Onslaught are coming to Greece at 20th of Octomber (Athens) and 21 of Octomber (Thessaloniki). According these performances, Rock Overdose had the chance to talk with Nige Rockett for a lot of subjects. Enjoy the interview below:
Rock Overdose: Hello and welcome to Greece's Rock Overdose! How are you doing?
Nige Rockett: Hi My friend, thank you... Yeah, all is very good in the Onslaught camp right now, very busy with lots of cool plans in the making... 🙂
Rock Overdose: Let's talk about your latest album “Sounds Of Violence”. It's been out over a year now, so looking backwards, would you change anything?
Nige Rockett: Nothing at all..!! thats the first time i can honestly say that about an Onslaught album release.
We spent a lot of time in our own studio preparing and fine tuning the tracks on the SOV album, so we would have no excuses if we were unhappy about anything..
Jacob Hansen did an amazing job on the albums production and mix and i feel its the first time we have truly captured the live sound of the band on record...
Rock Overdose: How was the writing process of the album. Where any differences from the process of your previous work?
Nige Rockett: Yeah we did things in a slightly different way this time around, generally i will work on ideas at home and them take them into the rehearsal room with the band when i have a good outline of a song, but this time myself and Andy Rosser Davies worked together on each and every song, bouncing ideas off of each other.. It was a very productive way of working, we recorded every track every step of the way, so at the end we would have fully produced demos of all the songs..
This meant when we came to recording the actual album we were so tight and well rehearsed in our respective parts..
Rock Overdose: So looking forward to your headlining concerts in Greece... how do you think that will be? Do you have any idea how popular Onslaught is over there?
Nige Rockett: We cannot wait to return to Greece once again, Onslaught loves coming to your country to play because it is always a lot of crazy fun..!!!
This will be our 3rd time in Greece now, first time we came and played 2 shows with Napalm Death in Athens and Thessaloniki and they were reallt amazing shows,totally insane..... as was our last show in Athens around 2 and a half years ago..
So we are very much hoping for more of the same madness in October..!!!!
Rock Overdose: So, well it's been a few years now and two albums since the band got back together. Is this reunion as good as you expected?
Nige Rockett: 7 years back and currently making our 3rd album, and its been totally fucking amazing..!!
its has been far far beyond what we ever imagined would happen this time around for the band and things are getting better ever year, the profile is rising all the time and the response from the fans and press has been minblowing so i guess we are doing something right..!!
Rock Overdose: I've read that Steve was the guy that got the band together, but he's left the band. He said that he saw things happening in the band again now that happened back when the band originally split... What do you have to say about that?
Nige Rockett: It was myself who originally formed the band back in 1983 with Paul Hill & Jase Pope, but you could say Grice was the one who instigated the reunion in 2005...
To be brutally honest he can say whatever he likes about the reasons why he left the band, but him and us know the real truth behind his departure and if he doesn't wish to make that public that his decision, we have nothing more to say on the matter..
Mic Hourihan is your drummer now. He is playing to Desecration, a grindcore band! Do you feel that he's adding some extreme feeling at your material?
Nige Rockett: For sure Onslaught have really moved onwards having Mic Hourihan on board, he has really opened a lot of doors in terms of what this band can now achieve creatively..
There's a whole new level of aggression and intensity to the Onslaught sound both live and in the studio and it has enabled us to bring a much more technical edge into our new music...
Rock Overdose: Are there any plans about to write some new songs for a new album?
Nige Rockett: Hell yeah, All the music is now complete for the next album and it's due for release in may 2013, we are currently working on the vocals and the overall pre-production right now, before we enter the studio early next year..
Its the next step on from SOV, with a whole new level of energy and brutality, lots of old school Onslaught in there too, so the old and new fans are really gonna dig it..!!
Rock Overdose: Let's go back in time, to your “In Search for Sanity” album. I've read somewhere that was the album with the most sales between all of your albums. Why do you think that happened?
Nige Rockett: yeah thats very true, but not because it was necessarily the best Onslaught album...!!! it was not for sure..!!
It was simply that it was released on a major label who had huge budgets for mass promotion and an enormous distribution network to get lots of albums into stores everywhere in the world..
If SOV had the backing that the 'Sanity' album had it would have gone stellar...!! but this is 2012 and the whole industry has radically changed..
Rock Overdose: So, thank you for this interview, it was a great honor! Anything you want to ad before we close?
Nige Rockett: The pleasure was mine my friend..!!! and the honor is ours once again for being invited back to play in your wonderful country..!!
Onslaught will see you all in October for 2 crazy fucking nights of metal and we will of course meet you all for some beers after the shows..!!!!!!!!!!!
Rock Overdose: We are waiting your performances in Greece! Take care!
Nige Rockett: 🙂 thank you.!!!
For Rock Overdose,
Antonis "Jey Key" Katsaros
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