KickAss Festival successfully completed its second year last weekend with a bumper show at Kenilworth Showgrounds that emphatically proved rock music is alive, well and thriving.
Held over two days with local acts appearing alongside established bands such as James Reyne, Kingswood, Dragon and the Choirboys, KickAss Festival did just that and more with thousands of music lovers taking advantage of the camping facilities on offer to spend the weekend in rock paradise.
HEAVY was granted exclusive media access to backstage interviews on the Saturday, and we managed to corner Kingswood, Choirboys and Lecia Louise for some up close and personal time.
After speaking to Alex Laska from Kingswood several times via zoom, it was long overdue that we finally got the chance to talk with him in person, and it didn’t disappoint.
Kingswood are currently riding the crest of a musical wave that is steadily building to a tidal wave. Following the release of their country inspired album Home earlier this year – an album that has since seen them secure ARIA Awards in that genre – and a massive Australian run of shows, Kingswood are now only days away from heading overseas for another European tour. It seems everything they touch is gold. Until they said yes to this interview.
Kyra-Jade Coombs and Kris Peters drew the short straws for the day.
Kyra kicked things off by bringing up Kingswood’s ever changing sound and whether it is a planned progression musically or more a matter of circumstance.
“To be honest it’s so weird,” Alex replied. “You would think there would be a distinct conversation and then there’s a strategy behind it where we say we should do this, but honestly Fergus and I love so much music and always have done. We’ve been musical around each other since we were 12 years old. There are so many different influences. These things happen where we eventually just go ‘this is inspiring at the moment, what do you think of this?’ And there’s so much mystery that has made us who we are musically that at some point, once you’ve exhausted something, you feel like you become accomplished in it…“
Nothing is off limits in the ensuing 30 minutes as we cover everything from touring to festival survival tips. Strap in and enjoy the ride.
*note due to the live recording of the interviews some background noise and comments can be heard intermittently. Keep an eye on HEAVY over the coming weeks for the full video interviews, uncut and (mostly) uncencored *
