We cornered Metal 2 The Masses, Kent, winners Unnatural Order, before their debut set on Bloodstock’s New Blood Stage to hear the story of their triumph at the second attempt, how they took on-board advice to hone their craft, and how networking will take you even further.
I wanted to open this entire interview by saying congratulations on winning a Metal 2 The Masses, Kent! So, can you tell us the story of your win and the journey that you took to get there?
Beau: “So this was actually our second time. Well, as this band, it was our second time competing – we got very good feedback from the first time, as we got to the final, but didn’t quite make it through. We took in all the feedback, had a couple of changes in the band, rejigged the set around, you know, recorded some bits. Gave it our all this year, which felt like the longest year of my life, personally, I don’t know about you guys? A few awkward turns, but when we got to the final, that was the most stressful part because we were playing with, I think, six bands in total. It was six of a group of our friends, all there, all hanging out, and then all playing together.”
Nathan: “All amazing bands, as well.”
Beau: “The undertones felt like, ‘Oh, this is just a gig with all my friends. And then at the main part of it was, “Uh, these guys are pretty good, actually, they might win this”. But when we came out winners, it was just crazy. It was unbelievable for us.”
What was your reaction when you guys got announced as the winners?
Nathan: “I had to take a second! Hold on. Wait. Was that us? that they just said? I’ve heard of that band! Unnatural Order, yeah. Oh, wait, that’s us!”
Jack: “I was actually outside dealing with the merchandise when I heard Stuart, who’s the manager for Kent, I heard him go “Unnatural Order!” I was like, “That’s enough syllables…” And it wasn’t until my friend went, “Jack, you’ve just won!” And then I just darted, going through the crowd to the stage, and so on the footage online, you see these two [Beau and Nathan], they’re straight up there. Alex literally gets hauled on stage by people, dragged up. And then I get up on stage!”
Nathan: “Jack got changed at that point. So, he was on stage with his silly little jean shorts – his jorts.”
Alex: “And funnily enough, I was packing away because I assumed we weren’t going to win.”
Beau: “So we were all very hopeful, as you see!”
I like the optimism there! So, Alex, you played your first gig with the band in November last year.
Alex: “I joined just before, but my first gig – yeah, something about that period of time. I joined the band, and Nathan said, “We got five or six songs for you to learn. Do you think you could be ready in a week and a half?” I’ve never been in a band before that’s performed, so I was terrified. I could remember the few days before I thought I was going to have to let them down. Tell them I can’t do it; I haven’t got the minerals for it. I’m too scared, I can’t do it. I haven’t got the ability.”
Jack: “So there’s that same positivity there.”
Alex: “But every show I’ve played after that, I’ve got more, and I just look forward to it, every show we do now, and I do the best I can do. All of us do; we have fun with it. And I think people can tell watching us, we’re all very close friends. There’s a lot of camaraderie between us, and we’re all very different, you know, it’s cool.”
Jack: “He’s doing an extremely good job, and we’re very proud to have him as our vocalist.”
It leads nicely onto my next question – so because you had your first gig with a week-and-a-half, as it turns out, to get all the material down, and you’re now here playing New Blood. What do you think that says about you guys as a band and what you’ve been able to achieve?
Nathan: “We like to think that we do perform as a cohesive unit, and what we do when we do it together.”
Beau: “The chemistry on-stage between us is very strong.”
Nathan: “I think that that can be felt by the crowd, that we should be in a band together.”
Beau: “Yeah, we definitely have the balls for it. I mean, whenever we play gigs in pubs to fifteen, twenty people, and we play our set, it’s always so loud and fills up the room, and it’s just that type of sound that people have actually said multiple times, “Why isn’t this on a bigger stage?”
So, to have it on a bigger stage?
Nathan: “I think we take the approach to any gig as if it is a big one. It’s quite easy for a band to maybe not put as much energy into a pub gig because it’s just in a pub.”
Beau: “But that’s where the heart of all local music is.”
Nathan: “That’s where it starts.”
Going back to the night when you won, what do you think it was that tipped the balance in your favour?
Nathan: “It’s easy to say, ‘our music did it, but I think everyone in the final… Going back to the chemistry again, isn’t it?”
Beau: “We’ve got such a solid three up-front, me behind on the drums. It’s just uniform, it’s almost militant how we are on stage. There’s chemistry. We don’t have choreography, but we do work together. We, as you can see, dress in a way that we should, so people look at us and go, “That’s got to be a band”. Even if we go down the high street, they look at us and go, “That’s a band”. You look at us, and you hear us all together, and “That is a band”.
Jack: “So for people who can’t see us, we’re basically dressed in these utility vests and combat boots and stuff. We were told, going towards the final, to focus on our stagecraft as well, and I think that’s something that maybe put us over the top as well. All the bands had amazing stagecraft; they moved around a lot. And I think ours was, even though it wasn’t choreographed, it was still natural. Pun-unintended.”
Would you say that’s one of the things you learned from being finalists in 2024 and being unsuccessful on that occasion?
Jack: “It was a huge help. Massive.”
So, these were some things that you were going to take from that and then learn and apply to this year?
Nathan: “Last year, when we entered, in the very first heat of last year, we had a different bassist and a different vocalist. Jack joined just before our semi-final heat last year, and we went through to the final with a different vocalist. We got Alex shortly after the final. And that is it – we changed quite a few elements of the band in terms of the sound and the appearance and things like that and almost created something new from that. We re-recorded all the songs, re-wrote a lot of stuff, almost rebranded ourselves, changed our logo, and just tried to be much more professional and cohesive, following a specific vibe and image. Just pay attention to all the small details, just in terms of what we wear and how we are on stage.”
It all came together and gave you a renewed focus to get to where you are today. In playing the New Blood Stage, what are your goals for Bloodstock?
Nathan: “Well, whilst we are here, it’s time to talk to as many people as we can. We’ve been on the patrol, talking to people about the band.”
Beau: “We’re very curious creatures, especially me and Nathan, so our main thing is: how many people, bands, media, not-bands, just audience, whoever, how many people can we talk to and how much can we learn about those people whilst also letting them know about us? We love a good chat!”
Alex: “I want to add to that as well. We want to represent our hometown, Canterbury. We’re from the South-East, down in Kent – we’ve got a lot of friends here today who are coming to support. We want to make them proud, and we’ve got a lot of judges who were at the Metal 2 The Masses finals coming to watch us. We want to be able to show them that they made the right choice in putting us through. Hopefully, we can get some new people on side with us who like our music and like what we’re about – that would be amazing.”
Beau: “We are here to prove ourselves more than we already have. Just keep it going.”
Jack: “The whole country is kind of centralised in Bloodstock, so we’re hoping to make new friends, new fans, and support each other. And yeah, just have fun.”
Nathan: “Luckily, the people that we already knew were coming here have been very, very, very good in spreading the word that we are playing the New Blood Stage, the time we are playing and are very supportive and talk quite highly of us. They’re very good friends, so obviously they’re going to do that! But yeah, that support as well, which is not just us obviously having to talk to people. We have people willing to help.”
So you released “Bloodsport” a little earlier this year. Is there any new music cooking, or have you been fully focused on getting here?
Nathan: “We’ve been in the kitchen cooking!”
Beau: “A lot of pies in the oven.”
Nathan: “There was a lot of focus on this show, of course. So, had we not been playing Bloodstock, we would probably be in the process of starting to record stuff. Obviously, this at the moment for us was very important.”
Beau: “So I mean in the group chat that we’ve got every other week, Nathan would go, ‘Oh, I’ve got a song idea, and then I’ll just come back about two days later and go, ‘Don’t like it, anyway Bloodstock…”.
What is 2026 looking like for Unnatural Order?
Nathan: “We are pretty open at the moment! We are looking to start filling the calendar.”
Beau: “We have small talks of potentially doing a mini tour somewhere up the top of the country – try and actually branch out from where we are, because we’ve done two years now in where we’ve been. We want to try and arrange maybe six or seven dates?”
Nathan: “Luckily, we’ve been networking with all the other bands staying in the artist camping, and we’ve made some really good friends already. There are quite a few bands already that I would really like to potentially organise some shows in their hometowns.”
Final thing, is there anything that you’d like to say to the Devolution readers and to your fans?
Beau: “Stream our music!”
Jack: “We love you!”
Nathan: “Stereotypical tune in, big things coming!”
Jack: “We’re just really appreciative that you support grassroots music and bands. Thank you for reading or listening – we are very thankful.”
Beau: “If you don’t know, get to know!”
https://www.instagram.com/unnatural_order_uk
Interview By Lee Carter
Photos By Rebecca Bush – https://www.instagram.com/beckybphoto/