With Million Dead having just completed a mini-tour, finishing up by supporting Hundred Reasons, they have every right to feel that success is very much on its way. This year is looking to be the London-based band’s best year yet, with another tour scheduled for April, and the ever-present possibility of festivals to come.
“We’re writing [for an album] we should be releasing a single or EP in the next few months, but a new album is a little way off, we’re concentrating on playing this one and getting some kind of following overseas, Japan, America, Australia, places like that. The next album is not going to be five years away, we’re happy with the new stuff we’re writing and the next album will kick some serious ass.”
Fans of the band will be pleased to hear that they will be back on the road again soon, “There will defiantly be something new released in April, because we have a big UK tour then and the plan is to release something before that, and of course we want to do all the festivals we can, whatever’s possible really”.
The band has come a long way since their beginnings 3 years ago in London. Their popularity has grown hugely in recent months, and what was largely an underground following has developed in to something much more mainstream. They are now, what they call ‘underground, in the most commercial way’ and were last year nominated for Best Newcomer at the Kerrang! Awards, alongside acts such as The Darkness and Funeral for A Friend. On being nominated they said “We felt good because we were assigned to a small indie label and we were up against bands such as The Darkness who’ve had however many thousands of pounds pumped into them, we were never going to win it but to be on the same list as those guys was a nice feeling, we felt pleasantly out of place at the K! Awards”.
Hailing from London and Australia, Million Dead have a wide basis for material – as is clearly present from the lyrics and music of the group. The band is uncomfortable with the title ‘political band’, something which raises both eyebrows and seems to conjure-up mixed feelings when its suggested.
“We’re just a band, we play music and some of the lyrics [Frank] writes as one-quarter of the band, refer to politics because it interests him, that’s not to say that the rest of us don’t agree with it, but it’s a topic in life to write about, and there’s plenty of other ones”, they go on to say, “It’s just we are a band and if we had a stance or a manifesto then we would be politicians I presume, but we don’t”.
With a clearly talented band, on their way to big things, it’s easy to assume super-stardom has already taken hold, especially with the levels of critical acclaim that have come from all of the media, not so with Million Dead. “The first thing we’ll be doing when we get back home [is] going back to work, uni. We’re not quite at the stage of going home to our mansions yet, or a quick trip round the disused airfield in the Rolls Royce, we all still work or do something outside of the band, we will be going back to that, but hopefully not for too long.”
So the future holds the usual tours, albums and accolades, but what of the actual music? “Musically its going to get a bit more diverse, we’ve never aimed to sound a certain way or to do a certain thing, and as we get better at what we do, and as we evolve as musicians and listen to different stuff the end product will change” As the band look forward to a busy few months, their fans can expect great things to come.
Check out Million Dead’s profile page to view details of the upcoming April tour.