We have taken a trip down the M62 and are enjoying the post hardcore and metal delights at the, Love Day, all dayer at, Aatma and The Peer Hat in Manchester. We are also here to interview the incredible, self-proclaimed, “Post everything,” band Pleiades who first came to our attention when they toured with Hidden Mothers in 2023.
The reports back from that tour were so great that we had to check out their music and we absolutely loved it. Pleiades definitely occupy a very exciting, interesting side of post-rock, post-metal.
So, where did the band get their sound from, what were their main influences?
Frontman Andy Calderbank takes on the question, “It’s been a combination of starting off with a traditional post-rock unit, the sound of the big soundscapes, and then adding elements when we added different members. So, I joined on vocals later on that brought a change in a lot of the original post-rock kind of characteristics. And then Ryan joined to make us a five-piece, so we ended up with a much more guitar-centered sound, more textured. It sort of developed into more of like, post-rock influenced, as opposed to being straight-up post-rock. We get asked about our genre quite a bit, I think. Without it sounding too kind of like big headed, we’ve got a unique sound that covers a lot of the posts. In our bio it just says post something, so whatever people want.”
Pleiades can just say, “We sound like us,” we think that’s the best thing any band can say. From here we divert our attention to today’s big topic, Pleiades’ incredible album, ‘Affinity With’.
We certainly thought these guys were onto something new when we heard it. We mention we love the fact that these days, whether it’s the advent of Spotify or not, people have broader musical palettes allowing artists like Pleiades to take broader strokes in their compositions.
Andy agrees “Yeah, I think people’s influence is much less tailored to the one genre, it’s just such a melting pot now, especially the bands you’d see at, ArcTanGent Festival for example where one band can have twelve different genres in the space of an album, so that’s our market I guess, what we feel that we just want to be and we want to see how we develop it into something.”
Guitarist Ryan adds “It’s nice to look at the scene though, like you said I’ve played with Hidden Mothers recently, we’re similar in certain ways but they’re a bit heavier than us in a sense. We can also still play with bands that play, maybe in broader brush strokes with a more ambient kind of sound.”
We mention there are a few bands that at the moment that can play with a broad range of acts. Conjurer are a good example we say as they can fit onto most bills. Whether they support Gojira one night Carcass the next, Strange Forms festival or support a leftfield rap act as they did with Clipping!
Bassist Joshua answers, “I think that’s the kind of band we’re striving to be. Just for variety’s sake, just getting on a whole different bunch of line-ups. It makes it more interesting at the end of the day Instead of just playing strictly metal nights and being strictly underground.”
We agree it’s a lot of fun for fans If they can go somewhere like Outbreak and then see Death Grips one minute and Converge the next,
Andy agrees, “It can only be a good thing, right? Like you said when we play with Hidden Mothers, they have the post-metal and the black metal as well and we feel like we complement each other, we get on so well. I think that kind of shows in the performance. You can see, we watch each other play, and you’ve got elements of a bit of friendly competition, but also you just want the best performance. I was jumping on songs with them and vice versa so we had that kind of collaboration as well.”
We did see a bit of footage on the internet of some collaborations going on.
“Yeah, I got asked to do that at the last minute, so I was rehearsing my bit in the hallway. I think that’s a cool kind of thing you see growing up, your favourite musician jumping down with your other favourite musician. Yeah, it’s always cool. Yeah, and to be able to do that in front of your friends, it just like, it took me back.”
We agree that for the audience, it’s nice to have an, “I was there when…” moment.
To seemingly prove a point these trigger memories of when we saw Joey Jordison playing with Metallica.
Josh exclaims “Oh, were you there?”
Yes, we were, we can confirm it was mental. This leads Metallica stories and underlines our point about making performances special with one off appearances and collaborations for people to reminisce about in interviews!
But we are Foodinati UK and we have a job to do!
We tell the band that one of the things we like to do on Foodinati UK, is consumer reports. Today we are investigating the fact that everyone knows when you get hot crisps from the supermarket, they’re a bit crap, and they taste like tomato ketchup. So, our friends at Chili Shop Leeds, have done a little deep dive. We found some hot crisps from all over the world for us to taste test with the bands here today.
The brave lads in Pleiades have chosen, Herr’s Carolina Reaper cheese puffs, made with real cheese, apparently…what can possibly go wrong?
We all dig in expecting to be stung but they might be absolutely nothing, that’s the risk with crisps. We ask Andy if he’ll be returning to sing after this.
“I don’t really know who’s singing after this. One probably would be fine. I’ll wash it down with some Liquid Death.”
Right, ok then. 3, 2, 1, let’s go….
Andy says it best, “They’re like a Wotsit on steroids.”
“It’s a creeper, isn’t it? I reckon if you do the whole bag of them…”
We tell the band to wait because there is a burn, right at the end and with that it fades disappointingly. So yes, Herr’s has a bit of heat but its playful heat. We expected them to be scarier. We round the consumer report off as we always do with a rating. The verdict from Pleiades is in…
“6 on heat, 7 on flavor. In terms of flavour it’s nice.”
Herrs, out of America. “Family owned and enjoyed,” you get six on heat, seven on flavor, we would recommend on flavour, maybe not on heat. We notice that the Carolina Reaper spice here is still lingering though, maybe we spoke too soon?
“Yeah, it’s at the back of my throat.” says Andy
We think we’ll wrap this up on that note!
Interview & Table Images By George Miller – https://linktr.ee/601music
As part of Foodinati UK – Series 4
Band Promo Photo Credit: Jack Moss
You can watch the full interview by clicking on the image below..
