Interview with The Deep End

The Deep End are an Australian band whose latest album, "Cop This", is making some noise in the hard rock and heavy metal community. Recently I had the pleasure of interviewing the band's lead singer, Dale Schober. 

 Andy-Could you introduce us to the band please.

Dale-Welcome to The Deep End. Your hosts will be Dale shattering glass on lead vocals, Drew melting faces on lead guitar, Jazz playing tighter than a nuns nasty on rhythm guitar, Trixxxy chugging on the bass and Nick in the engine room on the drums. Wow, that sounded cornier than I had expected...

Andy-You guys started out playing in a garage right?   

Dale-Thats right. We started off playing covers between drinking beers on the weekend at our former lead guitarists house. From AC/DC to ZZ Top, we played it all a fair bit till we started writing our own songs. From there we started to play gigs in the local area and started to gain a following so it all snowballed from there!

Andy-Who were some of your personal influences growing up?

Dale-Our personal influences vary a little bit, ranging from acoustic rock to hardcore, but the common denominators that we all found to be our biggest influences have been mainly Aussie pub rock bands like The Poor, Rose Tattoo, The Angels, AC/DC and Billy Thorpe. We also draw a fair bit of influence from other world greats like Motorhead, Van Halen, KISS, Thin Lizzy, The Darkness.... I could go on for days.

Andy-Since you happen to hail from Australia I'd wager the comparisons are always the same. Other then the obvious bands, AC/DC and Airbourne, how would you personally describe your sound to someone who might have never heard your band? 

Dale-The AC/DC and Airbourne comparisons are very common, but to be quite frank we are very humbled by that. AC/DC is the greatest band in the world and Airbourne are a band that are headlining European Festivals. We're absolutely stoked to be compared to them, who wouldn't!? However though I think that our blend of rock n' roll is perhaps a bit more diverse and is a little more evolved thanks to our different influences. 'Cop This' is a perfect example of the bands ability to have a certain edge whilst holding down our pub rock roots.

Andy-It's a Long Way to the Top (If you Wanna Rock 'n' Roll) isn't it? Or has it all been a blur? 

Dale-It is most definitely a long way to the top, but for every kick in the teeth you get there is also just enough great things that happen to make you persevere. I don't know too many international touring bands that haven't worked their balls off to get to where they are. Sometimes you're so tired and burned out on tour that it drags along but you only need one great show to completely reverse the morale of the band! It's always amazing to see what the next day in the life of rock n' roll will throw at you!

Andy-Was there ever one of those moments when you stopped and said "I can't believe we're doing this?"

Dale-There has been a few. Good and bad. Good ones were standing backstage having beers with your idols like The Angels, Rose Tattoo and The Screaming Jets just after you played an epic show with them to a huge crowd. The bad ones were times were you're starting a 20 hour non-stop drive back down the East Coast of Australia to get home in time for work the next day, and you can't see out the windscreen because it's raining sideways!

Andy-If The Deep End had a mission statement what would it be?

Dale-No Standing Still On Stage.

Andy-You guys have played with some pretty big names. What has been your favorite show so far?

Dale-Making us choose a favourite support show is like picking favourites out of your children. It's too hard. They were all a blast!

Andy-Any crazy stories from the road you can share? Obviously I mean nothing that would get you in trouble with the authorities LOL!

Dale-Theres quite a few as you can imagine from a band that tours up and down the country in a clapped out van with no money and accommodation regularly! To summarise - sleeping in primary schools, been woken up on the beach by paramedics because people thought you were dead, sleeping in underground shopping centre car parks, picking up girls to get a bed for the night, scabbing as much free beer as possible, storming music shops and doing shotgun shows in public for money!

Andy-What's the one thing The Deep End has to have with them when you hit the road? 

Dale-Instruments. And lots of our favourite bands tunes. When you do 20+ hours a day in the car sometimes you need a wide range of killer tunes.

 Andy-What's your dream tour look like? What bands would you like to hit the road with if you could?

Dale-We will take a 747 jumbo jet decked out just like Ed Force One (Iron Maiden). We will play in every capital city in the world as well as a handful of other destinations we would just want to travel to. We will take some bands from Melbourne that are awesome inc. Empra, Dead City Ruins, My Dynamite, Electrik Dynamite and Sudden State. Headlining will be AC/DC, Motorhead and Van Halen and every night we will play and then watch AC/DC and Lemmy team up and beat up David Lee Roth. Man... that is a dream.

Andy-The new album has a much edgier vibe. Was that your intention when you stepped into the studio?

Dale-We made a point of just letting the songs flow and find their own vibe in the writing process. Naturally the more we played them the more ideas would come into their own and the songs sorta polished themselves in the end just from playing them so many times. Our intention in the studio was to just keep letting the creativity flow and not be afraid of trying anything different if it worked. In the end we found that it come up sounding a lot more epic than we'd ever expected and we are pumped about that!

Andy-How's the reception for the album been in your home country?

Dale-The reception here so far has been fantastic. We sold out the album launch at one of our favourite Melbourne venues which was epic! Plenty of community radio airplay and interviews as well as some great publicity. Our management and publicist have really been doing a stellar job of putting us in front of the right people and its still only early days which is exciting.

Andy- Favorite songs from the new album?

Dale-Once again, picking favourite songs is like picking favourites of your children. But... I'd say the kid who gave you the least trouble would be Cheap Night Out and the very talented sportsperson in the family would be Midnight Sun. 

Andy-I know when we talked early you said you have had a few orders for the new album come from Ohio. What has been some of the biggest surprises for you guys as far as album sales go? Had any orders that made you stop and go "Wow, who would have guessed we'd ever get an order for there?"

Dale-So far we've had orders from most East Coast states in the US, the UK, France, Germany, Austria, Belgium, Switzerland, New Zealand, Japan.. the list goes on and on! Perhaps most exciting though was the order for 100 CD's from a German music store just a couple of days ago! As an Aussie band that's never toured over there its amazing to see the power of the internet. We are beyond stoked about our humble little band going international!

Andy-What's 2013 hold for you guys?

Dale-2013 holds a lot of killer shows around Australia and NZ, a lot of beers being consumed and hopefully some more international touring later in the year whilst we think about the next record.

Andy- I always let the band/artist have the last word. Anything you want to say to your fans? Words of wisdom?

Dale-Huge thanks to everyone for all the support in any which way or form you have given it. To those in the northern hemisphere, thank you for your support even though you haven't seen the band yet. The more that can get behind us the closer we will be to getting over there and meeting you all for rock n' roll and beers! Cheers!

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