Funeral For A Friend: No More Big Arse Arena Rock

Matthew Davies, frontman of the Welsh hardcore stalwarts Funeral For A Friend, has described how internal tensions and creative burnout led to them releasing what he now sees as less-than-perfect albums of “big arse arena rock”:

“When we reached semi-burnout, we started to let other members of the band into the writing process and then it became apparent that not everybody may have been on the same page… I feel we slipped away from initially what I wanted from this band when we started when we did those records, and now I'm happy to say that we're back on track. I think we're able to be ourselves, for the first time in a long time.”

By reconnecting with the DIY spirit of the local shows that Davies used to go to “two or three times a week”, he says they were able combine this unpretentious punk-rock passion with the lean, no-nonsense attitude of an internationally touring rock band:

“I'm not saying that there's a lack of professionalism, but there's not a sense of theatre or whatever a lot of rock bands do; we just get up onstage, plug in and start playing. There's no 'Woah, this is us. Look at us. Adore us, we're Funeral For A Friend, worship us', y'know? We just get on the stage and try and get people to sing along and get up and grab the mic, to really show and share how passionate they feel about sharing their emotions with us.”

Davies says it was important that the band's new lease on life was reflected in their latest album, Conduit, where songwriting “became this whole idea to reclaim this thing that people over the years had come to say that we'd maybe slipped away from or something. We thought that place where we started from was really where our heart was, and also where our strengths were.”

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