{"id":39814,"date":"2021-08-27T07:00:21","date_gmt":"2021-08-26T21:00:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/maytherockbewithyou.com\/mtrbwy\/?p=39814"},"modified":"2021-08-25T19:28:37","modified_gmt":"2021-08-25T09:28:37","slug":"phil-knight-of-shihad-2-interview-old-gods","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/maytherockbewithyou.com\/mtrbwy\/2021\/08\/phil-knight-of-shihad-2-interview-old-gods\/","title":{"rendered":"Phil Knight of Shihad"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>\u201cEven though we\u2019ve always been a political band wanting to sing about equality and against injustice and everything from the beginning, and still do.\u201d<\/p>\n

If anger is an energy, then \u2018Old Gods\u2019 \u2013 Shihad\u2019s 10th studio album \u2013 could singlehandedly power our capital city for a year. \u2018Old Gods\u2019 is a step into fury for frontman Jon Toogood whose lyrics encapsulate our collective anger at recent world events, an album that states its intent from the moment the crushing, grinding riff of opener \u201cTear Down Those Names\u201d explodes to life, and just one song later Toogood urges for the killing of the \u2018old gods\u2019 in the title track. Elsewhere, Toogood takes aim at conservative talk radio, the legitimization of racism, and the radicalization of a generation fueled by misinformation.<\/p>\n

At home in Melbourne, Phil gave us a call to chat about the new Shihad album \u2018Old Gods\u2019, its content, touring, and more\u2026<\/p>\n

So I decided to start my day with the album and boy howdy was I awake very quickly! This album just jumps straight into it\u2026 this is a heavy record, was that the intention going into making it?<\/strong>
\nYeah. I\u2019d be lying if I said it wasn\u2019t, yeah it was I mean when we were writing the music instrumentally as we do at the start of the process, back in 2016 everything that was coming out was all just very heavy, low-end sort of heavy. Not like the FVEY stuff we were trying to move on from there and step it up again.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s been seven years since FVEY, in that seven years what do you feel helped shape what has become Old Gods?<\/strong>
\nWell on the musical side we had over that time about half a dozen jamming sessions where we just recorded everything we do and just jam down riffs and not think about it too much actually, we just recorded everything that we do. We write the music before the lyrics and Jon will go away and do the lyrics by himself, he just wanted to concentrate on being the guitarist and having fun while we\u2019re making the music, and so that sort of shaped that. Then I guess the anger, the lyrical anger of the album Jon\u2019s point of view, well from all of our point of view, we\u2019ll tell him if we don\u2019t like something that\u2019s for sure but we\u2019re mostly happy with everything that he brought to us. You know we had the four years of Donald Trump for a start *laughs* we weren\u2019t too thrilled about that where we come from, and yeah just watching, and I know Jon personally as we all were, I know Jon was affected by the Black Lives Matter movement and George Floyd and being brutally murdered on the streets. We\u2019ve always been a very political band, we are a multi-cultural band with Karl in the band who had experiences in the past growing up. He hasn\u2019t always written songs about it but as far as the racial stuff is concerned, he has more of a perspective now and he\u2019s been looking at what\u2019s happening in The States and stuff with Trump and that, and with a totally different perspective. Even though we\u2019ve always been a political band wanting to sing about equality and against injustice and everything from the beginning, and still do.<\/p>\n

This is the band\u2019s tenth album, looking back over your catalogue it can be very easy to say what can change within a band over time but what for you is the one thing that has always remained the same about Shihad?<\/strong>
\nI mean just off the top of my dome, the importance of delivering live 100% and just getting off that stage and leaving everything on the court, leaving everything on the stage, whether you\u2019re playing to five people in Ballarat in 1996 or playing to a Big Day Out crowd in Sydney at Homebush in 2001, or supporting AC\/DC to 60,000 people in new Zealand, you give it everything and that\u2019s our sacred moment and that\u2019s something that\u2019s never changed with Shihad.<\/p>\n

I was going to say that a Shihad live show is where you guys absolutely shine, and with a tour hopefully still on the cards this year, what can people expect when they come out to see you this time around?<\/strong>
\nWell we were lucky enough to get away to New Zealand a couple of weeks ago luckily on our New Zealand passports, and get away to do a show in Queenstown and for the first time ever we played two new songs off the album, we started with \u2018Tear Down Those Names\u2019 and we were like OK, that was a good idea this is going to be the opening song for a while I think. I think we\u2019ve been opening our set with \u2018Think You\u2019re So Free\u2019 for the last five years or longer *laughs*. In the past we\u2019ve had a couple of albums that hasn\u2019t really captured the raw intensity of the band live, people listen to the albums and there are seminal songs we play live and they\u2019re like wow, essentially we\u2019re a live band and it\u2019s always been very hard to capture that fire in a bottle in the studio that is the live intensity of Shihad and I think we\u2019ve gotten a lot closer to it on this new album and our other album FVEY and stuff.<\/p>\n

I always like to pick a song that stands out for me, and \u2018Feel The Fire\u2019 is the one for me, it just has that hook and groove, what do you remember about that one coming together?<\/strong>
\nJon had this song buzzing around he wrote most of it on a beach in New Zealand when he was touring by himself and he was very excited about it, he\u2019d played it to other people and played it to Adam Spark and I\u2019d heard it too and \u00a0we said well we\u2019re going into a very heavy album and a very combative album how do we fit this in because this is a great song, and lyrically it ties the whole thing together very well you know? It\u2019s about a lot of things, about being locked down in a hell hole of a situation that you guys are in now. I mean we can jump there with all the huge sounds we\u2019ve gotten from other songs and delivered with the same intensity really? I mean I like to think of it as if you\u2019re familiar with our second album \u2018Killjoy\u2019 it\u2019s a very heavy album as well but it has \u2018Deb\u2019s Night Out\u2019 in the middle and it works, and this works in the same place in terms of listening lines. We made a video for it in New Zealand when we were there too.<\/p>\n

Now it is a rare feat to be the same unit for over three decades so what\u2019s one thing you haven\u2019t yet had the chance to do that you\u2019d still love to?<\/strong>
\nWell there\u2019s many parts of the globe that we haven\u2019t had the chance to tour yet like Asia and Japan and places like that, so maybe when things open up again that would be cool. I mean we\u2019ve been pretty lucky we\u2019ve supported AC\/DC eight times, we\u2019ve been really lucky and spoiled by supportive people. I mean like everyone we\u2019re just eager for the world to open up again and get out there. We had a small tour in Great Britain in November 2019 not long before the shit hit the fan and would just love to get back over and get in amongst it all.<\/p>\n

Lastly, let\u2019s look ahead to the future, finish this sentence for me, by the end of 2021 Shihad will\u2026<\/strong>
\nBe very good at playing the new songs off the album that we haven\u2019t played in their current version with Jon singing and playing guitar at the same time.<\/p>\n

Well when we do finally get to see you it\u2019s gonna be one hell of a show!<\/strong>
\nYeah totally, it\u2019ll happen at some stage.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Essential Information<\/u><\/strong><\/h2>\n

From:\u00a0<\/strong>New Zealand<\/p>\n

Band members:<\/strong>\u00a0 Jon Toogood \u2013 Vocals \/ Guitar, Tom Larkin \u2013 Drums, Phil Knight \u2013 Guitar, Karl Kippenberger \u2013 Bass<\/p>\n

Website:<\/strong>\u00a0\u00a0http:\/\/www.shihad.com<\/a><\/u><\/strong><\/p>\n

Latest Release: <\/strong>Old Gods (Warner Music Australia)<\/p>\n