Formed in 2019 by five strangers who met via TikTok and Instagram, Classless Act soon found themselves appealing to a wide audience with a blending of anthemic rhythms, shredding guitars and soaring vocals – musical characteristics in themselves dime a dozen, but when performed with true passion and conviction a force unto themselves – and soon caught the attention of producer Bob Rock who took them under his considerable wing.
Only three songs into their career and with a debut album Welcome To The Show set for release on June 24, Classless Act have already had Justin Hawkins from The Darkness perform on the track “This Is For You” and Motley Crue’s Vince Neil lend vocals on “Classless Act” PLUS are in the early stages of a stadium tour which sees the band opening for Joan Jett, Poison, Motley Crue and Def Leppard.
Not bad for a group who only three years ago barely knew each other and are yet to release their debut album.
HEAVY caught up with enigmatic (yes, already) vocalist Derek Day for a fun romp through what is happening with the band, starting with just how the hell they managed to get two of the biggest names in hard rock/metal to appear on two of their first three singles.
"Oh man, you've just gotta ask the universe, that's it!” Day exclaimed. “I don't wanna be a hippy or anything, but... it's a long stream of events. It was just being in the right place at the right time and over and over again, just falling into place. But we were ready. We had an album recorded- we had half an album recorded - and we did it with Bob Rock, and Bob Rock has done the Dr. Feelgood album, Metallica's Black album, all sorts of things and he said let's record it at Tommy's place. Tommy Lee has a recording studio and every now and then he would come down, maybe with an espresso, and listen to what we were doing then leave. And he'd air drum a little bit, and we were like, this is cool, and he'd leave... so he got a first glimpse at what we were and we finished the album later at Sunset Sounds and I think that helped us get on the tour. We pitched to their management and that's how we met Vince. We said Vince, do you wanna sing this song? It sounds like you, it feels like you, it's the name of our band and it will help us immensely (laughs), but it will also help the song and he was like, sure, why not? And just did it. Same with Justin. We were trying to write a song and couldn't finish it - it was just too hard to finish - and our management had a contact and reached out and said hey, do you wanna write with these guys and he was like sure, that would be cool to write with those lads and he finished writing the song which is now “Time To Bleed” and after that we became friends over Whattsap and we just asked him. We just asked. Hey, do you wanna do a solo on this? And he's like, sure, you guys are good lads (laughs). It was cool."
In the full interview Derek tells us more about what to expect from Welcome To The Show, considerations going into a debut album, working with Hawkins and Neil, the four-part interlocking video series of singles that will be completed on June 24, featuring on The Retaliators soundtrack, touring with Motley Crue, handling the extra media attention, coming to Australia and more.