As Everything Unfolds: “Oh, Fuck You. Give Us Some Of The Bar Take Then!”

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With the release of As Everything Unfold’s sophomore album ‘Ultraviolet’ around the corner (Friday!), the band recently embarked on an emphatic tour supporting Enter Shikari alongside Cody Frost. I had the pleasure of catching up with Jon Cass and Adam Kerr to talk about the upcoming album, touring life, and much more! here’s what went down!

Hi, my name is Nick from The Rock Fix and I’m here with Jon and Adam from As Everything Unfolds. How are you guys?

Adam: Yo, What’s up Nick! I’m very good, we’re rocking mate!

So let’s just start off with the new album which is due out next month.

Adam: 21st of April.

There we are. There’s the date! How has it been transitioning from your previous album into this one? From what I’ve heard of it there is a lot of contrast and different styles compared to the first release.

Adam: It’s a bit more mature, isn’t it? I feel like, I said this the other day as well, it feels like it almost sounds like we’ve got a ghostwriter because we really sat down and worked on it. You and me sat down, didn’t we? And we were like, well, we really want to make something cool, fuck about a bit and see what happens.

Jon: We wrote about 30 instrumentals and then just narrowed it down.

Adam: The first one feels really eclectic. I think this time around we were more like, okay, how do we make it more… I hate to use the word, like… radio-friendly, do you know what I mean? Because when we watch people in the crowd and it’s, verse, chorus, breakdown ha psych! You thought, there’s another chorus, there’s another breakdown, or whatever, and you watch them kind of going, I don’t know what to do, we just make it a bit more clear.

Jon: Crowds that hadn’t heard of us were always getting very confused by the stop-start progginess of the other one. But this one, I feel like it just rocks! And we love rock!

Just from the single releases. There is a lot of diversity in this album alone. There’s a lot of the softer and heavier stuff, especially on say a song like ‘Flipside’. With songs like that are those heavy ones more tailored for your live show rather than airtime?

Jon: They’re not tailored for it because we just do what we like, but they definitely do better live. They definitely are ones that are like a staple live and not necessarily like on the last album, even, like Wallow was our heaviest one that always went down amazingly live, but it wasn’t one of the favourites, you would say, out of all of the singles.

Adam: I think people just like a pit. I guess it depends on how the show is. If it’s like a metal show, people want to pit, you can’t pit to sad stuff.

Maybe we need some sad moshing.

Adam: Yeah. I think people just like a mosh and we just like to give it to them.

Looking at this tour as a shining example of diversity in the rock and metal scene. How important do you think it is that we continue on this trajectory? More diversity on these kinds of tours?

Adam: It’s just better, isn’t it? Well, look at the fucking bill, it’s sick!

Jon: There are sick artists, It doesn’t matter what they are, as long as they’re fucking sick.

Adam: If you make good music, fucking listeners rock out! Let’s not hear the same band five times a night.

Another big thing in the industry at the moment is the massive talk about merch cuts at certain venues. What are your guy’s thoughts on that sort of situation?

Adam: Fuck off, Fuck right off! Listen, if you provide the merch person and whatever and you set it all up and stuff, okay, I’ll get it to a certain degree of a small percentage. Because you go, look you guys go off, have a nice time, we’ll do it, we’ll pay, we’ll do everything. Okay, cool. If they just go, oh yeah, give us money, it’s like, oh, fuck you. Give us some of the bar take then!

Jon: Yeah, They tried to take a merch cut off us yesterday. And did you see the merch? We told them to fuck off.

Adam: For those people who weren’t there. It was literally a loading bay next to the lift and the bins and they were asking for 25% and we were just like fuck off.

Jon: We wouldn’t make any money at all. Like, we’re trying to break even. We wouldn’t even break even.

Adam: Merch is the bit that bands use to prop everything else up. And it’s nice as a fan to go there and go if I buy some merch then I am helping the band, if you’re going, oh, I’m buying this, but actually the venue is taking a big old cut of it, fuck off.

Would you say then, if it was a point of saying it was going to be that costly for you guys, would you opt to not sell merch on that certain date?

Jon: I do like what other bands are doing where they’re doing pop-ups instead. I think that’s good. It would honestly be almost detrimental to not sell merch.

Adam: I’ve seen a few where they call up a local pub, like, down the road and ask if they can put a merch stand up to bring those people with us. And they’re like, yeah obviously. All these people are going to come in and buy our drinks. Oh, yeah, okay. They buy merch, they’re going to buy our drinks. It’s a win-win for everyone, of course.

Another thing, especially touring, I’d say probably more internationally than just in your home country is getting a lot more expensive. And you have your German dates coming up and festivals coming up. Have you noticed a big jump since, say, this time last year?

Jon: Yes. The answer is yes.

Adam: Even stuff that you wouldn’t even expect. Like, we have to pay for a big list of our gear so that. We have something for the border people to tick off, That cost us a grand. You can’t travel through different countries without it. You have to put all the shit you’re bringing on with it. Otherwise, you can get fined. If you’re bringing stuff into the country that isn’t on the list, even though beforehand you just walk in, it doesn’t fucking matter. Bollocks, mate.

Jesus!

Adam: Like, oh, it’s a pain in the arse with the fucking merch and stuff. Because if you bring merch through, you bring stuff in and take it out again, it’s not bad. If you bring merch to sell it, make a profit, you have to do all the taxes to all the different countries and whatever. Some people just get the merch when they get to Europe, for example. Do it, leave it there and then come home without it. It’s just easier. Surely that’s not the easier option.

I guess. Unless you’re at that point where you can just have multiple merch stores. We’ll sell it from Germany, sell it from England etc.

Jon: We have to guess how much we think we’re going to sell because otherwise, it cost us money to send it back to the warehouse. It’s fucked! It’s just one of those stupid things that you just don’t think about and then you get slapped with the bill.

Well, I’ll finish off with a little bit more of a light-hearted question. Obviously, this tour, you said has already been amazing, but out of all the nights so far, other than this one, what is like the standout moment from this tour?

Adam: KK Steel mill!

Jon: Yeah, KK Steel Mill every time. It’s the best venue in the UK.

Adam: I heard that KK Slider was there.

Jon: Not Slider!

Adam: God! Charlie’s got me saying it now! Nobody knows if he is there. He could be staying in the back away from everyone.

Jon: He’s hiding by the bar!

Adam: He doesn’t want to be harassed so he stays at the back but I know he was there and I know he liked it.

Especially your set right

Adam: Especially our set!

Jon: Only our set!

That sounds logical! Thank you guys so much for your time.

Adam: Thank you, Nick!

Jon: Yeah, thanks!