As gigs go, it would be hard to find a more exciting, visceral experience than a Gallows show. Consistently exhilarating live, Watford’s finest hardcore punk band always deliver a jaw-dropping, raucous set. When they burst on the scene back in 2006 with the release of their debut album, Orchestra of Wolves, they were hailed as the saviours of punk. A year later lead singer, Frank Carter, topped the NME’s Cool List, much to his indignation. This year the band released their second album, Grey Britain, before embarking on a world tour. And now they’re heading to Hastings to play at the Crypt on Friday December 11. We caught up with drummer Lee Barratt for a bit of chit and a lot of chat, during the band’s tour of the US of A.
E: How’s the tour in the States going?
LB: It’s going really well. It’s the first time we’ve toured in a van over here, so that’s kind of a new experience for us to begin with. But we’ve been getting on really well with that and getting on really well with AFI, who are the headline act. And we play to lot of people every night, so I think we’re doing really well and picking up new fans every night. America’s such a big place to travel round and we’re trying to just crack little markets here, by picking up new fans, and I think it’s going as well as it can do.
E: I’ve been checking out the Twitter feed and there seems to be a lot going on: fires in venues, Lags throwing up on stage – what’s going on out there?
LB: Yeah, there was an evacuation the other day, in Hartford actually. I don’t know if anyone set the fire alarm off or whether there was an actual fire, because I was on the roof at the time. If there was a fire, I wouldn’t have known about it anyway – I would have gone down with the building. But yeah, there’s been a lot of eventful stuff going on, like people getting naked in dressing rooms and stuff you wouldn’t normally expect to see. So yeah there have been a few funny events.
E: How do the American audiences compare to the British ones?
LB: On this tour it’s been a lot, lot different, because we’re playing to probably 75 per cent of the crowd who probably don’t know who we are or may have just heard one or two songs and never seen us live. So it’s kind of like starting out again for us, because we’re just trying to win over the fans who probably don’t even know who we are. I’ve been enjoying it because there’s not really any pressure on us, we can just go up and do our own thing and hopefully convert some people along the way.
E: How do you keep up the energy levels on tour like this?
LB: I’ve no idea. We just go up there. We’re pretty much one of those bands who complain about being on the road and having to sit in the van, or on the bus, for 23 hours a day. But when we get up there for that hour or 45 minutes, we come into our own. And I think all the frustrations about day to day life come out on stage and the adrenalin and the passion we’ve got as a band come through. I think that’s all that gets us through it. And that’s why our live shows are pretty much the same; high intensity every day.
E: When you first started out did you have a clear idea of what makes a good live show?
LB: We’d actually seen a ton of bands and said to ourselves, that’s how it shouldn’t be done. That’s what spurred us on, because we were sick of the local scene and going to see shows in London where bands were all sounding the same, all looking the same, they all had the same stage moves. Pretty much every band was a carbon copy of another and we got so bored of that. We said to ourselves when we started the band, that we were going to be a dangerous live band, we were going to do whatever we wanted to do on stage, write music that we wanted to write and it kind of rolled from there really. But we never really set out to be like another band on stage, we were more kicking against the bands that sounded the same and looked the same.
E: As a band you seem to pick up a lot of injuries: are you looking after yourselves out there?
LB: (laughs) Just about. It’s more like muscle pulls and fractured fingers and things like that, that happen onstage. So far, this tour, nothing really bad has happened. A couple of us have picked up colds, but that’s the norm.
E: What’s the worst gig related injury you’ve suffered?
LB: Personally I’ve managed to break a couple of ribs by stage diving. That was to one of our songs as well, which is quite funny. Another guy took over on drums from another band and I was just stood there on the side of the stage thinking, ‘What am I going to do?’ And then I got invited by the crowd, in Japan, to stage dive. I managed to hit a bunch of girls who couldn’t hold my weight and I went down and broke a couple of ribs. And then I managed to play through another three or four shows with these broken ribs, not really knowing what was going on. Then I went to the doctors. So, that was painful.
E: As a band that gets injured quite frequently, were you disappointed with Iggy Pop’s recent insurance adverts, which didn’t even cover musicians?
LB: (laughs) That’s the thing. He’s doing it, then you ring up to ask for band insurance and they tell you to fuck off. It’s a bit of no brainer that one. But he can do whatever he wants. He’s old enough and he’s done it all and I’m sure he just wants to pick up another pay cheque at the end of the day.
E: For those readers who might not have seen you live, how would you describe your live show?
LB: Unexpected. Come down and see us and then you’ll find out. You never really know what’s going to happen. It’s going to be ridiculous at the Crypt.