Exclusive Interview: Past The Fall talk “Poison Mirror”, Bloodstock and fine art!

If you’re ever down on your luck and thinking no one is listening to your sonic creations then look no further than the inspiring story of Cambridgeshire riff merchants Past The Fall. A shared vision between two life long friends for a sound that blends Groove Metal with Grunge saw them create their debut album “From Insanity’s Ruin” has not only taken them to Bloodstock and Hellfest but also to shows across Europe, North America and even in Mexico. Now the band return with new single “Poison Mirror” and we got chatting them about that…

Having received a lot of praise for your 2021 debut album “From Insanity’s Ruin” which not only took you to Hellfest and Bloodstock but also to tour North America and Mexico, what are your aspirations for the future of Past The Fall? “We’re working on material at the moment and its really exciting as it’s a distillation of the best of us but much more focused. We also want to release lots of singles and treat each event like a mini album that has loads of cool/arty/unique video content for each one so we can give the fans the coolest experience possible! Once we have the tracks recorded we’re hitting the euro festival scene in 2024 and will be booking more in the UK hopefully”

Listening to your new single “Poison Mirror“, sonically it feels like a real tornado of souls of bands that we know and love, from the snarl of “Sweating Bullets” era Megadeth to the Groove of Pantera and the darkness of Alice In Chains. If we’re the product of our genes and our influences, who are your influences and what are in your jeans? “I mean you’ve nailed it pretty well there! Perhaps I’d chuck Mastodon and Black Sabbath in the back pockets and squeeze a little bit of Opeth in the Jonny pocket haha!”

Lyrically the new single feels like a statement about the state of world address; people becoming more insular with the advance of technology and mental illness rife. When things aren’t looking so great, what do you cling to? “Yeah that’s right, it’s a reflection of the times definitely. For me personally, I was having trouble with drugs and alcohol which was affecting my mental health so I took a break and that turned into several years! Its not a magic bullet but it really helped me recalibrate my relationship with the world and I found out who my real friends were. That extra space in my life gave me access to Climbing and Jujitsu. So that’s the key for me- face to face human interaction, physical activity and the outdoors”

We always say that even in the digital age, the first bite is with the eye and it has to be said that the artwork which adorns “Poison Mirror” is very fitting. How did you go about choosing it and what do you feel it says about the project? “Thanks! The imagery came from the song at its genesis, which we turned into a video treatment for the production of the forthcoming lyric video. For the video and the art we handed the final production to much more skilled people than ourselves to make and then we just tweaked it till we got something that we felt fitted the track.”

Looking back at the success of the past four years for Past The Fall, what have been some of the finest moments? What do you look back on fondly? “Probably just the creation and release of our Debut Record ‘From Insanity’s Ruin’ it was such a herculean task to create it all and find and extract the potential we always we knew we had. From that point we knew we’d broken through a barrier, and found Past The Falls soul. Playing Bloodstock was also great as it felt like we’d come full circle in many ways as it felt like our ‘local festival’. I remember getting high on a park bench listening to panhandling prince dreaming of putting a band together when I was a kid- then we were loading into the jaeger stage with Ugly Kid Joe playing it live on the next stage- pretty surreal and cool!”

What’s next for Past The Fall? “Just getting this music completed and showing the world something much more focused and powerful- we’ve been through so much in that time the look and feel of us and the band has naturally evolved into something so different- we can’t wait to share it with everyone!”