Beastwars' new album is comprised completely of covers.
New Zealand metal icons Beastwars are gearing up for the release of a new album - a collection of Kiwi covers.
The band’s tour to support it comes to town next month.
Drummer Nathan ‘Nato’ Hickey said the band would also be playing its second album - Blood Becomes Fire - in full to mark its tenth anniversary.
“We actually recorded the demos for that album in Whanganui. That album was conceived in your fine city.”
However, It has been over a decade since the band played a show here.
“Every few years we write an album, release an album, play some shows, and then go back into our cave to hibernate,” he said.
“It’s quite exciting to be in the full album release mode. We’re getting excited and it feels like other people are too.”
The new record - Tyranny Of Distance - is Beastwars’ fifth.
Hickey said said all the band members had been through “some big life changes” since the last album, 2019′s IV.
“Matt (Hyde), our singer, is in for remission for cancer and he put his soul on that record. He was singing about his life, singing about dying, singing about all his fears and regrets.
“When it came to writing another album, he said he really wanted to do something but he wasn’t ready to do another massive download of his life.”
It was Hyde who planted the seed for a covers album.
“He really liked that Marlon Williams song Dark Child and asked if we could do a cover of it,” Hickey said.
“I was at the airport one day and heard it on the speakers there. It was like ‘S**t, that is a really great song’. I made a demo of it, sent it to Matt and he loved it.
“Everything just spiralled from there.”
The band’s trademark heaviness remains intact on the new album.
“We really wanted to make a Beastwars record, that was the main thing.
“If we had written this song, how would it sound? We approached it right from scratch,” Hickey said.
The Whanganui gig band also features Shepherds Reign, Bad Schematics, My Damned Kind and Flower Of Hades.
Concert organiser Gioia Damosso brought Head Like A Hole and Villainy to Whanganui in February.
“That went really well so I decided to do some more rock gigs,” she said.
“There are so many electronic shows in Whanganui and all around the place and I feel like bands don’t have the same platform they used to.”
Hickey said he was a big fan of Whanganui band Pull Down The Sun.
Their music was “world-class”.
“I can’t say enough good things about them. They are great guys and really hard-working. That band is just incredible.”
As for Beastwars, he said he couldn’t believe they were about to release their fifth album.
“It’s absolutely mind-blowing to me that we’ve lasted this long.
“We’ve even started writing music for a sixth record and now it’s ‘Are we going to be like the broke Rolling Stones?’ Just playing forever.
“I’m very comfortable with the level of success we’ve had. It was never about being about the most famous band in the country. It was really about making music I loved for people who appreciated it.”
Along with Dark Child songs by Snapper, 3Ds, The Gordons, Julia Deans, Nadia Reid, Children’s Hour and Superette also feature on Tyranny Of Distance.
Hickey said it wasn’t meant to be “just a Flying Nun tribute record”.
“We’re spanning 42 years of music on this record. It’s a good stretch.
“It actually comes out on the day of the (Whanganui) show - October 13. It will be a good party.”
Beastwars play at the Whanganui Musicians Club on Friday, October 13. The show begins at 7pm.
Mike Tweed is an assistant news director and multimedia journalist at the Whanganui Chronicle. Since starting in March 2020, he has dabbled in everything from sport to music. At present his focus is local government, primarily the Whanganui District Council.