Interview by Rashid Alkamraihki
Melbourne based music machine Banks Arcade are in the prime of their musical career.
Having recently completed the Death 2 A Muse Tour, Banks Arcade now set their sights on the release of new album A Muse, which will be unleashed on June 28.
Formed over a shared love of music with a razor-sharp avant-garde aesthetic, Banks Arcade have always teetered on modernity; a fact displayed firmly on their 2018 debut EP Endnote, its 2020 follow-up Fever Dreams, and the group's head-turning singles Roses and Drown, both of which have gone on to amass well over 2 million individual streams.
Releasing their full-length Future Lovers in 2022, Banks Arcade cemented their future-facing trademark style while also turning heads courtesy of their emphatic soundscapes, searing metal and hip-hop additions.
Evolving from the darker sides explored on their recent DEATH 2 EP, released in February, A Muse finds the New Zealand-hailing, Melbourne-based quartet shedding the expected and instead flourishing between moments of searing rock, towering hooks, dance beats and fresh explorations into heavy surrounds.
HEAVY interrogator Rashid caught up with the band the afternoon of their final Brisbane show to talk more about the album, the tour, the different stylistic choices between both EPs (Death 2 and A Muse) and releasing them as two separate works rather than an album, hotel stabbings and the price of cheese in New Zealand plus more.