PlanetMosh Keeping it Metal
Adrian Shapiro from Lo! gives us a introduction to Lo! and a brief track by track overview of their album “Lo and Behold”.
Lo! Is
Carl Whitbread – Guitar + BG Vocals
Adrian Shapiro – Bass + BG Vocals
Jamie-Leigh Smith – Vocals
Adrian Griffin – Drums
Why did you pick the name Lo! and what does it stand for?
Lo! comes from the phrase “Lo and Behold” which is a pretty common phrase in medieval writings. We liked the fact that it is a call to attention.
How did you all get together to form Lo!
Carl started the project himself as a bit of a love project at home after his last band finished up. This was probably around 2006. The rest of the members probably joined around 2008 and we started playing shows in 2010. Carl and me knew each other from just playing in bands over the years and I’d met Adrian G (drums) through mutual friends. When we were looking for vocalists we flicked Jamie a couple of the demos and he recorded his vocals over the top and when we heard them we knew we had the band.
How would you describe the band?
It’s obviously a heavy band, but I think there are a lot of influences in there from sludge, hardcore, punk as well as raw rock n’ roll. We seem to be getting called Sludge and Doom a lot lately.
What are your musical influences?
The influences are wide and varied but bands like Breach, Converge, Queens of The Stone Age and Mastodon are all bands that we listen to alot and draw some influence from.
What equipment do you use?
Personally I use a Fender Jazz bass played through a GK 700W head and and an Ampeg 8×10. I only really use two pedals a Sansamp bass driver and a RAT.
Carl plays an Epiphone Custom through a Messa Duel as well as through a Line 6. He uses a couple of pedals too.
Adrian G plays a drumkit of some kind!
What kind of response did you get from your fans?
We’ve been getting a really good response from people to the album. It’s been a long time in the making so people have been generally pretty stoked to hear it. We’ve played three shows of the album tour here in Australia so far and all have been pretty killer.
How is the metal scene in Australia? What do you like most and least about it?
There are some great bands kicking around at the moment in Australia. I really like how supportive the scene is here, especially when touring. Everyone is pretty happy to offer up a place on the floor to crash and gear to use to make the whole thing a lot easier.
What don’t I like about the metal scene? Well I guess it’s a taste thing but there’s a lot of these bands kicking around at the moment that are doing the vocoder clean vocal thing which just sounds ridiculous to me. I don’t get it. If you can’t sing, fucking embrace it and start a punk band!
Can you give us a quick track by track description of the album ‘Look and Behold’?
1 Hath – Instrumental.
2 Deluge (Carnivorous Flux) – Heavy!
3 Bastion – This is Carl’s favourite at the moment. We’re working on a new film clip for this one.
4 Seraphim – Instrumental.
5 Hued Tarantula – This is tuned to drop A and is probably the most doomy/sludgey track on the album.
6 Aye, Commodore – This is a real tough feisty track which I dig..
7 Indigo Division – My fave. Heavy as fuck with some good thrash towards the end..
8 Doth – Instrumental.
9 Moira Kindle – This is a really interesting track in that it’s pretty different to everything else on the album. We had a guest vocalist, Richie from an old Australian stoner band called Tumbleweed sing on this track.
10 Fire at the Child Actors Guild – We generally end our lives sets with this.
Which track is your favourite and why?
My favourite track at the moment is probably Indigo Division because it’s so much fun to play live.
What/who were the main influences for it?
Indigo was actually written by Adrian (drums). When he first brought it to prac we all loved it. We then let Carl loose on it and do what we like to call “Carlify” the track. After he was done it’s pretty much as it sounds on the recording.
What made you choose Berlin based label Pelagic Records to release the album?
I think it’s more the other way, Robin luckily liked a demo EP we’d sent to him and was keen to put an album out through Europe which we jumped at.
We’re all huge fans of The Ocean so we were really just blown away when Robin got in contact.
Are there any messages that you would like to pass on to the readers?
We’re trying to sort out a European tour late May 2012 so hope to see you all at shows then!
Thank you Adrian, for taking the time to fill in this email interview.
Dennis’s Review of ‘Look And Behold’ album.
http://www.planetmosh.com/lo-album-look-and-behold/
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