Halifax are a member of the Drive Thru Records family. Bringing a mixture of pop punk meets screamo, they are one of the newer bands and have a lot going for them. We had the opportunity to grab a few words with Mike and Chris from the band earlier this year, so read on to discover exactly what was said.
Heaviest: Hi there – Who are you and what, do you do!
Halifax Mike: Well hi. My name is MIKE and I am the lead singer from my kick ass band, Halifax.
Heaviest: Right! Mike. Tell us a little about Halifax. How did you come together as a band?
Halifax Mike: Well, right now we’ve been together for about… yeah, for about a year and a half because a little over a year and a half ago we wrote and recorded this first EP, and that was our first coming together. Almost like our demo’ing stage. Chris and I were actually in a band prior to this which some people consider the original Halifax, but I’d like to officially clear it up that that was a completely different band. Chris and I um… we needed some new members, and we had some great new songs…. Adam, our guitar player was a friend of Chris’ and Tommy our drummer was a real good friend of mine… one thing led to another, etc, and here we are. Halifax!
Heaviest: So let’s set the scene. I’m a new fan. I’ve never heard you before. What should I expect when I press play on my cd player?
Halifax Mike: Well, outright, the first song that comes on is actually like, the single song. It’s gonna hit you. It means the most to me too, but it’s just down right in your face rock. If you’re in the mood to listen to something that’s gonna get you going, then as far as I’m concerned, this is the kinda thing you need.
Heaviest: You say hard rock, some say emo… what’s your thoughts on that whole “emo” classification thang?
Halifax Mike: Y’know… classifications in general, I don’t really care for. I like MUSIC. I like, everything. I mean seriously, just check my ipod. I have everything. Like, old Zeppelin, to Taking Back Sunday. Hell, even New Found Glory and Dave Matthews band got a look in. Emo… if that’s your style, whatever. Listen to it, but I honestly don’t think it’s a real classification, and I think people need to relax and just not be so judgemental.
Heaviest: Here here. I want to check your ipod now… what’s the most obscure thing on it?
Halifax Mike: God, I dunno actually. I know I used to have Learn Italian and Learn German in 10 days… and like. some classical stuff. Bach I think. Right now I’ve just cleared it actually. The most obscure thing…. I don’t know. It’s just all bands now.
Heaviest: Did you learn Italian or German?
Halifax Mike: Hahaha… No! Dammit. I tried a little bit. I seriously thought you could just learn it in your sleep. I had it on tour! I I didn’t realise you had to actually like, say the words. I ended up just randomly yelling phrases out. It sucked!
Heaviest: Das is sehr… oh wait, sorry, let me start that again, describe Halifax in two words please sir…
Halifax Mike: Rock. Rock, and… Rock and roll!
Heaviest: On that note, let’s talk a little about this here UK tour. How are you finding it?
Halifax Mike: Well, wow, this tour has been awesome. The kids… jeez the kids are amazing.
It’s like, SOME HOW, they know who we are, and some how they are there every night to sing along to our songs which is fucking incredible. Seriously amazing. UNFORTUNATELY though, I got real sick as soon as we got here so I’ve been losing my voice. Last night we only played two songs so I could try and prepare myself for the rest of the tour. I’ve got it back now though obviously, but seriously, this tour has been really fun, and to make it even better all of the bands are just amazing.
Heaviest: AND, of course, it was your birthday the other day was it not…
Halifax Mike: Yes!
Heaviest: In which case Happy Birthday from Heaviest! How old are you now? 30, 40?
Halifax Mike: Ha, 21, at last, legal drinking age! woo!
Heaviest: Ok, so, tell us, what’s been the highlight of this tour so far?
Halifax Mike: I honestly don’t think that there is one particular highlight. Everything is great. We’re used to being on tour now. Sharing a bus with I Am The Avalanche is pretty awesome. I guess, and I know it’s a bit of a cliché, but I guess the kids are the best part. Seriously. It’s real cool.
Heaviest: Has anything surprised you?
Halifax Chris: The kids! We get over here, a country we’ve never been to before, and it’s just as crazy as back in our home town.
Heaviest: Have there been any amusing tour stories you’d like to confess to us?
Halifax Mike: Oh dear. Yes, my birthday! I drank like, one beer before I went on stage to… how shall we put this… compose myself… anyway, yeah, um… Chris here decided it would be a good idea to get the crowd to buy me drinks, and I ended up taking 12 shots whilst on stage. I was D-E-S-T-R-O-Y-E-D. Luckily we only had two songs left, but for those last two I was spitting up green stuff. Yumm.
Heaviest: Did the rest of the band get you anything nice?
Halifax Mike: Umm… Tommy the drummer and our tour manager bought me some cool shoes.
Heaviest: What about you Chris, did you get Mike here a present?
Halifax Chris: Yeah! I got him drunk.
Halifax Mike: Not drunk. DESTROYED.
Halifax Chris: Ahahaha!
Heaviest: On that drunken note, let’s talk about your EP, A Writers Reference. Tell us about it.
Halifax Mike: Well, here’s the deal. A Writers Reference, is very old. I think a lot of people think it’s something we recently released, but we wrote those songs a long time ago. It was essentially our demo, and it’s just been passed on. We released it in ’04 on our then label No Milk Records, and then in Jan ’05 Drive Thru re-released it. We recorded it aaages prior to No Milk, so to us it’s just plain weird now haha
Halifax Chris: Yeah… it’s a very weird scenario. I wouldn’t say it’s embarrassing, but we wouldn’t call it our best work. Having like, re-releasing it and re-releasing it we’re just like WOW these are just demos. We were just like, when can we actually get down to writing our new cd, which I think is finally coming out in the states in like, September or something. “Inevitability of the Strange World” is it’s name. The songs on it are those which we have just put our ALL into. Super-passionate.
Halifax Mike: I think a good way to portray it is like… say you are a a reporter, and you are writing a story on something. You take down some notes, and before you have the chance to spell check it, grammar check and generally spruce it up, someone steals it and prints it as your final piece. It’s not even half the effort you could have put in, and you’d be like no no no. If you actually sat down and wrote it all out properly, revised it, did all of those rough drafts, it would be so much better. That’s the comparison between our EP and our new record. Expect better things! We love our EP, don’t get me wrong, but we also love the new record.
Heaviest: So if there was one message alone the EP could send out to fans, what do you hope it could be?
Halifax Mike: I guess, just have no regrets. A lot of the ep is…. well no, all of our songs have kind of negative undertones. Sometimes about bad break ups, others about bad friendships. My grandfather dying is of course the whole story with Sydney. I guess just don’t regret anything you do. Just live.
Heaviest: A nice message we think. Enjoy yourselves.
Halifax Mike: Exactly, just live and have a great time.
Heaviest: Alright, so, I’ve a couple of random questions for you now. These are going to test your knowledge and push your brains to the limits of it’s abilities.
Halifax Mike: Go.
Halifax Chris: Bring it on.
Heaviest: Did you know that Halifax is a large town in the county of West Yorkshire in Northern England, with a rough population of 90,000. The centre of England’s Woollen manufacture in the 15th Century. With this in mind, why are you called Halifax?
Halifax Mike: Ha! Nooo
Halifax Chris: Aaaha, no, no, it’s a completely different town called Halifax. It’s in North Canada. Halifax, Nova Scotia! A cold, cold place. A few of our old band members went to a hockey tournament out there and we couldn’t’ think of a name for our band, so I suggest that.
Heaviest: It’s also a huge bank in the UK.
Halifax Mike: Yeah! Jeez, so many kids run up to me after shows with their bank cards waving them in my face. I didn’t get it at first.
Heaviest: Also… did you know that the name Halifax is also supposedly a corruption of the two English words “Holy” and “Face”?
Halifax Mike: That’s actually a cooler meaning…
Halifax Chris: Ahaha, just imagine. “LONDON! WE, ARE, HOLY FACE!”
Heaviest: Riiight. Going back to a slightly more sensible topic here, what’s your opinion on internet file sharing?
Halifax Chris: I personally think it’s great. It gets our music out there and it’s just awesome… of course, it would be great to see our record sales go up and have a huge number in the charts, but that’s only half the business. The other half is the shows, and if there is gonna be another 200 kids at a show that don’t have the cd but got it for free and are still gonna be there going nuts and buying merch… well…
Halifax Mike: Yeah. Well you put all this time and effort into recording these songs… and you could be one of those stingy bands that doesn’t want it to happen, and like, people could go but your record, but probably wont. I mean, at least if they download it, they HAVE it. At the end of the day, of course money is important, but when a band puts their all into a CD, money vs. recognition is a shaky subject.
Heaviest: Money vs. Recognition. An interesting way of putting it. Ok, moving on slightly, do you have a favourite website?
Halifax Mike: Yeah! Too right, ebaumsworld! I go on and watch the crazy weird stuff. Kids in cars opening doors and falling out haha!
Heaviest: Alright, thanks guys, I think that’s all we’ve got time for… one last thing though, tell us straight, what is the BEST thing about being in Halifax?
Halifax Chris+Halifax Mike: The shows.
At this point, we all went our separate ways, and the band went on that evening to play a stonking set at the London Garage. A band certainly worth checking out, and some of the nicest guys you could meet. Thanks to Halifax for their time.