New Music

Winston McCall Talks Parkway Drive's On-Stage Return at Knight And Day Festival

Dec 28, 2021

4 min read

Australian metal gods Parkway Drive are set to make their trimphant return to the stage at Knight And Day Festival on New Years Eve and it's going to be... orgasmic!

Yep, we went there. We also went one on one with Winston McCall to chat all about the band's triumphant return to live shows and how they're all feeling heading into this EPIC way to see out the tumultuous past two years:

"It's just a wild thing to wrap your brain around after especially after this time, like, this is the longest time I've had away from music, full stop, as far as I can remember, and then to be able to come back in Australia, New Year's Eve, Castle. Like, first show back from a pandemic, you only ever get one of those in your lifetime. Like there's only ever one return from pandemic gig. So you know, it's going to be absolutely mental [laughs]."

The band are set to fire on all cylinders with Winston revealing the Byron Bay boys have been honing in on their craft during COVID to make sure the show we get on the other side (when the next phase of Parkway Drive arrives) will be their best incarnation we've ever seen:

"We haven't been slack in the time (off) like I've been working my ass off to be to be as fit as I can be so we come back stronger, we come back harder and we come back hungrier - that's the thing, it's not like any of us were just like 'Alright, this shit's done, let's just fucking pack in the towel and hope it starts off again. We just kind of went back to the tools and just grinded and sharpened and hammered to make sure like what comes out the other side of this of Parkway 2.0 is a whole 'nother beast."

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QDrydrsHXc4&t=7s

But what can fans expect from the rebirth setlist? Well it turns out, Winston and co. have only one goal in mind:

"Wreck it. Smash Everything! I mean, when you do several years worth of touring cycles, you get into grooves and certain songs become like muscle memory and you become really attached to them. Whereas now we have zero muscle memory with it. So it's like, 'Yo, what do we want to play?' So it's a it's a pretty even mix... basically we're like, 'what are the bangers?' It was interesting playing the set through [during rehearsals] and just going 'oh shit, they don't know what they're in for. I forgot it goes this hard."

"There's some gems that we haven't played in like five years plus kind of thing. So it's basically anything that we're like 'this will cause mass destruction or mass exultation' - that's what's going in setlist!"

Surely that's enough to get you over the line... But if for some reason you're still on the fence? Winston had one more thing to say before logging off the call:

"[If] two years of not being able to gig and then at least having a shot at this once in a lifetime opportunity ain't going to get you to a gig then Jesus I feel sorry for ya. Yeah, it's gonna be epic. We know it's gonna be epic. We'll see you there."

Damn straight. Full video interview below alongside ticketing details.

Interview by Paul ‘Browny’ Brown @brownypaul

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