Parker is the latest addition to the Belgian post-hardcore family. Although this name might sound new, all band members have been around for quite some time, as the band mainly consists of members of former Campus, When Hope Escapes and Her Concept.
These five individuals joining forces in 1 new band, engaging 1 new feel and sound, creating an all new experience in modern music scenery.
Come summer this guys will have released their debut EP as well as played some shows in and around town Parker is here to make the post-hardcore scene look unstoppable!
1. What type of band are you?
We are a post-hardcore band, meaning we play rather loud music, containing screams but combining this with melodic parts and singing.
The 5 of us are:;
Steven on vocals
Nick on guitar
Yannick on guitar
Michiam on bass
And Bert on Drums
2. Tell us the brief history of your band.
Most of us had been playing in other bands for several years already. The band actually came together as the former band of Yannick and Bert (When Hope Escapes) came to an end in 2011. They decided to go on with the 2 of them and were trying to find other guys to join their band. As Michiam was/is Yannick’s brother, who had been playing together in the first bands they played in, it was a rather simple step for him to join. The search for a 2nd guitarist was on and they found him as well but after a couple of months, he decided it was not his motivation to continue playing in this band. So search was on again, Nick had meanwhile heard we were looking for a guitarist and contacted us. So we were 4 again. Now we only still needed a singer. After some auditions, Steven auditioned and we immediately got the right feel and right sound with him. The band was complete.
3. How did you guys come up with your band name?
Well, we could come up with the most amazing stories about our band name here, but fact is we just had some brainstorming sessions to think of a band name. We knew we wanted something short, clear and containing some characters which we could do something cool with. We had a kind of classification and in the end "Parker" came out.
4. Who are your musical and non-musical influences?
Musically, our influences are rather broad. We listen to all kinds of music. We also believe that this is the only right approach to at least try being original, listening and being open to all kinds of music. If we have to provide some examples of bands that inspire us within the genre we play, we would definitely say Architects, Bring Me The Horizon, Oh Sleeper and more.
5. Who writes the songs, what are they about?Steven writes the lyrics, the music is written together. It mostly happens that an idea is posted online and is then further worked out during rehearsal, this for us is still the most ‘organic’ way to write songs.
6. Is there any story or concept behind the This Is PRKR title?
When we thought about the band name, we wanted to use some cool characters and these seemed ideal to also be picked up in the EP title. The title of the EP is simply related to the fact that we wanted to show ourselves as a new band, so telling the people that this is a part of who we are. We worked really hard to do what we love.
7. Who produced This Is PRKR and what was it like working with them?
We worked with Stef Appelen, and we must say, he did an absolutely amazing job, we couldn’t have asked for better to produce this EP. It was also a very natural way of working, he does not like to cut/copy/paste parts of tracks so we did have to play everything without any errors, everything on the EP has been tracked as we played it without to much editing on the recorded tracks. We would very much like to work with him again for a future full length.
8. Who did the cover art for This Is PRKR and how much input did you have on it?
Artwork was done by Stijn Hens, who is usually not too much involved in band designs but the concept of the EP is something special, he came up with the idea. Can’t tell you too much about this at this moment unfortunately, it would not be a surprise anymore… But we are very happy with the result and the concept, it is not an everyday CD.
9. Did the band have any definitive goals they were shooting for before the recording process began for this EP
Well what’s very important to us is that it always must stay fun to be in the band. We all have been in other bands and it’s also that experience that made us see that it should always be fun. Think we did have a lot of fun while recording, and hope we have written some good songs that will give us the chance to further grow as a band. Recording was at some stages also a challenge, as technically and rhythmical we did some stuff that none of us had done before. So in that sense, it was not a goal but we have evolved in our playing, also thanks to the recording of this EP.
10. Are you using any new instrumentation you've never used in the recording process before?
Don’t think we really did, however we have increasingly used samples in the songs, which none of us had done, or at least not in the quantity as they are in now. This makes it of course even a greater challenge to perform live, because mistakes can in fact be made, so it has to be spot on.
11. When did you start writing for this EP?
We started writhing before summer 2012. It has taken a while but we did want to get the best out.
12. Can you go into one or two tracks on the new EP? If so, can you give us the track title and brief description of how the track sounds and how it came about?
We want to keep this as a surprise.
13. How was the vibe in the studio?
Well the recording process was different from what most bands do. We did record drums at the studio, these all had to be done in 1 day; we believe our drummer did a great job. For guitars and bass we got a pre-amp from Stef to record all stuff at home and we could start recording ourselves, so not in the studio. Afterwards we just had to re-amp the whole thing which gave us the chance to really work on the guitar and bass sound and we believe this has paid off. Having seen the budget we knew that this was the best possibility for us.
14. When can we expect the new EP to be released?
The EP is being released May 10th in Hasselt, Belgium.15. What can the fans expect to see from you in the future?
Well, first of all we hope that we will be able to play a lot of cool shows, meet a lot of cool people and furthermore work on the new songs and come up with a full length somewhere in 2014. It would also be cool if we could head out to other countries and see the world.
16. Is that your final answer?
It sure is!
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