RingMaster Reviews Interviews – Skies Turn Black

By RingMaster Review on April 4, 2019 • ( 0 )

Who started the band, where and when?

Jamie Jordan (Vocals/Guitars) – Me and Adam had played in bands around Manchester for years when we were teenagers. I guess this line-up really started when me and George met Danny while we were studying music at Huddersfield University.

Who plays in the band now and what are they playing?

JJ – Our current line-up is: Jamie Jordan on lead vocals and guitars, George Turner on guitars and backing vocals, Dan Woodhead on bass and Adam Jones on drums. The music is primarily written by Jamie and produced by George.

Who has inspired you?

JJ – The biggest influences on my songwriting are bands like Metallica, Avenged Sevenfold and Bullet For My Valentine. These bands really taught me the importance of strong melodic material in heavy music. In terms of my guitar playing, I learnt a lot from Jeff Loomis’ (Arch Enemy/Nevermore) solo records, learning his material really took my playing to the next level.

Adam Jones (Drums) – Matt Halpern of Periphery is by far my greatest inspiration (even though we don’t have that much sort of stuff implied by our music) for his creativity in unique uses of parts of the kit, groove and learning how to make the most of what you have in front on you, which is what drumming’s all about at gigs.

Dan Woodhead (Bass) – Rush are the band that started it all for me. They really got me into how bass guitar can fit into progressive music and not just be a background instrument. All through the career, even in the synths 80’s period, bass is such a prominent part of the band. From the grooves in Working Man all the way up to the latest Clockwork Angels album. I find it all musically inspiring. Bands from around my era have growing up still stick with me though, A Day To Remember and Four Year Strong being the big ones that made things in a life a little heavier for me.

Why this name? And tell us the meaning of it.

JJ – The name actually came from a British band called Malefice, they had a song called “As The Skies Turn Black” and I thought it sounded really cool!

Have you released any albums? If so, when and what’s the name of it?

DW – Our debut album was out 19th October, titled ‘No Place Like Home’. It’s a 13 track album and we have just released the first single from it, ‘Let You Down’, which did really well! We are just really excited to get the album out; you can pre-order it now from our webstore. We love it.

Have you played with some famous band?

DW – We’ve been on line ups with bands like Crazytown and supported a band called E.Y.E once that had supported Metallica, Evanescence and Anathema in their home country, so that was pretty cool. The dream is to be on a support tour with Avenged or Bullet; that for me would be perfect.

JJ – Although when we played on Kerrang! it was between Alice in Chains and Slipknot which was pretty cool

What’s the plans for the future?

DW – Keep going. We love what we do, and we want the band to do well, but the only way we can have a chance of this happening is by going strong constantly, there’s no resting for us. The album is out now so check it out on iTunes, Apple Music, Spotify, Amazon Music and loads more.