Jericco

Speaking to the members of Melbourne progressive/alternative five piece band Jericco (in this case, bassist and founding member Roy Amar and guitar player Jordan Nagle), you get an intensely ambitious and focused feeling from them, and the sense of their massive work ethic. Forming not even three years ago, they have achieved a n incredible amount in their very brief tenure. But again you get the very strong feeling that they’ve merely scratched the surface of what they’re yet capable of… and the best is very much yet to come from these guys.

Could they be the next Karnivool, and outgrow the burgeoning but insular Melbourne scene? Only time will tell, but they certainly have the attitude and the gumption to follow in the footsteps of those mighty West Australians. Roy and Jordan speak of their aspirations and their philosophies towards music, hard work and dedication. “Something Fetah (keyboardist and former Superheist member Fetah Sabawi) says is it’s ‘all out war’,” Jordan emphasises. “Fetah manages the band, and his philosophy is like ‘just don’t give up, and it’s ‘all out war.’ Put everything you’ve fucking got into it. If we’re all not doing that, then we’re not going to achieve anything.

“When we’re not jamming, someone’s doing something,” he laughs. “Fetah’s constantly doing something. Roy’s constantly doing something. Luke’s (Halstead, drums) constantly drumming. A lot of bands are bringing out awesome albums and that’s great. A lot of people go and get them recorded with Forester (Savell), or whatever and spend the money, but you gotta be able to do it live.”

“It’s just basically not giving up,” states Roy, in his heavily Israeli-influenced accent, “it’s about really giving it the best shot you can ever do, ‘cos you’ve only got one shot.”

“You’ve gotta throw everything into it,” Jordan interjects, “because when you look back at the bands you’ve done and been in when you were growing up, compared to what we’re doing in this band, and you go ‘fuck, I wasted so much time in this other band. Really I was doing nothing.’

“You’d be sitting there saying ‘well I’ve rung a venue and hopefully they’ll call back and offer us a gig.’ We’ve got a booking agent but we still ring venues, and we still try to hook up shows with other bands.”

“But it’s just basically (a case of) work the hardest that you can,” Roy continues, “and just when you get there, work a little bit more hard. Because you never stop. That’s our motto in a way.”

There’s an extreme proliferation of bands on the heavy-rock scene at the moment, all trying to get a break. And many, many of them are exceptionally good at what they do (and some not so good, of course!). Because of this almost overwhelming glut of bands and music today, it very much pays for a band to have this kind of attitude towards hard work, and to set themselves up with a ‘point of difference’, something unique about themselves musically as well, to set themselves apart. And Jericco bring this in spades, bringing in their very strong Middle Eastern musical influences to combine with their high-voltage alternative rock.

If you’ve experienced Jericco in any way, you’ll notice that this juxtaposition of seemingly disparate styles actually works an absolute treat; truly giving them an edge in this ridiculously competitive scene. Roy and Jordan explain the thinking and ideologies behind their use of this type of sound, and blending it with the rock so that it doesn’t actually overtly dominate proceedings.

“I always intend to bring the middle eastern stuff in,” Roy starts. “I think Roy doesn’t even notice!” Jordan interrupts, laughing. “Roy started doing it, and then, coming to writing new songs… ‘cos Roy and Luke wrote the first EP… when I joined the band, I sort just put the colour in, to some of the bits. And Roy was like ‘I don’t really like this bit.’ I’d just change a chord and he’d go ‘I love it! It’s what I wanted.

“So when we started writing new stuff, at the start it was like ‘do we do this middle eastern thing, is this our thing?’ “Cos now it’s five people writing, instead of one or two. So we definitely started off straight away going ‘yep, let’s do this middle eastern thing. But then you have nights where you’re like ‘I can’t do anything’ and you say ‘what else have we got?’” “Sometimes I come up with commercial stuff,” Roy carries on, “like full-on U2 stuff, it comes totally natural to me.”

“Some of the tracks on this new EP,” Jordan intercedes again, the enthusiasm flowing out of both men, “they sound a lot more guitar driven, a bit more straight rock. But there’s always some little bit in the background, something that is middle eastern. Especially with Roy and Fetah, they didn’t want to be stuck with this being what we have to do for the rest of our time.”

“We’re a prog metal band, or prog rock band, or alternative,” Roy says, “but we’re a middle eastern rock band… I reckon our album’s going to be very interesting!”

The band launch their EP this Saturday night at The Espy’s Gershwin Room, and Jericco fans, new and old, should get down to see this mighty act live, for something just a little different: “It’s a bit more together,” Roy explains of the band’s current prowling, growling live incarnation, “and there’s a lot more elements of sound, everything sounds better, it sound full, it sounds really big.

“That’s exactly what people are gonna hear.”

JERICCO’s huge War Of Independence tour hits Melbourne this week as they celebrate their Nice To See You EP with a massive show at The Gershwin Room at The Espy on Saturday October 2. They’re joined by guests Self Is A Seed, Sadhana, Sounds Of Sirius and Anna Salen. Tickets from jericco.oztix.com.au and myspace.com/jericcoband.