Sit back, close your eyes and think of Devon. A never-ending summer’s day, ice-cream on the beach and lazy-days spent catching a tan to a tune of distant seagulls. Unfortunately for the day-dreamers, your illusion may be about to shatter, and Devonshire-based pop-punk/hardcore band Not So Righteous might just be the reason.
Being compared to the sound of blink-182, A Day to Remember and New Found Glory, the lads are generating huge hype in the South-West, and with their debut EP ‘A Nasty Way To Go’ proving increasingly popular, we caught up with frontman Brett Daniels to chat all things righteous.
Involved in projects together previous to NSR, friends Jordan (Guitar) and Cameron (Bass) had visions of producing a sound unlike anything they had done before, and enlisted the help of Alex (Guitar), Matt (Drums) and Brett to enable the dream to become reality.
“The majority of the songs were written to accommodate the heavier style that the band was keen to produce and were now able to with the clean vocals / screams dynamic.
“When the first two tracks we released as singles, ‘The Captain’, and ‘Bitter Taste’, started taking shape, the fire was lit and we really thrived from the experience, and it pushed us to really get stuck in on the tracks that followed.”
You would be forgiven for mistaking this as a process where the road was one travelled smoothly, but with the six-track EP drawing on the band’s real-life personal experiences of loss, toxic relationships and overcoming ‘whatever life throws at you’, it is echelons apart from the fictitious tales told by an increasing number of artists today, particularly when it comes to track ‘Drift’.
“Lyrically, I wrote this track about my own struggles with depression, specifically the impact of losing my mother to cancer around the same time my partner was 6 months pregnant with our daughter, and the overwhelming lasting impact those events in sequence have had on me.
“It’s an incredibly cathartic song to perform as I know the majority of people can relate and feel what I’m singing. The other side of it for me is [I] know although she’s not around to see me perform, she’s still a part of the performance.”
The fire in the stomach looks far from dimming for Not So Righteous, not only as they push even harder to write their next collection of tracks, but as they are actively encouraging those who may not usually attend heavier shows to experience their music on a personal level.
“We try to get everyone involved, there’s a bit of something for everyone in our music and we want our shows to be the same.
“We’ve had an exceptional response, and we’re so grateful to everyone that has supported us and streamed our songs, bought posters, shared our posts on social media and come to our shows.”
‘A Nasty Way To Go’ is really all about bringing people together to understand and learn from past experiences, using the lessons gathered from navigating different paths of life to do so, and sees the band urge listeners to take the time to look after themselves and check in on those around them.
“Loss is like a heavy weight, it never gets lighter but as you go on you get stronger and it becomes easier to bear day by day.”
Find Not So Righteous online on Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube. Stream and download ‘A Nasty Way To Go’ here.
