Five For Five With Drew Gardner of Totally Unicorn
Another band from my neck of the woods is Totally Unicorn. They play the sort of aggressive hardcore that will knock your cock in your wash-pocket, should you dig bands like Converge, The Dillinger Escape Plan & Daughters. Amazing, both on record and live. Check them out, and read on to see what Drew has to say about stuff involving music.
If you could narrow down your top five favourite bands/ artists, who are they?
Fuck this is a ridiculously hard question.... ummm literally gonna throw the first 5 that come to mind. But I have about 50 top bands/artists.
Daughters
Converge
The Dillinger Escape Plan
Lagwagon
Elliot Smith
Is there an album that changed your life?
Daughters - Canada Songs
Musically this album is like going on the Sizzler at Funland Quick, Dangerous and you get real dizzy. This album also opened my eyes to so many bands that became big influences musically to me.
I think I heard the opening song “I heard the chuds came” on a Building Records compilation and was just like “What the fuck?! This is too much...”. It Was a song I always skipped after that. Fast forward 6months later and a friend lent me the Canada Songs totally forgetting who the band was and I feel in love.
Later realising it was the band from the compilation. I guess it’s not always love at first sight (listen) and this has been the case for many bands I love.
Anyways listen to this record it’s a wonderful 11 minutes.
If you were forced to listen to five albums for the rest of your life, what are they?
Faith No More - King For A Day
Daughters - Self Titled
Elliot Smith - Either/Or
Converge - Jane Doe
Survival of the fatest - Fat Records Compilation
Best show you've ever played
There have been a lot of ripper shows it’s so hard to pick but I guess at the moment it would be our last album launch at Crowbar in Sydney a few months ago.
Getting to share the night with our best friends bands in Pagan, Arse and having mates NOLA who we toured with in Japan come over and play as well was such a fun time.
I couldn’t stop smiling all night.
Was one of those I don’t want this night to end kinda nights.
Worst show you've ever played
It really depends what you mean by worst show. I really love playing so no shows are bad. I’ve had some unlucky experiences in the form of me being an idiot and injuring myself (I guess that’s my fault not really being unlucky).
But I guess something that sucked not necessarily at a show but after.
Some of the security at a venue that shall remain nameless waited for me in the car park to beat me up because apparently they didn’t like how I didn’t stay on the stage while we played.... They mentioned to me while we were playing that they would be waiting in the car park to “fuck me up”. As soon as we finished I ran to the van and the boys put the gear on top of me so they couldn’t see me. I could see them leaning up against the car swearing and interrogating the other guys in the band. They said I’d run off and they didn’t know where I’d went so they bailed. Show was fun though hahaha.
Any current artists you wish more people knew about?
Yes there are so many great local artists at the moment!
A few I’ve been loving at the moment
Arse
Gravel Pit
Hoon
Velvet Elevator