After getting plucked from obscurity to front one of the world’s most hotly tipped bands, Northlane’s Marcus Bridge has spent 2015 getting his feet firmly under the table – not least by singing on immense album Node.
“It’s been insane and exhausting!” he remarks. “I’ve been able to tick so much stuff off my bucket list. A lot of old fans were sceptical about the singer change, so it was all pretty daunting at first, but heaps of people have come around, and now there’s no place I’d rather be. I couldn’t be more proud of what we’ve achieved.”
THE FIGHTER
A mixed year couldn’t keep Becca Marmozets down
Wrapping up an amazing couple of years by owning Reading and Leeds’ main stages in August, it’d be easy to assume it was all rainbows and sugar for Marmozets in 2015. But that’s not the case. “It’s been challenging, adventurous, mind-changing, world-changing,” is Becca Macintyre’s review. “It’s been our best year, but in some ways it’s been horrendous. Me, Josh and Sam’s nan died, and she was a big part of the band. So I just feel like 2016 can throw whatever it likes at us. We’re not going to break.” World, you have been warned.
THE HEARTBREAKER
Will’s cult of Creeper grew stronger
“So much has happened this year that we’ve not really had a chance to look back!” laughs Will Gould. It’s a fair point; in 2015 Creeper landed a deal with Roadrunner, released acclaimed second EP The Callous Heart and toured with some of their biggest heroes.
“I would never have thought this year would happen, so it’s been manic, fun and really surreal. I just wanted to write songs and play with bands when I was a kid, and this year we’ve got to do all those things at once!” It’s hard to shake the sensation that this is only the beginning…
THE SCREAM QUEEN
New Years Day’s Ash shook the demons off her back
While you’d think a new label, a new album and some big-ass tours would make 2015 a winner for New Years Day’s Ash Costello, the reality is slightly different. “It was a rough year,” she reveals. “A lot of my ‘ride-or-die’ people got out of the car. I had to really learn how to be strong on my own this year; I had to learn how to rely on myself and how to let people go that weren’t good for me. But I feel proud of myself! I stood my ground, I knew what I deserved and I strived for it. I learned to trust my instincts more, and I wouldn’t change anything.”
