Welcome back to Bristol! How does it feel to be back?
D: It feels great.
J: We’ve been here many, many times. In fact, last time the power actually died after our set, so it was an eventful one (laughs).
You’re coming to the end of this UK leg of the European tour with August Burns Red, how has it been so far?
J: Good. Short, but sweet. We’re actually kind of bummed that it’s so short.
D: Yeah, we were surprised that we only have five shows in England and one in Scotland when we normally come for two weeks at a time.
So now onto the rest of Europe! Anywhere in particular you’re looking forward to playing?
J: Germany is cool. The crowds in Germany are always really good, same with Sweden.
D: Yeah, and Switzerland. Scandinavia is always fun. There are a lot of cool places to play. We’re playing Luxembourg on this tour, which is exciting.
How do the crowds in the UK compare to those in the rest of the world?
D: The US is our biggest market, but the UK is a close second. They always make the shows here really enjoyable.
J: Metal fans are universal and it’s only Japan where things are really that different. The craziest are from South America; they’re really just on another level.
D: The Japanese are just polite and clap after every song (laughs).
J: South American fans are just nutty, crazy and a little bit scary. They’ll jump on the van as you’re driving away.
D: It’s flattering, though (laughs).
What tracks in particular are the ones that get the biggest reaction from UK fans on this tour?
D: Well, we’ve been playing a lot of new songs and really seem to be digging those. Not new, new songs but songs from ‘Dead Throne’. No brand new songs yet. We definitely have some but we’re just not playing them.
J: We’ve got some pretty concrete stuff; we’re just trying to build on them.
D: They’re in our secret lair (laughs).
How has the live show of The Devil Wears Prada evolved over the last few years since the release of the ‘Zombie’ [EP] and ‘Dead Throne’?
J: I think as we get a little bit older and the up and coming bands are coming in a little bit younger, we take it more seriously. I think a lot of people have so much emphasis on everything else about their band, fame and lots of other elements, where for us it’s really just about playing music. So that’s inspired us to put on a bigger and better show because nobody cares what we do for 23 hours of the day, so we try to make that 1 hour we spend on stage our main focus.
Do you think 2012 has been the biggest year for the band so far?
D: Well we released ‘Dead Throne’ in 2011 so I feel like that was our biggest year. This year we haven’t been touring as much, we’ve had a lot of off time, but we’ve been writing. So, big year to come, we hope.
Filming the live DVD for ‘Dead & Alive’ must have been a dream come true.
D: Yeah, most definitely. We had wanted to do a DVD for a while so it was cool to be able to shoot one the way we wanted to.
How do you decide on a venue for something like that?
J: We had a few options. We’ve played the States so much that we know the clubs that breathe good music. Worcester (Massachusetts) just worked out timing wise and with the room. We knew that we wanted a big feeling, not just big crowd. We were kind of torn between there and the Electric Factory in Philly, but we leaned more towards Worcester because it’s a really metal town and the crowds are always crazy there.
Was it difficult choosing the tracks to be included on it?
J: No, we were really focused on just grabbing what we had from the ‘Dead Throne’ tour, so we didn’t change anything. It was just the set we had down in its raw form and we kept it that way.
The tracks from the ‘Zombie’ [EP] really stand out on the live recordings. Was that release a bigger success than expected?
D: Yeah, definitely. I remember when it was a week before it came out and I was talking to our manager, saying that I’d be stoked if it did 6,000-8,000 records, because it’s an EP. Then we got the first day numbers and we had done 12,000 or something and I was like, woah.
Are there any plans for a follow up to it?
J: We’ve tossed around things, mainly jokes, but I wouldn’t take if off the table. It’s a good way to be able to write some songs and not have to commit to a full, big thing. We’re just not really into ‘filler’ and every song that we write for a record is intentionally there. When previous records have come out people tend to be like, ‘Well, we need a few more songs’ and we could just put together some chorus/verse/chorus junk but we don’t really have any interest in that.
We touched on it previously, but what stage is a follow up to ‘Dead Throne’ currently at?
J: We’re definitely putting the pieces in order right now, so we’d be hoping to have something out by next year.
How’s that looking in terms of tone and theme, can fans expect something completely different?
D: There’s always a lyrical theme to the records that Mike (Hranica – vocals) puts together, but I don’t think it will ever be as apparent as with the ‘Zombie’ [EP], which was very self-explanatory (laughs).
J: Tonally, I guess it will just be a further extension of what we already have. We try and continually build down a path instead of trying to reinvent ourselves as people tend to like our band for a reason, so we don’t want to totally change our sound. I think you should just be the best at what you can be.
Is it exclusively Mike who works on lyrical content?
J: Yeah, 100%. He’s probably writing on his laptop right now. It’s always been the way he works and it’s always been about how he sees the world, so there would be no point for us to jump in and say ‘Hey what about this?’ (laughs)
It’s common knowledge for fans that at least in the early days of the band you were heavily influenced by Underoath, what are your thoughts about their decision to call it a day?
J: It’s a bummer, really.
D: Yeah, really bummed about it. They will probably always be a favourite band of mine, even if they don’t exist anymore. They were my first favourite band!
J: I looked at the dates for their farewell tour and for some reason I didn’t think they were going to work out, so that sucks.
D: It’s only 10 shows or something like that.
Finally, what do the next 12 months have in store for The Devil Wears Prada?
J: Just keeping busy, especially over here (the UK), that’s a really big priority for us. At the start of our career we really didn’t come over very much and a few years ago we made a big decision to make the entire world a big priority, not just America.
D: Playing shows is the priority, because where there’s a want for us we wanna be there. The Devil Wears Prada are touring with August Burns Red and Veil of Maya throughout Europe until November 19th.
