As December Falls‘ Ande Hunter and Bethany Curtis information us by way of the creation of the band’s newest launch, ‘The whole lot’s On Fireplace, However I’m Superb’, out on August 08 through ADF Information.
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This could be a shock to listen to, however your favorite band is struggling now greater than you realise.
Though we’re extra linked than ever earlier than, and every little thing is far more seen and susceptible than it has ever been, there’s nonetheless an underlying sense that in the event you’re making music, touring the world and gaining traction, then you definitely’re getting by simply high-quality. Though which will have been the reality previously, when artwork was held to the usual it deserved, occasions have modified, and it’s a lot more durable to easily preserve issues afloat.
For As December Falls, once they shaped a decade in the past, the purpose was to achieve the very high, to dwell like their idols who had come earlier than. However as time has handed, the realities of what it means to dwell out your dream have sunk in.
And you recognize what? They’re taking advantage of it.
“Once we began this band as youngsters in school, the top recreation was to be rock stars,” guitarist Ande Hunter smiles, humoured by the innocence of his previous self. “You’d see the decadence of the 80s and 90s within the music enterprise as one thing you look as much as and say, ‘Wow, that’s stardom’. Then you definitely get increasingly more into it, and also you begin to realise that it’s all faux. I feel that one or two bands that we now have performed with or are pals with are okay, and everybody else proper now could be fucked. We’re all struggling, and nobody talks about it. It’s a must to placed on this presentation and fake every little thing goes nice. That’s what led to this album and the honesty of what’s really occurring.”
It’s fairly clear the place inside all of this the quartet stand with a document titled ‘The whole lot’s On Fireplace, However I’m Superb’, however it’s far more than only a damning assertion on the post-COVID surroundings of other music. It’s their most diversified, unstable, and vibrant assertion, an ode to letting free and never permitting the constructing stress to maintain you down. Being sincere in each side of who they’re, each inside the band and of their on a regular basis lives, they’re making music that’s extra enjoyable, liberating, and wonderfully brash than something that they’ve dedicated to tape beforehand.
“It’s not a case of getting a ‘We don’t give a fuck’ perspective as a result of we actually do give a fuck,” vocalist Bethany Curtis remarks. “It’s extra a case of that is us. That is our true selves popping out. We’re a really sincere band, and I feel that’s what folks like. They resonate with the brutality of that as a result of we’re telling them it precisely how it’s.”
To search out out extra about this journey, Rock Sound stepped within the flames with Bethany and Ande and found what it means to come back to phrases with how issues really work and use it to your benefit.
THE SOUND
Bethany can be the primary to confess that up till now, she put limitations on what she thought As December Falls could possibly be. Arising by way of the ranks of the UK pop-punk underground, it’s simple to really feel as if you’re caught with the sound that impressed you within the first place. However when all bets are off, and nothing is for certain, it’s a bit simpler to let free and do no matter feels proper. That’s why ‘The whole lot’s On Fireplace, However I’m Superb’ covers so many various bases over its 14-song runtime. As a result of As December Falls is regardless of the band need it to be, and the liberation that comes with that realisation is boundless.
“This album looks like my most genuine self inside our music,” Bethany feedback. “Just a few years in the past, I don’t suppose I might have felt like we may have accomplished one thing like this as a result of I might have thought, ‘That’s not As December Falls’. Whereas now I really feel like, ‘Fuck it’. We’re not maintaining ourselves in our personal containers. If we hear one thing we like, we’re placing it in. And I really feel like we’re taking extra influences from issues we like this time round.”
Take ‘Prepared Set Go’, a pulsating trendy rock epic that has extra in widespread with Dimension and Sub Focus than blink-182 and State Champs. Written within the aftermath of watching Season Two of Arcane and letting their nightly periods on League Of Legends information the best way, they got down to pen a track that might soundtrack Jinx making their manner by way of the Zaun undercity. The result’s quick, livid and dripping in frantically danceable manufacturing, an experiment that may be felt pulsating by way of the grittiness of ‘Fall Aside’, too. Alternatively, there’s ‘For The Plot’, a cue from the ebook of The All-American Rejects, written with their pal Holly in thoughts, making a soundscape that might embody her chaotic power and lust for all times. Such exhilaration has additionally rubbed off on the grins that accompany the sunshine of ‘Grim Reaper’ and ‘I Can’t Relate’ too, regardless of their subject material nonetheless being notably severe. By focusing extra on the traits that outline who they’re outdoors of band life and never simply adhering to the beforehand prescribed positions inside it, they’ve enhanced their lives inside it.
“We’ve all been doing this for a very long time, and we’ve been getting higher at doing extra,” Ande remarks. “I’m not simply the lead guitarist, Timmy [Francis] is not only the bassist, Bethany isn’t simply the vocalist. And there’s a way of safety in that. Of not being scared to point out ourselves.”
A lot of this confidence to unfold their wings additional than ever earlier than additionally comes from producer Alex Copp. After approaching the band again in 2022 through Instagram DM, asking if there was something he may work on to realize extra expertise behind the desk, he has grow to be extra of a fifth member than an affiliate. Now, even being part of the band’s highway staff as a tech and managing his workspace, M2 Studios, alongside Ande, which has the recording schedule for this very document eternally etched upon its partitions, it’s a testomony to what permitting the precise folks into your world can conjure. It has additionally allowed the band to experiment at a lightning tempo, making testing the waters considerably sooner than in the event that they had been taking all of it on alone.
“He gave us the liberty to trial and error much more stuff due to him having the house he does now,” Ande nods. “One thing we’d do on our personal at residence would take 20x so long as if we did it with Alex. We may get concepts down and know in the event that they weren’t working in simply 5 minutes and be capable of transfer on. Whereas on our personal, we’d have labored on that concept on our personal for 3 weeks. We simply knew he was the dude the second we met him.”
THE LYRICS
Admitting to themselves how tough issues have grow to be, particularly as a challenge working independently with no supervisor or label to information them, has allowed As December Falls to make each a part of their music their very own. That’s much more true relating to shifting perceptions by way of their lyrics, revealing what life is de facto like behind the scenes. For Bethany, this is available in exhibiting people who, regardless of typically being placed on a pedestal as a lady in a scene so male-dominated, she doesn’t all the time have the solutions and that the best way she is considered on stage isn’t all the time the be-all and end-all of who she actually is. She’s working all of this out on the similar fee as everybody else, and that’s actually vital to maintain highlighted.
“Generally it feels prefer it’s seen as ‘Beth is slightly bubblegum fairy’. And yeah, I’m, however I’m additionally a badass bitch who is aware of who they’re”, she feedback. “I really feel like with this album, I really feel extra assured and happier to be exhibiting this different aspect of me. I really feel that with our followers attending to know me higher and being so sincere, they perceive that that is who I actually am. Up to now, I might really feel like I couldn’t do or say one thing and even put on sure garments as a result of it’s not the model of me that they knew.”
Such a shift hasn’t occurred in a single day, although. It’s a belief and an understanding that has developed over time, spearheaded by the band livestreaming themselves as a lot as potential. Whether or not it’s online game walk-throughs or Q&As between paying their VAT payments, exhibiting off what life is de facto like for artists in 2025 has made it a lot simpler to specific emotions which will come as a shock in any other case. Take the stark one-two punch of ‘Rest room Ground’ and ‘Indignant Cry’, songs that don’t sugar coat any kind of frustrations or heartbreaks which have occurred alongside their pursuit of stardom. The identical might be mentioned for ‘Remedy’, a chaotic mesh of feelings which, since its launch again in January, Bethany has seen folks connecting with greater than songs which were out for years. In permitting the unhealthy to stream as freely as the great, to chuckle within the face of the ever-approaching void relatively than wallowing in its presence, and to know that there’s extra to this than that school-age dream of headlining Obtain Competition, the band have by no means felt nearer to the people who assist them. And on the finish of the day, that’s what will stand the check of time.
“I used to be speaking to somebody lately about Oasis,” Ande remarks. “[When they started] they had been singing songs from a really specific level of their lives, the place they had been struggling musicians and nonetheless very a lot working class. The factor is that you simply lose resonance with these phrases, as they’re now not true now as a result of they aren’t residing that life anymore. However with us, the phrases do all ring true. It’s there within the music, but additionally there as a result of we discuss it and are so open in every little thing we do.”
Authenticity has by no means been extra vital than it’s now. Followers will see by way of you want clingfilm in the event you’re cosplaying in any kind of manner. So, to share every little thing that you’re, warts and all, you’re already on the precise aspect of your individual historical past.
“Nobody roots for the hero on the finish of the story with out the battle that has taken place earlier than,” he continues. “And every little thing we now have accomplished has been a results of our personal efforts, albeit accidentally, by way of trial and error. It’s tough to know in the event you’ve made the precise determination, however at the very least all people is aware of that it’s actual.”
THE TITLE
Although there’s loads of storytelling and revelation going down inside the songs discovered on ‘The whole lot’s On Fireplace, However I’m Superb’, probably the most outstanding instance might be discovered within the title that umbrellas it. The story of As December Falls as a complete, to be precise. It’s a set of phrases that struck Bethany lengthy earlier than they even began writing what would grow to be the title monitor and ones that got here from contemplating their earlier output up till this level. A manner of defining how the final decade has performed out, it allowed a way of empowerment and possession over their journey up to now. Of letting all these round them know, as a lot as themselves, how every little thing has actually performed out.
“I feel after I was developing with it, I’m very conscious of how a lot I like a narrative,” she smiles. “I really feel like with all of our albums up to now, we’ve instructed that. We began with the self-titled album as a result of we wished to come back out and say, ‘That is who we’re.’ The second album was ‘Happier’, which was written through the COVID-19 pandemic, and it was simply us making an attempt our greatest. Then, ‘Be part of The Membership’, we wished everybody to rally behind us and be part of the As December Falls household. This album is us saying that we now have arrived on the fucking desk, however every little thing is certainly on fireplace round us, however it’s okay as a result of we’re right here at the very least.”
Whenever you lay out their albums in such a manner, you see simply how a lot they’ve overcome. The chances have been towards them at many a flip, however Bethany and Ande have all the time come out the opposite ending preventing. The place lots of their friends may, and have, thrown within the towel, to be this far in and nonetheless waving the flag is a victory in itself.
“I actually wished to permit our fan base to be following and experiencing our story together with us,” she provides. “As a result of we’re doing a few of the coolest shit we now have ever accomplished in our careers, and I’m grateful for each alternative that we’re getting. Us even simply doing any of that is loopy, and I’m so flipping pleased with us, however it’s arduous, and we by no means need to shrink back from that.”
THE FUTURE
The reality of the matter is that there isn’t a clear indication of the place issues are headed within the subsequent few years. With funding within the arts persevering with to be depleted, unbiased venues having to combat for his or her lives in each nook of the UK, and the potential for touring abroad economically trying cloudier by the day, it doesn’t instil an terrible lot of hope for bands like As December Falls in planning for the long run. Nevertheless, coming to phrases with that enables them to understand what they’ve within the current much more. And although they’re having fun with chart success, primary stage competition bookings, and watching their fan base develop bigger earlier than their eyes, they know that once they look again on their time with the band, it is going to be a distant reminiscence, and the numbers received’t be what they’ll concentrate on. It’s the connections that can all the time stand out. And regardless of the dimensions of the flames round them, they’ll by no means be destroyed.
“After I’m previous and gray, I’m not going to recollect the sleepless nights and the occasions once we thought we would go bankrupt,” Ande concludes. “I’m going to recollect the followers that bought engaged on stage and bought married two years later with us being part of their story. It’s going to be the messages from followers saying how a lot songs have modified their lives of their darkest moments. It’s going to be the sense of group of once we performed the primary stage at Slam Dunk.
“That’s the stuff that fuels us, and it’s what will preserve us going, it doesn’t matter what.”
