Parkway Drive vocalist Winston McCall has voiced his support for Australia’s alternative/heavy music scene.
The metalcore icons are currently on their biggest tour yet to celebrate their 20th anniversary, playing stadiums and arenas across Australia.
“Australia, it’s been a while. To be honest, it feels like forever. We didn’t plan it to be this way, but then again we didn’t plan on making it this far in the first place,” McCall said when the tour was announced.
“So here it is, we’re finally back, with the biggest headlining tour we have done, anywhere, ever, full stop. A celebration of a 20 year journey, of the roads we have walked through, the generations, to the path we still define, our own. 20 years, through blood sweat and tears. Still Australian, still unbreakable. Australia, turn the fuck up and make us proud, this is one for the history books”
In a new interview with Rolling Stone AU/NZ, McCall discussed the current strength of alternative/heavy music in Australia, of which his band are a major part.
“It’s still seen as bad. It’s still seen as shit music.” he said about the heavy/alternative music scene Down Under. “I talked to one of my neighbours the other day and they still have no idea how big this music is, its value; not just personally, but its value to the economy.
“You think about the international tours; you think about the festivals like Good Things and Knotfest, everything else in this country is going under. All of these trends are moving on, but guess what’s not? Guess what no one talks about? Guess what no one gives the validation to? It’s the fact that the peak of this country’s music industry, at this point in time, is what we’re talking about right now. It exists in local heavy artists, which is awesome!”
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McCall revealed that it was Knotfest that led Parkway Drive to go so big for their 20th anniversary tour.
“It felt like a massive gamble,” he told Rolling Stone AU/NZ. “[When] we did Knotfest – that honestly knocked us on our ass, in terms of the response and the feeling we got from those crowds. So then it’s like, even if you do four, eight nights, you’re still excluding so many people who have a connection to this band. We were just going to have to go for the biggest thing that we’d ever done, which was crazy… After Knotfest, I could feel the vibe. I knew we had to do this thing. We had to go big.”
Elsewhere h the interview, McCall expressed his hope for the future of alternative/heavy music in Australia.
“The more we talk about something, the more someone will go, ‘You know what? I’m going to go and check that out,’ and then they fall in love with it. From there, it gets even stronger,” he said.
“You’ve got bands like Polaris, Northlane, Alpha Wolf… they’re doing massive numbers in this country. The big swell that got them there happened in a generation that was completely removed from the big swell that initially pushed Amity [Affliction] and ourselves. It’s happening over these generational pushes now and maintaining in between. Give it another couple of years and there’ll be another one.
“We have this depth of history and talent, and it’s growing within this scene. It’s amazing, not just for Australia, but internationally. We have a big, big reputation and it’s sick to be able to know we’re all exporting in a big way right now. It’s making a large impact and it’s nice. We exist in the generation that has built it from the ground up.”
Born on the sunny shores of Byron Bay, Parkway Drive have released seven full-length albums, scoring three consecutive #1 hits on the ARIA Albums Chart with Ire in 2015, Reverence in 2018, and their latest, Darker Still, in 2022.
Parkway Drive Remaining Tour Dates
Ticket information available via destroyalllines.com
Tuesday 24 September 24th
John Cain Arena, Melbourne, VIC
Friday 27 September 27th
AEC Arena, Adelaide, SA
Sunday 29 September 29th
RAC Arena, Perth, WA
