaviest shit we’ve ever written.

Joel: Its funny because at these shows most people have never heard us before, which is such a privilege to play to these rooms full of people. We’re super grateful for Casey for having us in that environment but theres lots of chitter chatter while we play and between songs and then we start playing Paralyse and the room just goes silent… and then we play Run and the room can’t stop moving.

Matt: And Joel always gets a bit of a clap going in Run and you look around and almost every single person in the room is clapping and you’re just like ‘alright! I think they like it this is cool’. And thats absolutely wild for us, being on the opposite side of the world and all thats going down, its sick.

ME: Finally, whats different about touring over here compared to touring in Australia?

Matt: Europe has the most amazing hospitality we’ve ever seen. you rock up to a venue and they’ve got showers, they’ve got catering…

Joel: They’ve got towels! Which is crazy for us.

Matt: They’ve got like shit loads of alcohol.

Joel: UK Reminds me of Australia, you just got some water. But thats alright we’re used to that completely.

Matt: But the biggest luxury is not having to do ten hour drives when you want to get to the closest city.

Joel: Exactly, every show in Australia we drive ourselves for ten hours, where as here in Europe and UK we have, we’ve invested in a driver and we’re really appreciative. Plus, you have big vans, like really big vans over here. So, not having to drive for a full day or overnight between shows is the biggest luxury in the world to us.

 

Follow the lads on Twitter by clicking here.

Check out my review on the show here.

 

About Shay Jenkins

I'm Shay! I'm a University student in West Wales, UK. I'm all about music.

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