A Q&A with Versus

High-energy alt-rock from Yorkshire…

What’s the title of your latest release, and what does it mean to you?
Our latest release is called ‘All Good Things’ that was released at the back end of January and it means a couple of things, the first being getting out of a toxic relationship and having the tenacity to live for yourself and no one else. The second thing that track means for us is closure – it was the last single to come from The Catalyst, so we can concentrate on another album.

What was the hardest part about putting this release together, and why?
I think the hardest thing about this release was the timing; a couple of us were over in Australia at the time it dropped, the band was going through some positive changes and being an independent band, getting the music out there!

Who produced the release – what did they bring to it? If you produced it yourselves what do you enjoy most about producing your own material?
We self-produce everything that we release – I think for any band like us, it’s the creative freedom to write and have the creative freedom to release good music. I’m not saying that folks who are signed have to play to someone else’s tune with their music and stuff, but we don’t have any external interference in the entire process, start to finish. It means we can release music that we really feel on a personal level, and music that we truly believe in.

What do you want the listener to take away from listening to your music?
We get asked this one sometimes. We just want people to feel something. They can feel love and happiness, hatred and sadness, whatever as long as they actually feel something and resonate with the music. Music is interpretive isn’t it, so if our stuff resonates and makes someone feel a certain way, then we can chalk that up as a win.

How does a track normally come together? Can you tell us something about the process?
Rob usually writes demos, fires them over to us and Calvin & me make suggestions and edits to get to where we want the song to go dynamically as well as getting some kind of subject matter or theme down before writing lyrics. Cal usually bites the bullet after a demo and lays his drums down for the track and away we go with layering everything else on top. It’s kind of like cooking, where you put ingredients into a dish, mix it about a bit until you get something lush out of it (and the award for over-simplifying the production process goes to Shortie!)

What band/artists have influenced you the most since you started this project, and why?
We have evolved over the years and have had so many influences that play a really big part in our writing styles. We all vary but it’s safe to say that we have taken influence from some of the greats like BMTH, Dayseeker and Enter Shikari.

What countries would you like to tour? Are there any standout venues you’d like to play in?
We have all said that we would kill to play in the United States, but believe it or not, we have never chatted about where over there, but personally the venue I want to play is the Whisky A Go Go – I heard stories about that place growing up so it’s a bucket list thing.

If you could pick one track for our readers to listen to in order to get a taste of your music, what would you pick, and why?
‘All Good Things’ is a great start. It’s heavy and will absolutely hit hard from the start with no compromises. It gives the range of what we do melodically and dynamically, and it’s just a really good song. It’s one of our fan favourites.

What ambitions do you have for the band/your career?
I guess our main ambition would be to be able to do this full time instead of having day jobs – that is the dream, right? I think any band in our position or situation would feel the same, but we know super good guitarists from a band with a decent following still holding down a day job, so in that sense, we just want to be able to forge ahead and carry on doing what we’re doing… And maybe be able to buy a jet on the band’s credit card?

Finally, as you leave the stage, what are your parting words?
Peace and love, and thank you so much for your time x

Find out more about Versus at VersusBandInc.com