Cracked And Torn: Interview with Emma Cameron

Carl recently had the pleasure of catching up with Emma Cameron, lead singer for Ashei and managed to squeeze in a few questions to follow up their National tour of New Zealand including some Australian tour dates. This is what Emma had to say ……….

 

Ashei have recently completed their first semi-international tour and played your first overseas show. How did you feel performing to your first crowd outside of New Zealand?

 

AMAZING! I’ve seen bigger bands say time and time again that they love the challenge of being a “new band” somewhere and I think with the struggle to get our name out here in NZ over the past few years was enough for me to disagree with that but since playing those Aussie shows I now have to agree that it’s much more rewarding. We put in all the hard work here in NZ perfecting our music and our live performance and dicking around for 5 years to get to the serious-ness we are at now and to take it over to a place with people who have absolutely no clue who we are and we’re “newbies” in their eyes and then just throwing out there what we give to audiences here in New Zealand and the level we’re at now was seemingly a bit of a punch in the face to the small amount of people attending our first shows over there. We had people who were very excited to have “discovered” us at these shows and bought our EP straight off the bat so that was really fun to have that feeling like you’re winning over new fans immediately. We’ll definitely be going back for more shows next year.

How do you believe that the Australian’s received your music compared to us Kiwis?

 

I think what we’re trying to do is much more accepted there… a way big market so there are more people in to alternative music that’s not being played on mainstream rock radio. There is a whole music community in Australia that are in to the type of music we are influenced by and want to sound like so I think it’s much easier for us to connect with people there. The same community isn’t as strong here which is why we hardly see any of our favourite artists coming here.

Since the release of your debut single, music video, and a killer EP has this had a snowball effect on the bands popularity?

Well Bright Eyes and the music video for it was not our debut by any means. We’ve release 4 singles and 4 music videos prior to that over the last few years, but I think timing everything smartly with the single, EP, tour and next single has definitely had a bit of a snowball effect, in a very small scale. It’s no Lorde… ha ha. But yeah people seem to be more interested the more we do so moral of the story is to just keep putting shit out there, I think!

How is the 5/4 time signature treating you?

HA HA someone has been stalking my personal social media. 5/4 is going great – I just finished a chorus. It’s funny because when we started out we were all about experimentation then we started writing more pop-rock songs that we really enjoyed and just adding in we experimental bits but if we’re going to do another record I want to bring entire-song-experiment vibes to it to show people what we’re capable of. I mean the guys are jazz school trained and I’m in to metal and experimentative music so it would be cool to showcase our technical skills more and more and mix it in with those hooks!

If Ashei could perform a gig alongside 2 other bands, who would they be?

This is my personal want, because we’re all in to different music – I would love to play with Taking Back Sunday or Biffy Clyro but I’m not convinced the 3 of us together would be the most sensible line up.

Now that you have performed throughout NZ, what is your favourite venue?

 

I’m going to base it on the venue alone as opposed to where we actually had the most fun playing – cuz you can have the time of your life playing in a shitty venue. But Players Entertainment Centre (I actually think it might have a different name now) in Invercargill is pretty crazy – the green room for the bands is MASSIVE and lined with lazy boys.. it’s crazy. It also has an entire LED wall behind the stage so you can have your logo or what have you up in lights while you play. It’s a decent size, and our sound guy made it sound amazing. Even if we only played to a handful of people.. haha .. we did it in style! 

Can you finish two double downs back to back in under 4 minutes?

I can’t finish one ever because I don’t eat meat and I especially have a moral loathing towards KFC… 🙂  

 

Besides Biffy Clyro, who are you listening to right now?

Heaps! Alive in Wild Paint, Taking Back Sunday, Manchester Orchestra, Nine Sons of Dan, Envy on the Coast, Saosin… oldies and new stuff. I’m always listening to music. I tend to have favourite bands and just stick to those though, it’s not very often a new artist enters my world unless they make a huge impression.

In a game of Yahtzee between you and Brad Vickers from These Four Walls, who would win?

I’m going to guess Brad because I have no idea how to play Yahtzee. I could kick his butt in Mario Kart though.. 

 

What’s your most embarrassing moment on tour?

Nothing, really… I mean for the most part it’s just me and the guys hanging out and I don’t really get embarrassed in front of them cuz we’ve been together so long. It’s like being around your Mum and Dad ha ha

 

Who do you think is a more iconic female rock artist, Lzzy Hale (Halestorm), or Hayley Williams (Paramore) and why?

Well I’m going to have to say Hayley Williams because I am not familiar with Halestorm. I didn’t really grow up listening to women in rock music which is a shame, but they hardly ever make it up to the dizzying heights of success that male-lead rock bands are. I’d like to see this become more evened out, obviously. I have no doubt there are just as many women-led rock bands who are just as good if not better than many of the male-led ones that ‘make it’ 🙂 

 

Which NZ Bands would you like to see more of and why?

I would like to see more of Ashei ha ha ha. House of Mountain, who are a Christchurch rock band which I love – I’ve been pestering them for releases since I first saw them live a couple years back! Would love to see/hear some releases from them very soon, please.