No Peace
Thank you for your time, mates. We only began a new year a few days ago, but how has everything been going on that side of the globe?
Life has been very busy. I have been neglecting this interview, and I apologise. Work and life commitments have gotten in the way. But not anymore, lets do this! Thank you for having me.
First off here is a little intro: my name is Jesse Hurricane Conte, I sing for No Peace; I play guitar in Collapse, and All In; I drum for Stressed. I've been Straight Edge for 14 years.
Australia is at an interesting point in time. Our central left leaning government has been elected nationally and in my state, so things are more positive on a political front. Small changes are slowly happening and there's more of an emphasis on health, the environment and renewable energy. See how long this lasts!
Let us start off with that oh so cliché question: where did it all begin? The story of a Hardcore band from Australia.
March 2020 the world (Australia especially) went into some pretty hard Covid19 lockdowns. My home town of Adelaide just stopped... Fortunately my work kept paying us, which was absolutely life saving, where so many people struggled I had the privilege of being paid to stay home and write riffs and lyrics. Forever grateful for this, as it’s not often a company takes care of their employees.
March 2020 is where No Peace was born. I had so much time free and I needed to have a creative outlet to deal with the fucked up world unfolding around me. My band at the time (All In) was pretty inactive, and I decided I needed to write some more pissed off and energetic lyrics and riffs.
Fast forward 3 years later, and No Peace has been a driving factor in my life. Giving me purpose where I had none.
Your latest release - “Something More” - is packed with friends. How did it come about, and why? I have always seen Hardcore as a constant gathering of friends, so I get how calling your mates makes sense.
If I had my way the band would be a revolving door of my friends singing each song while I played guitar. I love HC records/songs with multiple voices on them, at adds to that sense of community.
What is the concept
behind this album? Lyrically speaking, that is. Is there a line that holds all
the 11 tracks together, or are they 11 tracks with their own essence and
message?
"LIVE WITH THE PAIN" I think sums up the record. But at the same time, every song has meaning in and of itself.
Now that I mention
Message and Essence… what is the message and essence you extract from Hardcore?
Do you look at the genre today, the same way you did when you first got in
contact with it? And how did you get in contact with Hardcore, for that matter?
Where to even begin. I think Hardcore has both saved and ruined my life. From a young age I was lonely and had no sense of community, I had so many questions that adults couldnt answer. Hardcore taught me to value inner strength and outer defiance, common bonds of fellowship and love through this music scene and the Straight Edge community. There's nothing else like it. It ruined my life because its all I fucking think about.
Did you start a band
to be more active on the scene, or because you felt you had a message that
needed to be heard?
Both reasons. To become more active, but also because I felt like no one was saying what I wanted/needed to say. Also to prove to myself I can do it and stand in front of people and be myself.
Where do you all get
inspiration from? I mean, we all have those bands that we look up to, those
subjects that almost force us to write… what are your sources of inspiration?
I could list endless amounts of bands. Instead I'd rather list feelings or themes: defiance, strength, optimism, pessimism, anger, fury, rage, passion, change, growth...
How do your surroundings influence the way you create? And with that we jump into your local scene (and even your national scene). I am completely unaware of the Australian scene (mostly because I have no time to search for music), so I got to ask you: how is it?
Whatever I am going through at the time has a huge impact on what I create. Creating is inherently connected to experience.
Australia is going off again, we have Speed to thank for that. They're leading the way. But, there are so many other incredible bands from my country. Active bands worth checking: Fever Shack, Heat, Horsepower, Gravitate, Bolt Cutter, Persecutor, No Brainer, The Others, Terminal Sleep, Two Faced... I'm probably forgetting so many.
I have a question that might sound very arrogant: what are the future perspectives for a band based on an island, a big one, but an island, nonetheless? Not that you are isolated, but geographically speaking, it has to be hard (the obvious situation with touring, yes).
This is actually a fucking great question. Let’s look into this: Australia has a population of less than 30 million people and our cities are spread out so far, that the closest major city to Adelaide – where I live – is an 8 hour drive. So yeah, its fucking hard, man. Unless you are from Melbourne or Sydney, it’s hard as fuck to get noticed, and in a heavy music landscape that idolises metalcore, a No Peace styled Hardcore band is not on many people's radars.
To put it in perspective, a big band like Comeback Kid tours Australia and they'll play 8-9 shows down our East Coast. If CBK went to tour the US, Europe, or fucking anywhere else, they could easily play a show every day for a month if they wanted to bust it.
It means that unfortunately our local bands cant play many shows consistently, which means it takes us years longer to get tight and confident live because there are drastically less opportunities around us to tour and play.
Back to “Something
More”. How did the whole creative process go? Is it an individual or you go
straight into jams?
Our creative process is simple, I write the riffs and lyrics, then take the often completed songs to our drummer Jeremy and we work out beats together. He is a skilled drummer, goes hard.
I found out about you via YouTube, in one of those days where you press PLAY and let it roll. It has melody as well as power, and both are very well balanced. It is a very up-tempo sound. Is that what you look for when creating? That it sounds energetic, positive, filled with power?
I love that you recognised those qualities in our music, because that is exactly what I go for. I want to write Down To Nothing style energetic songs and sing Have Heart or Internal Affairs lyrics. I am not into slow heavy music, its boring and lame majority of the time.
“Something More” came out on December 3rd, not long ago. Do you have plans for your next release?
Well yes we do now, because I have taken so fucking long to write this interview we are 3 months into 2023 and have already recorded our next release. If all goes to plan we are doing a split with two international bands that I love.
Any last words, perhaps, to that one guy that is going to read this. Lure him in, maybe eheheh it was a pleasure, as it is always a delight to discover new music, good music. We eagerly wait for new music. Rock on, mates! Cheers.
As I write this interview
it is 4:30am and I'm laying in a hospital bed about to get my appendix out.
These may be my final words, so fuck yeah I got shit to say.
Find something you love
and do it until your last breath. Give and create, I don't believe in any gods,
so our purpose in life is what you make it. Make change in your local Hardcore
scene, get up on stage and grab that mic off your favourite band, learn an
instrument, start a band or write a zine... do it today, do it right now!
Because if not you; who? And if not now; when?
Life Lair Regret Records Official Bandcamp
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