INTERVIEW: Discussing New Music & Touring With The Brilliant Press To MECO
We sat down with Adam, Luke and Lewis from Press To MECO after their performance opening for Shinedown. Among other things, we discussed the origin of their band name, touring with the incredible Shinedown and of course their own music. The band recently released their sophomore record and are just about to release an acoustic EP, which you should definitely give a spin or two once it releases tomorrow. Besides their musical talent, the guys from Press To MECO were such an absolute blast to chat with and here’s what we discussed.
How are you?
Luke: Very well, thank you!
We’re still a little bit sweaty and I’m a little bit ill, so stay away, but other than that very good!
How has touring with Shinedown been so far?
Luke: We’re on show 12, so we’ve been away for a while now. We’ve done 7 in the UK and then we hit Paris, France and Germany and now we’re here!
Adam: It’s been really good, just rooms full of appreciative fans.
We got to play Brixton Academy in London, a beautiful venue with amazing architecture. This venue (013, Tilburg) is also awesome!
We’ve been told by your fellow artists that there’s a difference between UK crowds and European crowds. How do you experience this?
Luke: I feel like this is a case of the grass is alway greener, because everyone feels the other way around. People from Europe feel like they are the ones that stand back a little more, but people from the UK feel the same way about themselves.
Lewis: So many bands our level will go to Europe and will be like “Wow, that was crazy!”.
Luke: One thing we have noticed is that in general people have been jumping onboard with us. We feel like in Europe they do this a little quicker than in the UK.
What sets apart a Press To MECO performance apart from the rest of the rock bands?
Luke: We really, really care. I think we’re just a rock band but I think the unique part of this band is that we all do vocals. There’s a lot of harmony and vocal arrangements. That’s normally the thing that people comment on or pick out.
Lewis: Also lots of sweat.
Does it inspire to watch a show from “Shinedown” with a huge production?
Luke: Yeah, I think with Shinedown it’s kind of like that. Production-wise, in the UK, they had all kinds of lasers as well and in terms of setlist choice and how they construct their whole set, you can learn so much.
Adam: The shows have been so packed, you can hardly walk through the door.
Speaking of your name, what does it mean?
Luke: Press To MECO, MECO is an acronym for Main Engine Cutoff. In a shuttle launch sequence, when you’re going out to space and you reach the right height and velocity to enter orbit you drop off the main engine, you don’t need that fuel anymore. So the point of no return, you have to press ahead.
So, in 2018 you released your sophomore full-length titled “Here’s To The Fatigue”. You went to America for the recording of this record, any special reason for that?
Luke: It wasn’t so much that we thought geographically we needed a change, it was more the producer we wanted to work with was there.
Lewis: He built his own studio out there.
Luke: We could have flown him over and picked a studio here but to get the most out of this guy we just had to put him in his element. It was nice to be in his little bubble and focus on being creative.
Adam: There was an outside shower! It was amazing, you would just shower in the nature. It was special to just be able to look up and see birds while showering.
Luke: Being there in the rural countryside, it was a good place to be and exist. A nice little vacation spot as well! There was another producer who lived nearby and he’d take us out on a family trip. One time we went on rapids, water rapids, hang out by the river. There’s also this thing called “tubing”. All you do is sit in the inflatable tube, drinking beer, and it’s really funny sitting at the end because those people are just floating and they don’t realise how drunk they are until you get up so we saw a lot of people having a hard time trying to get out of it.
Can you tell us something about the new music?
Lewis: It’s bloody good!
Luke: We wanted to keep the sound of our band, we didn’t want to stray too much from the first album, just make a better version of it and have fun with it. The first one brings a lot of stress and pressure.
Adam: With the second album you can use everything you’ve learned from the first album.
When you write an album, do you keep in mind what the audience wants or is it more you doing your thing?
Luke: It’s more you doing your thing. I think we were aware of the stuff we didn’t do so well.
Adam: We’ve always felt quite confident in what we were doing and the only agenda was writing what Press To MECO wanted to write.
If you would have to describe your music in 5 keywords, what would those be?
Lewis: “Hydrometic”!
Adam: Five words… “Boy band”…. “Metal”…. “Boyband plus Metal/Rock”
Luke: “Choruses”, “Harmonies” and “Three-lead vocalist”
Lewis: “This Is Bloody Fantastically Great”
Luke: You think that will sell it to listeners?
Lewis: If we think it’s great, will they as well?
Of course, confidence is always great!
One thing we really love is that every artist has a different story on how they get signed on their most recent record label. How did this go for you?
Lewis: Pretty boring. It was typical us, because we wrote and recorded the album and we came home and we had it mixed and mastered and we had it and we were ike “Who wants to put this out?” and some of the deals were good. Some of the labels were good, but then the deals weren’t so good and we just thought “In this day and age you can do so much self-releasing it”. So we put all infrastructure towards self-releasing it and then literally the week before the pre-orders were meant to go online, Marshall Records stepped in and said “Boys, we need to have a chat.”
Typical Press To MECO.
Luke: It’s interesting with Marshall because Steven who owns MR, he approached us quite early on, quite soon after we recorded the album but the label has only been about since 2016 so when they approached us, it was a completely different model. It was something that wasn’t gonna work for our band, so we decided to self-release it, we thought we were gonna be better off that way. But in a time of 6-7 months they restarted the whole label and reapproached us with a deal. We were skeptical going back, but we met with Steve and were really optimistic.
What’s next for you?
Lewis: Good question!
Luke: We’re gonna go home, I’m gonna play the new Spider-man.
Adam: I’m gonna play Red Dead Redemption 2.
Luke: We finish on the 7th of December, so we’ll probably spend some time getting all the way back.
Luke: We worked a bunch of our songs into acoustic versions so we’re gonna work on that. We’re releasing them on the 15th of February (which is tomorrow).
After that we’ll probably do our own headline tour, we still need to do that but this came up.
Hopefully coming back out to Europe!
How are you?
Luke: Very well, thank you!
We’re still a little bit sweaty and I’m a little bit ill, so stay away, but other than that very good!
How has touring with Shinedown been so far?
Luke: We’re on show 12, so we’ve been away for a while now. We’ve done 7 in the UK and then we hit Paris, France and Germany and now we’re here!
Adam: It’s been really good, just rooms full of appreciative fans.
We got to play Brixton Academy in London, a beautiful venue with amazing architecture. This venue (013, Tilburg) is also awesome!
We’ve been told by your fellow artists that there’s a difference between UK crowds and European crowds. How do you experience this?
Luke: I feel like this is a case of the grass is alway greener, because everyone feels the other way around. People from Europe feel like they are the ones that stand back a little more, but people from the UK feel the same way about themselves.
Lewis: So many bands our level will go to Europe and will be like “Wow, that was crazy!”.
Luke: One thing we have noticed is that in general people have been jumping onboard with us. We feel like in Europe they do this a little quicker than in the UK.
What sets apart a Press To MECO performance apart from the rest of the rock bands?
Luke: We really, really care. I think we’re just a rock band but I think the unique part of this band is that we all do vocals. There’s a lot of harmony and vocal arrangements. That’s normally the thing that people comment on or pick out.
Lewis: Also lots of sweat.
Does it inspire to watch a show from “Shinedown” with a huge production?
Luke: Yeah, I think with Shinedown it’s kind of like that. Production-wise, in the UK, they had all kinds of lasers as well and in terms of setlist choice and how they construct their whole set, you can learn so much.
Adam: The shows have been so packed, you can hardly walk through the door.
Speaking of your name, what does it mean?
Luke: Press To MECO, MECO is an acronym for Main Engine Cutoff. In a shuttle launch sequence, when you’re going out to space and you reach the right height and velocity to enter orbit you drop off the main engine, you don’t need that fuel anymore. So the point of no return, you have to press ahead.
So, in 2018 you released your sophomore full-length titled “Here’s To The Fatigue”. You went to America for the recording of this record, any special reason for that?
Luke: It wasn’t so much that we thought geographically we needed a change, it was more the producer we wanted to work with was there.
Lewis: He built his own studio out there.
Luke: We could have flown him over and picked a studio here but to get the most out of this guy we just had to put him in his element. It was nice to be in his little bubble and focus on being creative.
Adam: There was an outside shower! It was amazing, you would just shower in the nature. It was special to just be able to look up and see birds while showering.
Luke: Being there in the rural countryside, it was a good place to be and exist. A nice little vacation spot as well! There was another producer who lived nearby and he’d take us out on a family trip. One time we went on rapids, water rapids, hang out by the river. There’s also this thing called “tubing”. All you do is sit in the inflatable tube, drinking beer, and it’s really funny sitting at the end because those people are just floating and they don’t realise how drunk they are until you get up so we saw a lot of people having a hard time trying to get out of it.
Can you tell us something about the new music?
Lewis: It’s bloody good!
Luke: We wanted to keep the sound of our band, we didn’t want to stray too much from the first album, just make a better version of it and have fun with it. The first one brings a lot of stress and pressure.
Adam: With the second album you can use everything you’ve learned from the first album.
When you write an album, do you keep in mind what the audience wants or is it more you doing your thing?
Luke: It’s more you doing your thing. I think we were aware of the stuff we didn’t do so well.
Adam: We’ve always felt quite confident in what we were doing and the only agenda was writing what Press To MECO wanted to write.
If you would have to describe your music in 5 keywords, what would those be?
Lewis: “Hydrometic”!
Adam: Five words… “Boy band”…. “Metal”…. “Boyband plus Metal/Rock”
Luke: “Choruses”, “Harmonies” and “Three-lead vocalist”
Lewis: “This Is Bloody Fantastically Great”
Luke: You think that will sell it to listeners?
Lewis: If we think it’s great, will they as well?
Of course, confidence is always great!
One thing we really love is that every artist has a different story on how they get signed on their most recent record label. How did this go for you?
Lewis: Pretty boring. It was typical us, because we wrote and recorded the album and we came home and we had it mixed and mastered and we had it and we were ike “Who wants to put this out?” and some of the deals were good. Some of the labels were good, but then the deals weren’t so good and we just thought “In this day and age you can do so much self-releasing it”. So we put all infrastructure towards self-releasing it and then literally the week before the pre-orders were meant to go online, Marshall Records stepped in and said “Boys, we need to have a chat.”
Typical Press To MECO.
Luke: It’s interesting with Marshall because Steven who owns MR, he approached us quite early on, quite soon after we recorded the album but the label has only been about since 2016 so when they approached us, it was a completely different model. It was something that wasn’t gonna work for our band, so we decided to self-release it, we thought we were gonna be better off that way. But in a time of 6-7 months they restarted the whole label and reapproached us with a deal. We were skeptical going back, but we met with Steve and were really optimistic.
What’s next for you?
Lewis: Good question!
Luke: We’re gonna go home, I’m gonna play the new Spider-man.
Adam: I’m gonna play Red Dead Redemption 2.
Luke: We finish on the 7th of December, so we’ll probably spend some time getting all the way back.
Luke: We worked a bunch of our songs into acoustic versions so we’re gonna work on that. We’re releasing them on the 15th of February (which is tomorrow).
After that we’ll probably do our own headline tour, we still need to do that but this came up.
Hopefully coming back out to Europe!
Press to MECO are releasing their acoustic EP tomorrow!
