We spoke to Sam and Tom from Architects at Warped Tour, to find out what the hard working Brighton boys have been up to.
R13: You've just completed a huge tour across Asia, Australia and Canada, how was it?
Tom Searle: It was amazing, so much fun. We couldn't really believe some of the places we went to. We're still taking it all in, when we look back at footage it doesn't even feel like we were there.
Sam Carter: Some people will say "how was tour?" and if it was three months long you can't really say that it was good or bad because sometimes I had the time of my life and sometimes I wanted to go home and cry. It was amazing though, just a really good experience to be out that long. I'm 25 and I probably should have been but I've never been away from home for that long.
R13: Where was your favourite show and why?
TS:Probably Kuala Lumpur but Hong Kong was amazing. The shows in South East Asia were wild, not massive but the people there are so much fun and go so crazy.
R13: Did you get time to explore while you were there or was it literally just show to show?
TS: It varied. When were in Hong Kong we had two days off before the show and the promoter put us up in a nice hotel and took us out to the beach, it was like a holiday.
SC: That was the same with Bali, we had three or four days off there.
R13: Did any of you get Bali Belly?
SC: I did, that was fun!
R13: So I've heard!
TS: He was shitting himself and I was on magic mushrooms in the swimming pool. If you just did magic mushrooms you probably would have had a better time.
SC: Imagine if I'd done magic mushrooms and then Bali Belly kicked in!
R13: Such a nice visual!
TS: Mushrooms are everywhere out there, in the streets people would just stop you and try and sell them to you, it's like my dream, all I want to do is eat mountains of magic mushrooms; it would be perfect! We also had four shows in Brisbane so had some time there, it was our fourth time in Oz, but it was cool just to show up when the show started.
SC: We love Australia. Melbourne's the best; we have a bunch of Melbournites on tour with us right now.
R13: You've also just completed your first ever European headlining tour, how did that make you feel?
TS: It was cool doing it for the first time as you have no expectations; if no-one turns up it doesn't matter, but luckily people showed up every day and loads of shows had sold out.
R13: You're about to go on a UK tour, how are you feeling?
TS: We played in Southampton yesterday, and we're classing this as our London show. It's a bit more nerve-wracking than Europe because we've done loads of headline tours here, it feels like there's more pressure on us and that we have something to prove.
R13: I think people are more judgemental in England.
SC: I think so, but London is probably the best place for us to play. I always hear people say that London is a shitty place to play, but once you've won them over they're the best. We're from Brighton so it's kind of like a hometown show for us, we always have our best crowds in London but who knows what today will be like.
R13: For people who haven't seen you before, what can they expect to see at a live show?
SC: Really, we're no frills. We spend our time trying to write decent music and that's hard enough. All these other bands wear make-up and do crazy stuff on stage but I've never had time to think about that. I don't think there's anything wrong with doing that but I don't feel the need to. Our shows and our music are honest, I think people relate to that, we're not on the cover of all the magazines, we don't have drug addictions, we don't sleep around with groupies, we are just normal people who play in a band and I think that's how it will always be.
R13: There are so many metalcore bands out there, what do you think makes you stand out from the crowd?
SC: To be honest, I don't know and I think that's why I'm so insecure about our band because I watch other bands and think they're great and I totally get why people are into them, but with us I always think "What do people see in us?" and that makes me insecure. It's great, but I feel like we're suddenly going to get found out. We've always been slightly more technical, it's just honest music so perhaps people just relate to us being very, very normal rather than rockstar-like. We're just trying to make songs that we like.
TS: I think a lot of bands write an album because they have to; they'll get to the two year point and set aside two weeks to write a record, record it and release it. We just enjoy playing and being in the studio.
SC: Writing the record is my favourite part, as soon as it comes out and gets reviewed it all gets tainted for me. Before it is just this thing that we all worked on and we're proud of.
TS: It's like having a kid and it's their first day of school, you let them go and the teacher says "You're kid's a little shit, he's stupid, he's a fucking bully."
SC: I know it's stupid, but I don't like seeing our record getting slagged off and reading that we're shit and that happens a lot! I like it when it's just us and there's no judgement.
R13: You were very young when the band started, how has your music changed and developed with age?
SC: I don't think there's a direct correlation between growing up and the sound changing in a certain way.
TS: I think we've learnt from record to record but that's pretty standard for a band.
SC: We've never had a specific target or aim so it has always changed, we were heavy then we weren't as heavy and now I want to write the heavier stuff again. We just play music that reflects wherever we are at the time, that's why we wanted a name that didn't pigeon-hole us; if you have a name like As Blood Runs Black you don't really have a choice what you sound like.
R13: It has been almost a year since you released your last album, is there another one in the pipeline?
TS: There is one planned but we haven't started writing it yet, it will be a reflection of what we enjoy playing live and we'll try to capture that heavy, aggressive vibe that you get at the pinnacle point of your set. There are parts of our set where it doesn't matter what's going on, or how it's going down, we are just all in it. I hope the next record will be a lot more aggressive.
SC: It's an exciting point when you don't know what it will sound like and you just have a blank canvas. I'm excited, I was really pleased with the last record whereas I wasn't so much with The Here and Now before that, so I feel like we're in a better place as a band to make a record now.
R13: Do you think your line-up changes have made you a stronger unit?
TS: The four of us that remain have always been really close and Tim was maybe a little bit of an outsider, or at least a little bit of an outsider before the end. We have never had problems between the four of us; other bands have said "You don't have to hang around together all the time" but we are always together.
SC: Before we did this world tour we all went on holiday together. We did a show in Valencia and stayed out there, most people are like "You spend enough time together, why are you doing that?" but we actually enjoy each other's company. We all get on really well.
TS: We have a friend Adam, who came out with us years ago and he's been filling in on this but we need someone from the UK, but the hard thing is when you have such a tight unit it is difficult to invite someone in. We have to tackle that after this UK tour.
R13: With the changes has there ever been a moment when you thought 'this is it, we're done'?
TS: Yeah. I get those times all the time. I don't think we're done now but you start thinking you can see the end in the distance.
SC: You start questioning how many records you're going to release, or if you have a number one in you. Before Daybreaker came out I thought a lot of us were questioning if we'd make another record.
TS: It's such a rollercoaster, especially on a three month tour. One minute you think you're done and the next you don't think you ever want to do anything else. It changes all the time.
R13: Who inspired you to start playing music and can you remember when you first picked up an instrument?
SC: For me, I loved playing music as a kid and realised that I didn't want a normal job and probably couldn't have a normal job, I pretty much just played music every day and worked as hard as I could, and somehow it actually happened.
TS: All my friends played guitar in school and I eventually plucked up the courage to play guitar but it turns out that I was way better than them!
SC: That's why I started playing drums, because there were no drummers in our school, so I figured if I played drums I'd get loads of gigs. That turned out well because now I'm a singer.
R13: You're involved with PETA, how did that come about?
TS: I don't actually know, they contacted us and asked if we wanted to do something as all four of us are vegan. We only went vegan in January of this year, it's funny though, we put that PETA thing on the internet where it said that we said "Liberate yourself, go vegan" and now everyone rages at us and none of us ever said that.
SC: We love it and we're really enjoying being vegan, anything we can do with companies like that to spread the word is a great thing.
TS: People say we're preaching, but we did something that made us feel good about ourselves, we're not saying you have to be vegan and if you're not then you're an idiot. Whenever you withdraw anything from your life, people immediately think it reflects badly on them because you've done something and they haven't so they assume you think they're doing something wrong and they get annoyed, it's fucking stupid. People just need to relax.
SC: At the end of the day you do it for yourself, I'm not sitting here not eating dairy because I think it's a cool thing to do. I do it because it makes me happy and it makes me feel better, if you want to tell someone that and they get offended by it, they're not understanding what you're saying.
R13: I see being vegan as no different to someone saying "I don't drink" or "I don't smoke".
SC: Exactly, but some people get offended by people that are straight edge, it's always like "Come on man, live you life." They do, you don't need to have alcohol flowing through your system to have a good time.
TS: That said, I love a beer!
R13: What can we expect to see from you over the next twelve months?
TS: We never have any big plans, we'll go and do another record, more touring and see what happens.
SC: Our friend Tom Welsh has been on tour with us and has filmed the whole thing so hopefully we'll have a cool DVD/documentary coming out.
R13: Sounds great, thanks for your time.