Jesse Barnett – Stick to Your Guns ‘A True View’ of the band’s world of touring

Stick to Your Guns are no strangers to Aussie shores and they’re looking forward to jetting back down here in January for no doubt another stellar tour. Vocalist Jesse Barnett took some time to chat with Wall of Sound about the ins and outs of recording a new album, with a dash of excitement for the upcoming tour.

You guys are heading down to Australia fresh in the new year with mates from Being as an Ocean, and of course you’ve been down here a few times now, with a few headliners as well?

“[We’ve done a few] but for some reason it feels like our first proper headliner, and that’s not to discredit any other ones that we’ve done. We’ve been to Australia a few times now, I think this is our sixth time, but it definitely feels like it’s got a different vibe to it. It seems more serious, in a cool way. The last time I was in Australia, my head was in so many different places and I felt like I didn’t get to enjoy my trip so I’m coming back for redemption.”

 

A lot of people are aware of the upcoming tour, and that you’ll be sporting some hits from brand new record True Views, so for Aussie fans who may not have heard the album yet, what can you tell me about it?

“I feel so corny every time I say this and ‘cause it’s what everyone says, but it’s my favourite of our catalogue, but I think that if you’re in a band your newest record should be your favourite, and if it’s not you kind of need to reassess. When you’ve been a band as long as [we have], it sometimes gets difficult to solely do what you want to do, because being able to be in a band like ours and to consistently tour the world and make a living off, is like winning the fuckin’ lottery in my eyes. So every year that goes on, I go ‘ok well this is it, this is the last year for us, like things have been too good, everything has to come to an end’ (he laughs). I went into it [not really] giving a shit whether people like it or hate it, because we play to a genuine feel of it and we’d rather do that then trend to what’s hot right now.”

In terms of the way fans responded to the new record, do you think they sort of grasp the genuine approach that you guys took to the record and the way that you feel it came out?

“Absolutely, and I think a reason for that is [that] it works for people like who we are. We tend to be a bit ‘hardcore’ and less clean, and left wing political, so more progressive viewpoints. We know a lot of our records and a lot of our songs deal with topics of that nature and this record is an incredibly personal one about my relationships that have fallen apart. I think I’ve learnt from them and as well as well as reaching out to my mom for inspiration. Almost every song on the record and inspired by every conversation that I’ve had with her over the last two years of my life. I think people will be a little taken by surprise, especially given the American political climate currently, (like it’s a fuckin’ disaster). I think a lot of people were expecting, to get another ‘fuck Donald Trump’ song [but] lot of really great bands have already covered that so we felt like we had nothing else to add to the conversation, so we went a different way with it.”

 

Love the direction, and onto touring, it sounds like you’ve got a very busy few months coming up including the Aussie tour with Being as an Ocean, have you toured with them before?

It seems like a thousand times (he giggles), but those are our fuckin’ boys, we love them very much and we’re stoked anytime that [we can tour with them]. When you’ve been a band as long as we have, you try to come up with different things to do, and different bands to bring on tour and keep things fresh but everyone makes it a fuckin’ nightmare so we just go ‘fuck this’ and we ask Being as an Ocean and tours are always good so like why fix it if ain’t broken.”

Well we are loving the touring combination. What we are loving as well at the moment is that we just had our inaugural Download Festival ineup announced, which is really big for us, especially since we’ve lost Soundwave and Big Day Out, what do you think of the situation?

“That’s so awesome. I was surprised to hear when Soundwave took a turn and decided not to be a thing anymore, it seemed to be something that was so massive, that everyone loved. So many bands were stoked to being playing Soundwave, even though we never got to play, I knew a lot of people who did it and they said it was a lot of fun, it’s a bummer that it fell apart.”

Exactly right, but I think this is a great new chapter for Aussie metal music festivals. So finally, what can fans expect from the upcoming Stick to Your Guns upcoming Australian tour?

“The normal, we’re going to go up there and break our fuckin’ bodies and try to jump off a bunch of shit, go crazy. I think that we bring a different aspect to our music live, we tend to be a high energy group with everything that we do in our normal lives so on stage, we also reflect that, and I think it’s a mix for interesting or fun show at least I hope (he laughs).”

Interview by Ricky Aarons @rickysaul90

Stick To Your Guns – 2018 Australian Tour
with Being As An Ocean