AVALANCHE : Interview des guitaristes Veronica Campbell et Blake Poulton (ENG)

WTH : I'm here with the rhythm guitar of Avalanche, called Blake Poulton. How long have you been in the band?

Blake : I started playing with this band in December 2024. They just had a personnel issue and they had a few gigs lined up and they really didn't want to cancel. So, they gave me a call that I'd been recently retired from playing live music, so they knew I was available.

WTH : Recently retired? You're 25 years old, probably.

Blake : Yeah, let's go with 25. That sounds great. I'd wrapped up my previous band and hadn't been doing much, so they knew I wasn't doing anything else. They said, look, we've got some gigs coming up, some really important ones. Can you just come and fill in for a little bit? And I said, yeah, okay, these gigs sound fun. I'll go and do these. And then, as time has gone on, the commitment has sort of just grown. It's been like, well, the relationship's working really well. We're all happy. So, eventually, we changed that over to just being more of a full-time thing. And that leads us to here.

WTH : The filling became eternity.

Blake : Yeah, as happens with me with basically every band I've ever been in. They say, hey, do you want to join the band? No, but I'll fill in. And then, after a period of time, I say, all right, I'll join the band.

WTH : Veronika is joining us. Hello!

Blake : No worries. No, we're just asking my origins. We're up to the part where I get bitten by the radioactive spider.

Veronica : I'm good, thank you. Soundcheck, everything is done.

WTH : So, I was just asking, when the band formed, you formed it first with Steven, and then people came along with you?

Veronica : Yes, that's right. Yes, me and Steve formed it back in 2018. We had a few people come in and out, and eventually we found this guy, our drummer, Bon, and this is the best line-up we've got. We decided to keep him. Yes, we decided to keep him after we found him lost in the street.

Blake : They are putting up with me for now.

Veronica : No, he's the best guitar player I know, so he's definitely helped elevate the band to a new level.

Blake : I think that just means she needs to know more guitar players.

WTH : I think you don’t look so bad as a guitar player. I've seen some videos, your shredding is quite impressive.

Veronica : Oh, thank you.

WTH : So, your first album, Armed to the Teeth, was released just a few days ago. Have you received any feedback from fans or critics yet?

Veronica : Yes, definitely. We're getting so much reviews coming in every day, it's hard to keep up with them. It's really crazy and overwhelming. Fans as well, we've been trying to meet people after our set, we're at the merch table trying to meet people after each show, and they've almost sold us out on vinyl. They're all buying it, they're all loving it, so it's really crazy.

WTH : The comeback of the vinyl ?

Veronica : Yes, vinyl CD, we're almost out.

Blake : I think the vinyl is doing well because it's such a large medium. You can see the artwork really clearly, and when it's shrunk down to the CD, it's a little bit harder to see.

Veronica : It's a very bright, colourful artwork.

Blake : I like signing the vinyls more too, because I can see what I'm doing.

WTH : There's a huge Aussie pub rock influence in your band. In your opinion, what makes the Australian rock scene so unique and why?

Veronica : That's a good question. Aussie rock is definitely its own kind of genre. It's what you think of when you think of drunk people in a pub, just headbanging to real raw, loud rock kind of music. It's literally the quintessential kind of thing of that. Underground music.

Blake : I think of it as music that was designed to appeal to blue-collar workers, made often by people not far removed from blue-collar workers. It's very street and very genuine. It's not trying to be overly clever in its production or its delivery. I think people connect with and appreciate that genuine aspect of it.

Veronica : It is simple, but it's very powerful. A lot of people on a broad spectrum can really relate to it. If it's something you just hear and you instantly want to bang your head, that's Aussie rock, I think.

WTH : It's your fifth show tonight in a week. How do you manage physical intensity of your shows? Don't you suffer from jet lag? Because Australia is a little bit far away from here.

Veronica : We managed to completely bypass the jet lag because we had about four days straight of travel. We had to fly to Hong Kong, then we flew to London to pick up our lone gear from Marshall and Orange. They very kindly gave us some free amps to use for the tour, so we had to go to London first. Then we drove straight to Germany, so it was literally four days of straight travel. We didn't even feel jet lag because we were just awake for four days.

Blake : I don't know if I would recommend that method to anyone else, trying to avoid jet lag. There's probably smarter or safer ways to do it. We didn't really have a choice.

WTH : Have you noticed the difference between Australian and European audiences?

Blake : Yes. The difference is I'm finding European audiences are much more ready and willing to let themselves enjoy new music. In Sydney, it oftentimes feels like you have to work extremely hard to impress people. It takes a long time for Australian audiences to come around to you, if you're not already a thing that they know, which is strange. Australia was the breeding ground for the kind of music that this band makes. I'm not sure what the deal is there. It doesn't really make a lot of sense to me. When I go and see a band for the first time, if I like it, I go and let them know. I fully allow myself to enjoy it. It's been liberating to come here to Europe and see people's faces light up from the second key to the first note. It's an awesome feeling.

Veronica : Yes, people have been very welcoming and very nice and really enjoyed meeting everyone after the show and talking to them and signing stuff. Everyone's just been so lovely. That's really good fun, I think.

WTH : I hope you will enjoy the French audience.

Veronica : Yes, definitely. Very excited to play Paris for the first time.

WTH : Tell us about your collaboration with Steve James, the famous producer.

Veronica : Yes, that was the first time we ever worked with a producer, actually. He's worked with Airbourne before. He's worked with a lot of big Aussie pub rock bands like Cold Chisel and the Angels and stuff. It might not be as known here, but they're very big in Australia. It was lovely working with him. He only gave us the smallest of notes. Things like, keep the drums going a bit here, cut this section out or change the tuning a bit here. Just really small things. It was the last piece of the puzzle that made the whole song that we wouldn't have necessarily thought of ourselves. We've taken that into our songwriting moving forward as well. It's definitely been a really good experience working with an outside source.

WTH : Blake, did you participate on the album?

Blake : I did participate with the album, but the sessions that I was involved with weren't manned by Steve. I will mirror what Veronica said there. The mark of a good producer is not that they completely reshape the sound of a band. It's capturing and distilling what they're already doing. Making sweeping changes is probably not on the cards. If you can make a song all it can be with a tiny little tweak, you've got a good set of ears if you can do that.

Veronica : I guess a good example is for Bottle of Sin. Originally the second verse was just like the first verse, it was a little bit more mellow. But he's like, after the chorus, keep the energy up, keep it going. So we made the second verse more like the chorus rather than the first verse. And we've kind of done that with every song since then. So just little changes like that have really helped hone the sound in.

WTH : A little help on one song can help other songs ?

Veronica : And trimming out the fat of songs as well. Not needing sections that go on for a bit too long or a bit ego trips in a way. Just keep it tight, keep it the bare bones of the song is what we need.

WTH : How did the connection with Airbourne and specifically with singer Joel O'Keefe come about?

Veronica : We're from Sydney but we play all over Australia. We play Melbourne a lot which is where Joel and the band live I believe. They've come to quite a few of our shows in Melbourne. Also just randomly bumped into him at bars over there as well. But yeah, a few years ago he saw us play at this tiny little dive bar in Melbourne. There was like a dozen or two dozen people there. And he was moshing along hard to our set. And we got talking to him. He worked with Steve James so we were talking a bit about that. We sent him all of the masters for the album. And he listened to them, he said he listened to them on big speakers very carefully which was an honour for him to listen to us. And he gave us a call and he said the song Arm To The Teeth was one of the best new rock songs he's ever heard. He was comparing it to Let There Be Rock and early ACDC. And I wrote that riff when I was like 16 and learning to play guitar by playing Airbourne songs. So to hear him, essentially my guitar hero, tell me he really loves our song was really a big moment. And that's why we called the album Arm To The Teeth.

WTH : I imagine opening for them is like a childhood dream ?

Veronica : Absolutely. It's an adult dream. It's a childhood dream and an adult dream for sure.

WTH : How did the opportunity to tour with them come about?

Veronica : We've been talking to Joel about it for a while. He really pushed for us. Obviously the promoters here weren't sure about having a completely unknown band from Australia coming along. They didn't know if we were professional, if we were going to do a good job. But Joel really believed in us. He really fought for us and he got us this tour and we couldn't be more thankful.

WTH : Is the feeling different from when you come on a local Aussie Pub Rock stage and a wider one at the opposite of the world?

Veronica : I'd say yes and no. It's kind of the same feeling either way. You always get a little bit of nervousness but also more excitement and you kind of just channel it all back into the show. It's kind of the same thing but just amplified a lot more I'd say. So yeah, it's been awesome though. It's a really cool feeling. It's a lot of nervous energy but that just goes right back out into the playing and right back out into the show. So yeah, it turns into good energy for sure.

WTH : Let’s talk about your musical influences. ACDC, Airborne and Rose Tattoo are obvious. Are there any other bands, not necessarily Australian, that have influenced you?

Veronica : Yes, definitely. I really like a lot of blues music actually. I really like John Lee Hooker, B.B. King, even some later blues bands like Candy and Free.

WTH : ZZ Top maybe?

Veronica : ZZ Top, yes. I just love the blues is where everything came from. It's the basics. It's really soulful. The way they play is just all feeling and emotion. It's not like scales and technical stuff and that's what I've always been drawn to and what I try to bring out into my playing as well.

WTH : And you, Blake, what are your influences?

Blake : You probably won't hear a lot of it on the album because I didn't contribute all that much to it. I kind of came in pretty late in the piece. But I'm lucky to have been born kind of in the early 90s. So when I kind of became conscious of the world around me, what was big was grunge. I grew up with older cousins that were present for a lot of the 80s music. Like for example Queen or Guns N' Roses, Skid Row. So they exposed me to that. My parents grew up with music of the 60s and 70s. So that's why I got the Deep Purple and the Black Sabbath and Van Halen. And I have two different generations of grandparents. One who's deeply into Elvis and the other set was very much into things like Johnny Cash. So my whole sort of upbringing experience being looked after by all these people. I've got a good solid five decades worth of music. All of it gets funneled into me and then out comes whatever the hell I'm doing.

Avalanche - Armed To The Teeth (Official Music Video)

WTH : Is there any other bands you would like to tour with in the coming years?

Veronica : Yeah, AC/DC would be a dream if they don't retire soon. Same with the Rolling Stones, they're another band I really, really like. There's a newer band from Australia, you may not have heard of them. They're called the Southern River Band. They're starting to tour Europe quite often. They're getting quite a bit of momentum here. Very good blues based kind of rock and roll band. So we'd love to tour with them as well.

Blake : I would love to do something with The Darkness. They were sort of the resurgence of classic rock when I was in high school. They kind of came out as a young kid learning guitar. I was like, oh, it's cool to do this now. It's okay to like music like this now. These guys are doing it so clearly it's okay. Those guys are Slash, Myles Kennedy, The Conspirators.

Veronica : Guns N' Roses ?

Blake : Yeah, Guns N' Roses. Guns N' Roses might be a bit of a long shot yet. Stuff like that.

WTH : Alter Bridge was here two days ago.

Blake : Oh, that's right. They're travelling around here at the moment. I love Alter Bridge.

WTH : We're in Paris at the Zenith. If you had to choose one typical French thing to bring back in your tour bus and keep it with you until the end of the tour, what would it be? Cheese, wine, energy of the Parisian crowd ?

Veronica : Just chocolate croissants. They're very good. I had my first one this morning. It was very good. We don't have very good croissants in Australia at all.

WTH : Don’t you have French bakeries all over the country ?

Veronica : Not near me. I live in Western Sydney. There's not a lot of French ones. I remember we toured Nouméa, New Caledonia, which is a French colony before. That was the first time I had a croissant that was very, very good. I had another one today. I'm happy and I take some back with me.

WTH : And you Blake ?

Blake : I'm told Parisian coffee is pretty good. I haven't been able to try any yet, but if it lives up to the hype that people have been passing on to me, I would like to have a constant supply of good quality coffee. It's the only thing keeping me alive.

WTH : Last question. If you had a few words to say to our readers, what would it be?

Veronica : Keep rock and roll alive. Keep coming to shows and supporting bands and having a good time. We'll all be able to have a good time if that keeps happening.

Blake : I'm sure a lot of your readers play music themselves or are in the process of learning how to play music or write songs. All I want them to know is we started at the exact same place that they did. We're just guys that kept working hard and a little bit of luck managed to make it to where we are here. Hopefully that trend continues, but there's nothing stopping anybody else from doing what we're doing.

Veronica : Just keep going and working hard and rocking even harder.

Blake : Be passionate about it, be committed. Life can take you to crazy and strange places.