JENNIE SKULANDER & NIC MARTIN of DEVILSKIN: Taking Over The World With Heart And Drive
An interview by Sarah Kidd with photography by Doug Peters.
Seven years ago a band by the name of Devilskin were birthed from the bowels of the local music scene, unleashing their debut album just a few short years later. We Rise took the country by storm, reaching number one on the Official New Zealand Music Chart and remaining there for a further staggering 47 weeks. With singles such as the infectious ‘Little Pills’ and the anthemic ‘Start A Revolution’ it was little wonder that the album was soon certified Platinum and Devilskin were selling out venues all across New Zealand with their very first tour.
Fast forward to 2016 and Devilskin were releasing their second album entitled Be Like The River, once again peaking at number one on the Official New Zealand Music Chart. Upon hearing tracks such as ‘We Rise’ and the fantastic ‘Voices’, it was clear that the band had cemented their place well and truly in the New Zealand music scene.
Recently returning from a tour of Europe which included a performance at the iconic Download Festival in Donington Park and the Devilskin crew are ready to take on NZ once again with seven dates across the country. And of course, in true Devilskin style, they are bringing one of their overseas friends along for the ride; Sumo Cyco, the lovechild of punk rock and heavy metal flying in from Canada. Add to the mix some absolutely outstanding local support acts and you have the recipe for one hell of a night out!
I recently sat down with lead vocalist Jennie Skulander and drummer Nic Martin to talk about the upcoming tour, their time at Download, Motherhood and future plans.
Devilskin formed in 2010, which is seven years ago now
Nic: “Seven whole years …”
How are we feeling about the journey, seven years down the track?
Nic: “Oh I’m tired” (laughs)
Jennie: (Laughs) “Nah. I mean it’s been good, I think it just keeps getting better and better to be honest”
Nic: “I think we could agree, it hasn’t felt like seven years”
Jennie: “Oh hell no – no way!”
Nic: “It’s just gone like that, I joined in 2011 and it was pretty much straight into album writing and it’s quite easy to forget that there was you know two and half, three years in between when I joined to when the album actually came out! And it was the debut album so then that was tour after tour after tour and then squeezing in writing whenever we could.
Then all of a sudden we’ve got another album under our belts and we’re doing even more tours! I think once you do summer shows and you get overseas, it all feels like one big long tour that actually covered the best part of 12-18months worth of ground.
But then it all starts to pay off, people are paying attention and are listening to the songs and they know your words and everything. So I think it’s fair to say that it’s felt like a blur but at the same time it definitely feels like it has been seven years’ worth of effort!”
It would have been quite interesting for you too Nic in a lot of ways, being the youngest member
Nic: “I was fifteen when I joined the band! There was one stage where I was tossing up University as well and literally the semester started the same week as the We Rise tour which was the biggest tour that we were about to do at the time.
I just went ‘Well I can try and balance the two’, but it was quickly evident that I had to pick one – and University is always going to be there. Mum bawled her eyes out when I had to say ‘I am at this crossroads I have to pick one’. Dad [Paul Martin, bass player] was gunning for the band and Mum was gunning for University … Mum gets it, but yeah it’s been wild I guess you could say at least!”
Well you have still got time on your side
Nic: “Hopefully” (mutual laughter)
Devilskin of course played at the iconic Download Festival this year, which is an absolutely massive achievement for a New Zealand band! How was that experience?
Jennie: “Unbelievable … just …”
Nic: “Surreal! The atmosphere is everything you dreamed about; Eighty-thousand of your best friends essentially! Not that New Zealand festivals and gigs are ever bad or there’s a bad attitude; but it’s not til you go overseas to something like that that you really appreciate what it’s like to have a truly positive atmosphere on such a large scale at such a big event!
I think it’s got a lot to do with the population, you have just got so many more fans of metal and so much more passion about that sort of music – you know it’s the birthplace of heavy metal over there”
Metal is a very niche market here in New Zealand unfortunately and that is indeed purely because of our size
Nic: “Yeah for sure, and so when you have got that market over there, it just works and everyone is into it. People camp there for five days and they are just totally living and breathing Download”
Jennie: “And everyone is so happy, honestly friendliest festival I have ever been to”
Nic: “I didn’t see one fight!”
Jennie: “Yeah, no fights, everyone is having a good time, you can walk into the mosh pit and not be crowded, people walk around with bottles of wine and cans of beer and stuff because you can do that. Because people aren’t there to … I don’t know … bottle ya?”
Nic: “Get wasted and cause problems…”
In other words the crowd embraces what it is to be part of the brotherhood of metal
Jennie: “Yeah! It was just so good. I used to go to a lot of Big Day Outs when I was younger and have played Westfest, but I hadn’t been to a festival in a while – just to be at a festival. Obviously we were there for two days and honestly just being a munter was actually really cool! I didn’t think I would enjoy myself as much, I’m a bit older now, and a bit boring because I am a Mum (laughs) – I thought I would be like ‘Ugh, I want to be in bed by now’ but no, it was really cool! Playing there was really amazing and we had a really good crowd and it was just … different” (laughs)
Nic: “There is this one photo of Jen that I absolutely love – we only got 25mins on stage over there but that was all we wanted, that was all we needed – but there is one photo that she asked someone from backstage to take and she’s just got this … the biggest, most honest grin on her face ever, and it just captures that ‘We just played Download’ vibe.
That was just such an infectious, positive thing over there, like everyone … all the bands are so stoked to be playing, the whole crowd are stoked to see these bands and it was the first time in a long time it hadn’t actually been dubbed Drownload! Because usually you get just torrential rain; you see photos from 2016 and there’s someone stood, right dead centre of the mosh pit, head to toe in mud and everyone has got their ponchos on. This year it was just beautiful blue, clear skies for three days, it was absolutely awesome”
Jennie: “I actually wore gumboots on the Saturday, that was like a media day for us so we were doing a lot of interviews and I was like ‘Nah not going to get caught out’ so I wore my Aunties gumboots, so pretty much how I am dressed now [full rock chick chic] but with these green polka dot gumboots as well” (laughs)
Nic: “People were getting sunburnt”
As a band from New Zealand, what would be some of the learnings that you have taken away from the experience? Wisdom that you can impart on bands aspiring to do the same thing?
Nic: “I really think it’s a testament – especially to Paul and Nail – to the effort and the persistence of sticking with their guns to be honest. They’ve done the circuit in New Zealand countless, countless times, in so many different avenues, in so many different bands and I think to actually finally have that pay off … like we are still an independent band, we’ve had a little bit of help from Germany from an independent label, but we are still funding our own albums, we are still funding our own tours, funding our own merch.
We’ve always held the reins on the creative vision of it and I think that that speaks volumes. Once you get something out there and you are lucky enough to get that call: you go over there and you just have such an appreciation for it as well because you are one of two bands from New Zealand to be the first to play Download! That’s almost unfathomable to think of by itself! But to be over there and doing it, in that moment when you are on that stage, you get thinking about all the crappy bars that you’ve played, all the times that you could have buckled to a label, could have just taken the cheap offer, taken the easy route. I think it’s a really proud moment for us to be able to get that far without any huge influential government help or giant company handouts”
I know no one likes to be put on that pedestal – but I think that Devilskin certainly are an inspiration to other young bands coming through
Nic: “It’s only ever going to go to the people who have the heart and the drive I think, it’s gotta be a combination. You can be as driven as you want but if you do not believe in what you are creating to start with then I don’t think it’s going to go as far as something you are doing to make you feel fulfilled. Whether you are playing at Download or whether you are playing at Whammy Bar to ten people, I don’t think it should matter… for me personally I just got up on that stage and played the same 25min set that we had been practicing in our band room in Hamilton for the last two months. It was the same. But you do get that little moment when you’re buying that Download Tshirt with your name on it … on the bottom row … in the bottom right corner…”
(laughs) Yeah but it doesn’t matter does it? Your name is still on that tshirt!
Nic: “It’s there – it’s one word and it’s spelt correctly!” (laughs)
Going back to your earlier answer; I have massive respect for any band that plays like it’s the best show of their lives whether it’s to a stadium or to a crowd of twenty people
Jennie: “And that’s how we are; we go overseas and sometimes … you go to Germany play in places like Worms in the middle of nowhere on a tiny stage and our stage barrier is a picket fence …”
Nic: “And we are still on our hands and knees cutting out the backdrop and setting it up …”
Jennie: “Yeah, but we’re still performing like we would if we were playing to Auckland or wherever! Especially when you are still new to a lot of people, you want to try and catch their eye, and if you just stand there like ‘Aww there’s no one here, not going to do much’ They are just going to look at you like ‘Oh yeah’ (rolls eyes)
Nic: “We travelled to the other side of the world; I’m not gonna half ass it!”
Just over a year ago Devilskin welcomed another member to the family with Georgia being born; how do you balance the two Jennie?
Jennie: “Ahhhh (laughs) I mean it’s been hard at times but I just managed to do it. She came on tour with us when we had Halestorm over and that was at the end of last year slash start of this year and we did seventeen dates in New Zealand and three in Australia. She came along for most of the New Zealand tour and then I took her to Australia so that was her first time flying overseas. I was lucky to have friends and family and my fiancée as well to help out.
Then when we played Europe and the UK in February and March – it was like seventeen performances over there – she came along for that one. That was the hardest I found, because I was going and doing these shows and was coming back and as soon as I walked through the doors of the motel I was back to being a Mum! I might still be in my outfit that I have worn and all sweaty and stuff but if she wanted to be breast fed then I am going to feed her (laughs) I’m still a Mum! There were a lot of sleepless nights but we managed to get through it”
Nic: “Good God, you’re modest Jennie! She owned it, like honestly …”
Jennie: “I slept a lot in the van on the way to shows” (laughs)
Nic: “When she was four or five months pregnant – we were doing a big tour in Germany and around the UK – she got the flu and gastro and she couldn’t have any medication, we had to cancel one night in Edinburgh and then she recorded the next number one album with baby in her belly!
Jennie: “I just go with the flow…”
Nic: “And then eight months later, baby is on tour with us, around the other side of the world again! Just the composure that her and her fiancée both have; and Georgia is an angel, seriously she is so good. She likes people, she doesn’t cry unless she is hungry or has a shitty diaper …”
Jennie: (laughs)
Nic: “… and that’s it, you just give her a wave and she’s smiling!”
Jennie: “She’s a pretty brilliant little bubba. When we went to Download, I didn’t take her because it was just two weeks and we didn’t have a day off really, that was hard for me. I think if I was to take her on tour now, obviously it would be a little bit different because she has just started walking …”
Yes, you can’t just put them down like when they are a baby and know that they will still be in the same spot in ten minutes time!
Jennie: “Yeah and the plane ride because the flight to the UK is pretty long. I mean the last one we did – where I didn’t take her – we flew straight to Dubai and that was 17 hours! When she was three or four months old and we were flying on the plane she was good and then at six months she was still pretty good because she wasn’t even crawling yet … now I think would be a little bit different. She would just want to move” (laughs)
Is she going on tour with the band for the upcoming New Zealand shows?
Jennie: “No, I have my partner looking after her, and the shows that will be closest to home I will just head home after the show”
Nic: “Yeah we are doing a lot of Friday’s and Saturday’s as well to cater for the party days for New Zealand, so nice and chilled for this run”
Speaking of the tour – you are performing seven dates across the country and it’s nice to see that Invercargill has been included; they often get abandoned down there!
Nic: “We went there on the 2014 We Rise tour and it was sold out!”
Jennie: “It was great!”
Nic: “Yeah it was good; I think they did a bit of a hoop and a holler in the last couple of tours because they missed out. They have made enough noise, so we have booked Tillermans; Empire being the local band we have there. It’s going to be loud and entertaining!”
I think it’s great that you have several different support acts on this tour; at the risk of sounding clichéd that is how you spread the love!
Nic: “Wasn’t that the idea of a local support … was that you could rope in the locals?”
(laughs) Yeah, but often you see just one band picked up and they are taken through the whole tour
Nic: “Yeah … just because it is convenient”
For Auckland and Hamilton (arguably two of your biggest shows) you have rising stars His Master’s Voice– thoughts on the band?
Nic: “We’ve known them for a long time and obviously Jen, Paul and Nail know Az and Renee from Cripple Mr Onion, and Renee used to play drums for Pauls other band World War Four for a few years. They are just really great dudes and we really dig what they are doing; the whole Devil’s Blues thing is right up their ally and I really like it.
Around 2013/2014 we used to really like putting on a different show; we would have three bands and we would put Craig Radford from Sticky Filth on second. So you would have like a rock band or even a metal band and then you would have Craig Radford doing these haunting, punky, and acoustic tracks and then we would come on stage and that would be a really dynamic night! So we are going back to that thinking, about the whole night as opposed to just having three rock bands coming on and doing their thing”
Jennie: “Especially when you’ve got three rock bands that sound the same, sometimes it’s nice to have something different. His Masters Voice doesn’t sound anything like us and that’s great! That’s the good thing about it”
Nic: “We think it highlights both bands as well, it’s not like we are trying to put on slower or softer bands before us. We want to showcase the real dynamics, we want people to appreciate all aspects of the night, and we want to be able to put on high energy, big light shows”
So it’s an experience, the whole night is an experience for people
Nic: “Because those are the shows that you always talk about at the end of the night! The ones where you get into a hot sweaty room and you saw this band and they blew your mind and then you saw this band and they blew your mind for a totally different reason … then it was all capped off by Devilskin hopefully … rounding up the night”
Jennie: “Blowing your mind a lot!”
Sumo Cyco are also supporting you on this tour (on all seven dates), now you have co-headlined with them before, so who approached who about coming over to New Zealand?
Nic: “We stayed in touch because we just clicked when we were in the UK with them, they were just the warmest, most down to earth people and they had been doing things really similar to how we had. They get in their van, they grab their plane tickets, grab one guitar each and go and camp out for four weeks and do as many shows as they can, and they make the most of it!
So when we combined our forces I think that was beneficial for both of us; on tour they would finish one night and we would finish the next night. We had such a blast with them, it was that kind of fantasy idea ‘Oh you’ve gotta come to New Zealand’ you know New Zealanders and Canadians are …”
Very similar personalities?
Nic: “yeah always trying to apologise over each other and things like that …”
Jennie: (laughs) “sorry, SORRY, sorry!”
Nic: “They are always, always, hungry for shows. They just want to get in front of whoever they can and flaunt their stuff. So their guitarist Matt is steering it pretty much, and him and James – our manager – stayed in close touch and we just said ‘Well we need someone to open our shows’ …”
Jennie: “So do you guys want to come to New Zealand?”
Nic: “’Come to the corner of the world and have a good time!’ And they happily obliged”
I just love the fact that they too come from a town called Hamilton! I find that highly amusing
Nic: “Even when they were describing their Hamilton, it almost sounded like Auckland to us is their Toronto, so it was quite funny to hear that it was the smaller town and there’s not quite as much going on…
There are lots of little ties that make the show cohesive, bands from Hamilton, both female-fronted etc.
Nic: “Yeah and when we were doing the UK we had a British female fronted band called Eva Plays Dead – who again were just the loveliest people. So on the surface you’ve got three, four-piece female fronted rock bands and on paper you are going ‘Ok well that is going to sound like the same thing’.
But anyone who came to those nights knew that they saw three very, very different bands. Sumo Cyco especially, they are very colourful, very cheeky and very punky. And they get right into it, they are creative people and they use a lot of colour visually for their videos and in their outfits and in their music as well; they know how to entertain a crowd. Skye, their vocalist used to be a teen pop sensation in The States; she was opening for Britney Spears when she was fourteen or fifteen, and her band at that time are now Sumo Cyco. They just kind of flipped the switch and now they’re this big, gnarly, punky – I think they described themselves on their Instagram as like ‘a cheerleader being murdered’ or something like that. They are a dynamite band to see perform live and I am really looking forward to seeing how Kiwi’s lap them up!”
It’s great that you have another female-fronted band playing – because Jennie, you really do fly the flag for female vocalists at the moment. It encourages more women to participate in metal/rock because – unfortunately – it is one of those genres that they don’t always feel welcome in
Nic: “Yeah, it’s unfortunately male dominated”
Jennie: “Oh yeah, it is”
Nic: “And I think all three – Skye, Jen and Tiggy from Eva Plays Dead – on that UK tour all at different points said ‘I don’t really like this whole female-fronted term, why does it have to be there, why does it have to be pigeon-holed into that?’ And you understand it but you don’t like the way it is”
It only occurs in the metal scene though I have noticed – there is another band called The Charm and The Fury …
Jennie: “Oh yeah we played with them at Download!”
Yeah! And they are lovely people too. Once again a female lead singer [Caroline Westerndorp] and she doesn’t like the term either, because it always gets pointed out.
Jennie: “I never say that I am in a female-fronted band, I always say that I am in a band. I don’t listen to ‘male-fronted bands’? I just like singing and I got into doing this; I never had the intention to be like ‘Woah, whoa, she’s a chick in a band!’ I’m just a person in a band, let’s be honest”
Nic: “We don’t call them male-fronted bands do we?”
No. As I said, it only seems to occur in the metal genre because there’s that ‘toxic masculinity’ that runs around within the scene. There are still a few who can’t handle or refuse to accept that a female can front a metal band. They write it off as a gimmick
Nic: “Anyone who listens to metal and has heard Jennie sing could not honestly say that she doesn’t put most male metal vocalists to shame. It’s almost a bit silly at this point to be saying ‘Oh well, she is just a girl’, I think we are past that”
So any surprises on tour?
Nic: “Well they wouldn’t be surprises now would they?” (laughs)
(laughs) Ok, how about a heads up on what to expect? Like new material possibly?
Nic: “Yeah, definitely new material. We’ve been chipping away at the woodwork, and we have got some little nuggets to share”
Jennie: “Nuggets?!” (laughs)
Nic: “We are always aiming to move forward and upward whenever it comes to tours; we are always thinking about visuals, always thinking about the show. The drum solo might make a comeback, it might turn into an instrumental piece … it could be Jennie’s turn for a vocal solo maybe …”
Jennie: … (frowns) … “I mean ‘Oh yeah!’”
Nic: “Or something like that. Or she can just chug her cough syrup on stage” (grins)
Jennie: “Yeah. Whiskey actually” (laughs)
Nic: “But yeah, we are all about surprises, but at the same time we are still drums, bass, guitar and vocals and not a whole lot else. We like to highlight that with our light show and the set list as well; really making it a dynamic journey as opposed to ’Here’s some songs you do know, here’s some songs you might know, here’s that song you definitely know, and have a good night’, it’s always gotta be more than that!”
So speaking of new material – is there a new album in the works?
Jennie: “Yeeeessssss”
Nic: “Definitely new material in the works, but I think at this point now, you know how we talked about how fast the seven years has gone by? We haven’t really sat down as a band since just before the first album and really mapped out what’s actually going to be going on. We are always wanting to tour, always wanting to write new music, always wanting to put out new music, always wanting to put out cool videos, merch and cool stuff for people to enjoy.
But yeah it’s always one step at a time. I think it’s time for a refresh, and make some new plans to explore more of the world”
Devilskin are about to embark on a multi date tour around the country alongside their friends Sumo Cyco and a whole host of local acts. You can view all the details you need here, and keep your eye out on Ambient Light later on this week for a really cool Devilskin giveaway you won’t want to miss!
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