Alpha Wolf: What Doesn’t Kill You Makes You Pissed Off

Despite being around since 2013 Australian metalcore outfit ALPHA WOLF really left their mark with 2017’s Fault release, their debut album which spring-boarded them into being one of the frontrunners of their scene. Since then they have only grown in strength and stature, acquiring high profile support slots spanning across the globe. 2020 has been an intense year for everyone and it would only be fitting for the band to release one of the angriest releases this year has witnessed. Their sophomore album A Quiet Place To Die is a continuation of their core values that have brought them so much acclaim by writing brutally honest yet captivating material.

“It’s something we found ourselves doing a while back with our first release,” discusses guitarist Sabian Lynch. “We definitely found an approach to the music and an honest approach with the lyric writing. Seeing people reach out to us that related to our songs and stuff like that, it was a very humble feeling. We’ve definitely stayed on that path and written what is true to us at the time. The first album was very loss and grief related because that was relevant at the time. Now as time has gone on I guess most songs on this album are very angry because there are certain topics going on right now in our day to day lives that are pissing us off. Each song has its own little backstory that we can relate to personally that we’re writing in a more broad aspect so that anyone can kind of find their own relation to.”

A Quiet Place To Die touches on a range of uncomfortable subject matter such as loss, abuse and revenge. Unfortunate aspects of life that befall us throughout our time on this earth and experiences which ALPHA WOLF have channelled into the creation of crushingly cathartic compositions that the quintet write for themselves as much as the fans of their craft. “We want to write music that we ourselves want to listen to in our own personal time,” admits Sabian. “As much as it’s awesome to please the fans and what they want, if we didn’t like it we’re not gonna release it. So this album is something we’re very proud of and it’s something we ourselves have listened to non-stop since we got the mixing masters back. We’ve absolutely loved the album, even from its early stages. We were very eager to put it out and see what the fans thought of it. That’s always been the main process for us, as long as we really enjoy it and want to listen to it for the next couple of years then that’s cool. We’re the ones who will be playing the songs every night so we have to really enjoy them.”

ALPHA WOLF pride themselves on being meticulous with every detail of their tracks, ensuring every aspect is inch perfect before proceeding and this is one of the reasons why they are one of the most revered bands on the circuit. “Most songs for this release were written by Scottie (guitarist) and he will demo out songs and then we’ll mould them, take up bits and pieces until we feel its the best instrumentally written track it can be,” informs Sabian. “We had pretty much all of them done before most lyrics were written. Between myself and Lochie (vocalist) we will write a bunch of lyrics that we’re relating to at the time and we’ll find the right pieces of music to fit those lyrics to, we’ll put the more upsetting lyrics to a sad song and the more angry lyrics to the heavier song and it just seems to work that way and carve it down and whittle it out to be the best as possible. It’s a lot of hard work but looking back on it we definitely work really well with each other, everyone in the band does chips in.”

“We’re our own biggest critic and when you’re producing your own music you have to be. Scottie is an audio engineer himself. So by the time we have a demo in place, it already sounds really good and we get a very good understanding of what it’ll look like once it’s properly tracked and recorded. I think in total we had between 15 and 20 instrumental songs written but we knew which songs were going to make the cut. We’re always trying to experiment with new guitar pedals and whatever to find weirder sounds. We spent roughly two months on the vocals. Like not a flat out two months but we do a couple of days on, a couple of days off to save Lochie‘s voice and just makes sure we got the absolute best out of him. I would also revisit parts sometimes and even rewrite entire sections to make it better. We just put a lot of thought into everything.”

The various rules and regulations relating to lockdown and quarantine throughout the world have been especially rough on the music scene and Australia is one of the countries that is enduring stringent restrictions to the point where some bands can’t be in the same room as each other. This is something which ALPHA WOLF are currently facing but refusing to let is stifle their progress. “I guess we’ll always find a way to adapt” states Sabian. “At the moment we’re looking at doing the Patreon thing and now I’m trying to get a bit digital and seeing how that goes. We can’t do any live streaming because our drummer lives in Brisbane and currently we’re in Victoria which is no fly route. We’re kind of blacklisted from everywhere. It does suck but we have lots of stuff planned and hopefully, it all goes well for us. We’re gonna keep as active as possible.”

A Quiet Place To Die is out now via SharpTone Records.

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