After making it in 2004 Sikth just fell off the radar.
Bring on April 2006. Roomthirteen find Sikth in the middle of a tour that's a sell out, not only that but their latest musical offering posted on their myspace page has aquired almost 20,000 plays in the first week. Pre-Download the boys are going strong, we find out from guitarist Pin what's been going on for the last year and how the release of their new album is definitely going to push them back in to the limelight.
R13: How's the tour going?
P: Well every night is sold out on this tour, it's busy. The venues are quite tricky because they're not really big venues so you can't really move around and chill out.
R13: But there's six of you on stage!
P: Yeah, that doesn't help matters either. But it's been really enjoyable. We've had a good night every night, partied and travelled around.
R13: Has there been a night that's stood out for you so far?
P: Because all the nights have been sold out I think the night that stood out was York because it was absolute hell. We had issues with people getting turned away because they had some really strange I.D. policy which they didn't let people know about and a lot of people got turned away even if they looked thirty, "You have no I.D., you're not coming in". Plus we knocked over a fruit machine in the bar afterwards and that really pissed off security.
R13: How did that happen? Did you have a fight?!
P: It wasn't actually any of us, Justin [Hill - vocals] and I threw someone at someone else who destroyed the fruit machine, as you do.
R13: Threw someone?!
P: In good favour, we were having fun!
R13: Is there a future gig you're looking forward to?
P: Yeah, Cardiff's going to be good. Tonight's going to be cool because we did that Pontypridd gig last week and that was amazing so I'm hoping that Cardiff will keep it up to that standard.
R13: Roomthirteen last interviewed you in October 2004 and that's kind of where your latest biography fades away.
P: It just ends.
R13: You walked away from Gut records, was that easy?
P: It wasn't easy, we had to walk away from a lot of money but it was for the better cause.
R13: Why did you make the decision?
P: I don't want to go massively into it but the company and us didn't see eye to eye on a lot of things and it wasjust never going to work. Um, how do I say this? [pause] I don't know. Basically our paths were definitely very different and it wouldn't have worked, it was very difficult and better to be off it. Bad answer but...
R13: Are you happier now on Bieler Bros.?
P: Yeah they're great guys, it's definitely cool. Bieler Bros. is nowhere as big, but they've got Skindred who are clearly doing well and another band called Nonpoint and ourselves. They aren't a big label but they really know they're stuff and they're going to get us really touring which is something we've never really done, this was half the problem with Gut they didn't push the touring side of things. It's quite important.
R13: 2005 then, what did you get up to that year?
P: We recorded the second album, that's pretty much all we did. We only played twenty gigs which is next to nothing. We've just done twenty gigs, so we have done a year in three weeks.
R13: On to the album then. Your website claims you completed the album on the 23rd August 2005?
P: That's quite possible, we finished recording it then. We finished mixing it about two weeks ago.
R13: Who have you worked with on this record?
P: Well we produced it ourselves and used an engineer called Matt LaPlante in Miami where we recorded it. It hasn't got too many big names attached to it but it's all our own doing. The mix was again sent back and forth to America with us approving everything so again it was us doing it but we weren't there. We're very in control as a band, we're definitely very happy on how it's come out sounding.
R13: Have you decided on a name yet?
P: The album is called 'Death Of A Dead Day'.
R13: Release date?
P: Not specific for the UK yet but it will be in June but Bieler Bros. only have us for America so we're still finalising who's releasing it in the UK. Which makes life interesting.
R13: Your myspace page features one of your new tracks, has it been received well by fans?
P: 'Bland Street Blooms' is the first track on the album. We had a demo of one of the other tracks 'Part Of The Friction' up for quite a long time and that showed one side of the album and this one shows another side. So there's only another ten sides to look at really. I'm surprised at the reaction, some of the comments on the page are outragous, just so many compliments and basically 20,000 plays in less than a week so you can't complain really.
R13: The Sikth side project 'Sad Season'...
P: That's Mikee's project.
R13: Has it affected Sikth in anyway?
P: Well sometimes you have to keep on top of him to make sure he actually is going to arrive at a gig and not playing folk somewhere.
R13: Oh, is it a folk band?
P: Yeah it's an acousticky, folky, poetry, very Mikee. We've all got little bits and pieces. Dan's got a Metallica covers band, which is about as metal cliched as you can get but they're really good. I teach a bit of guitar and I'm working on getting a band together for a bit of fun really with the guitarist Jamie from Biomechanical, we're just going to have a crazy project just for the sake of it which we'll probably never do but if we ever get time.
R13: Your going to play at Download this year.
P: It's the second time we're playing it so it hasn't got quite the same 'woh!' as last time but it's still amazing. I mean basically the promoter we know is fond of the band and it was just good timing because the album's coming out the same time. So you know, it just seems right.
R13: Who will you be hanging out with backstage? James Hetfield?
P: It depends whose around. Most of us met Metallica last time we played which was cool but they wouldn't remember us. There's bound to be people about but it's just who we bump into and talk to.
R13: Do you think Axl Rose will actually turn up?
P: I wouldn't hold my breath but it would be cool, it's not quite Guns n' Roses is it...
R13: Anyone you want to see?
P: Prodigy, Tool will be worth a look so yeah they'll definitely be people out there playing.
R13: What's the plan for the rest of the year then? Just touring?
P: I hope so. See that's the thing, for the first album we didn't tour massively because it was only out here and Japan and sort of Australia but that was never pushed. So ideally yeah, all over Europe, America and all over the place, to do proper touring.
R13: Well thank you very much.
P: No problem. Pleasure.
You can listen to 'Bland Street Bloom' on Sikth's myspace page, just click here.