Ahead of the release of their awesome debut album, Planet Loud spoke to Dallas from Atlanta party animals Steadlur to find out more about what makes these youngsters rock.

Planet Loud – Hey Dallas, how’s it going?
Steadlur – Cool, things are going well.. I’m just hanging out at home in Georgia

Planet Loud – So, Download..?
Steadlur – Yes, it’s such an honour to be asked to play. We can’t wait..

Planet Loud – You know you’re opening up on the same day and stage as Motley Crue?
Steadlur – Wow, that is a good day for us to play. That’s going to be good! That’ll be our first time over in the UK so the whole experience is going to be new to us.

Planet Loud – What are you expecting from the UK?
Steadlur – A great time. We hear that people over their like rock ‘n’ roll and so do we. That’s what we like to play so I think we’ll be able to connect really well.

Planet Loud – What can we expect from the live show?
Steadlur – We like to bring it on! We love rock ‘n’ roll. We love the music we play and we all love the music we play so you can definitely expect a good time. We have a good time and we bring people into having fun with us. I think we’ve always envisioned ourselves playing on bigger stages like Download so we can’t to play.

Planet Loud – Have you got a vision of how big you want the show to be?
Steadlur – Oh definitely, we want to get it back to the big arena shows. You know? The huge, larger than life shows of the ’80s. In those days everyone was going to the rock show! We want people to be going to the rock show again!

Planet Loud – You’re a new band to the UK, tell us a bit about the history..
Steadlur – It’s me and my brother and we had a few things going on but they weren’t going anywhere so I moved to Atlanta and met our bassist Daniel. We became good friends and started playing music together. The three of us started Steadlur and had a few guitarists but we couldn’t find the right person and so we had to get rid of them. Phillip had always been friends with Tommy and were room mates at one point. When he jammed with is, I remember, it just felt right. People used to talk to us like the Ramones, they’d say Tommy and Dallas Steadlur are coming to the party so it stuck.

Planet Loud – Did it feel strange that people were comparing you to the Ramones?
Steadlur – Not at all, we’re all huge Ramones fans. I’m an old school punk rock fan and we all love our old school rock ‘n’ roll and, The Ramones man, they did it right. We love that and we love what they did.

Planet Loud – Was it bands like the Ramones that made you want to form a band?
Steadlur – I think it was actually more the idea of wanting to be in a band. Our parents gave us instruments when we were young. I was about eleven and he was thirteen and we’d have a drumkit and a guitar. We didn’t think about being in a band, we would just play. As we started to learn our instruments and grow we’d discover that there were places to play and people who wanna listen so it grew from there. We would watch our favourite bands and be inspired by them and their success.

Planet Loud – Apart from The Ramones what other bands are you talking about?
Steadlur – One of the biggest bands was the Foo Fighters because that was a band who really made an impact when we were growing up. We were growing up when Dave Grohl branched off after that horrible Nirvana incident. It was a horrible situation but he still came out of it with a great album and that first album is a record that we listen to a lot. It really sparked a lot in us and it had us looking for the whole rock ‘n’ roll sound. Nowadays I believe we have more of a Guns ‘n’ Roses feel to us. We sometimes had that punk rock, pissed off attitude. Since Tommy joined our sound has shifted as he really rips up the guitar and now we’ve all come together as a band and you can tell who our influences are and that, with the melodies, we enjoy everything from bands like Weezer to the Foo Fighters. We also have a very LA Guns, Guns ‘n’ Roses and even Motley Crue-esque feel to us. We grew up on the radio in the 90′s and then we ventured out and found the roots of what we love and the older stuff and morphed into what we are now.

Planet Loud – You mentioned a lot of the older 80s bands, how do you feel about sharing a label with Slipknot?
Steadlur – Oh, that’s awesome. Those guys are awesome. They are amazing and do it right. I’ve not seen them live yet. Their professionalism in what they’re doing is incredible. Some bands don’t take what they do seriously but those guys, I hear nothing but amazing things about those guys.

Planet Loud – What have you learned as a band so far?
Steadlur – We’ve seen by just going out on a few runs of shows that the younger crowd really digs our sound. People who aren’t jaded on stuff. We play feelgood rock ‘n’ roll. Sometimes it touches on serious subjects but, for the most part, we don’t take ourselves too seriously. We just love what we do.

Planet Loud – Do you think rock has become a bit depressing and jaded?
Steadlur – I think so. I’m a realist in a sense but, at the same time, I wanna live happy and music can really bring people together and spark emotion. A lot of music has been doing it for the worse and not for the better. We wanna come and bring a party. We want people to have a good time.

Planet Loud – Speaking of partying, what’s your ideal night out?
Steadlur – Nowadays we just hang out with our close friends but we went through it for a while going on benders. It’s funny while it lasts but you slowly realise that it can’t last. It’s not good for your body. We just love getting together and getting on the road. Also, when you get on the road, you find that your circle of friends gets tighter.

Planet Loud – Now, with your brother in the band, is there any fighting between you two?
Steadlur – Awww, yeah! Definitely. It’s all in love though. It used to be worse especially on our nights out. As they got worse so did our fighting. Nowadays we’re more focused on what we do. We’ll always fight but it’s about the dumbest stuff and people know just to ignore it!

Planet Loud – Awesome, that’s it’s pretty much covered. Just to finish, what are your goals for the future?
Steadlur – We just want to grow as a band and take what we grew up on and interpret it in our own way. We’re aware of our freshness right now so we want to be able to grow and see where it takes us.

Planet Loud – Well Dallas, thanks for your time and good luck.
Steadlur – No problem, see you at Download!

Interview by Graham Finney