Interview with Will Crawford of Devil’s Queen, ahead of their gig for ‘One Night of Rawk’, Inverness in December.
Devil’s Queen originally formed in 2012, a recent personnel change has invigorated the band, so the forthcoming event comes at a good time for the hard rock five piece;
IGigs – Trent Reznor said that “ rock music was never meant to be safe. I think there needs to be an element of intrigue, mystery, subversiveness.” What do you think are the key elements of your music ?
I think the key element of our music is the unknown factor that comes into our writing process. Although our music is considered straight forward hard rock, when we work on each song we try and draw influences from every genre and we are not afraid to try anything or add anything if we think it will make that particular song better.
None of our songs are ever considered finished in our eyes so there is always room for change in them if we think we can make something better then we will.
IGigs – As a band, you are only allowed to have one album to listen to for eternity, would it be an easy process to decide, what album would it be and why?
that’s a difficult one and to be honest we would need to ask for a compilation CD as there is not one album or band that we could listen to as our only record for eternity.
IGigs – The demands of being in a band are massive, what keeps your band gigging and what are the essential aspects to driving your band forward?
That’s a good question I think playing live is a bit of an addiction. Most of the time you travel for hours to play for little to no money, however for that 30-45 minutes of being on stage, you get a high watching people enjoy the music you have produced and all those efforts and sacrifices you have made to do the gig just go to the back of your mind. That’s what drives us on its a common bond we share.
IGigs – ‘One Night of Rawk’ features five bands with local links, what are the advantages and disadvantages of the local scene?
The local music scene is a bit of a double edge sword. The advantage is that because its smaller scene that a lot cities it becomes a close community where everyone helps each other out regardless of genre or status.
On the other side of the that the UK in general has scene support of live music dwindle over the past few years and in a small music community everybody is competing to get the attention of the audience.
IGigs – The experience of a band having a good live performance, stays with you, how do you prepare for your gigs, and what do you use to judge whether you have had a good night or not?
Our gig preparations are done in the practices prior to the show. We tend to focus on the set we are playing for that show making sure it is as good as it can be. Judging on whether we had a good night is down to a couple of things;
- Did we enjoy the show because if your not enjoying it anymore then it will show in your performance.
- Did the crowd enjoy the show because if they did then it is likely that they are the people who will continue coming to your shows and buy your merch and build your fanbase.
IGigs – Given the time of year, we are normally afforded the opportunity to reflect on the year, how would the band view 2015 and what’s next for 2016?
2015 has been our most productive year so far. We have been working hard on building our fan base and establishing ourselves, both in the local area and also in the likes of Edinburgh and Glasgow.
2016 is shaping up to be another very productive year for us with our EP due out in January (see the EP taster below) and gigs up and down the country already booked we will just continue working hard to be the best we can be.
Devil’s Queen will be playing ‘One Night of Rawk’ (Seed of Sorrow, Swamp Radio, Lawless & The Leash and The Broken Ravens are also on the bill) The Spectrum Centre, Inverness on Saturday December 12th.
Tickets available on line from here.
You can track the band down on Twitter @DevilsQueen2012 and Facebook @DevilsQueen.
You can read an interview with The Broken Ravens who share billing with Devil’s Queen at ‘One Night of Rawk’.
