Jessica caught up with Attack! Attack! in Cardiff during their Welsh headline tour to talk about the bands forthcoming album, wall's of death and much more.

Hey guys! How’s your tour so far?
(Neil) Great! Lovely and warm weather.
(Ryan) Lovely weather and we get to go home every night and sleep in our own beds which is nice.
(Neil) It’s the first time we’ve ever done that. But now we’re in Wales doing some Welsh shows, we’ve never done Welsh shows before. I mean we’ve done the odd Cardiff show.
(Ryan) But we’ve never paid our dues to South Wales ya know.
(Neil) We’re from South Wales obviously so we were like ‘Let’s go do some shows then!’

I think it’s great because a lot of the time Wales gets left off the touring map, is that why you decided to do a Welsh tour or were there any other reasons behind the decision?
(Ryan) That’s exactly why! We wanted to pay our respects to where we’re from. A lot of the time promoters like to put on a show in Cardiff because they know it’s safe and people will travel from around the area to Cardiff, so you never get a chance to play in The Valleys or, you know Swansea gets left off the list a lot of the time as well. So we decided to play those places.

After winning MIDEM 2009, ‘You And Me’ now features on Guitar Hero 5 alongside the likes of Beastie Boys, Jimmy Eat World, The Rolling Stones and The Bronx. What does that kind of international exposure mean to you?
(Ryan) Well it’s great to be on with those bands you just said but we’ve been everywhere because of it now, haven’t we?
(Neil) We noticed straight away from the YouTube plays of the video when it went from around a couple of thousand to around a hundred thousand in the first week of the game being out. It’s giving us the exposure that you just can’t get anywhere else
(Ryan) Computer games are the way forward! If you’re on a computer game you’re sorted, it’s just so much better.
(Neil) They sell millions of copies worldwide and there are people who will hear the song who would never have heard it otherwise.
(Ryan) It’s been amazing!
How does it feel knowing that kids, or grandparents in my family’s case – my Nan loves Guitar Hero – from all around the world like Oz, Japan or America are playing along to your song in the same session as they are Iron Maiden?
(Neil) Surreal. It’s strange.
(Ryan) We’ve had people sending in videos of them playing and whatever.
(Neil) Yeah people send in videos of themselves getting one hundred percent on the game and they’re like ‘Waah! Check me out how awesome I am!’ It’s strange to think that people are having parties, getting pissed and playing along to our song. It’s cool. We had our first tour in May since the game came out and we did see an increase in numbers at our shows. So it has helped us out in that way too.
Ryan: Funny what a computer game can do isn’t it!
It is strange. Any plans to move onto Rock Band or have your own Guitar Hero? The Beatles have their own.
(Ryan) We’re just waiting for them to ask us.
(Neil) I think Rock Band and Guitar Hero like enemy rivals. Once you go with one, you don’t get the other one.
(Ryan) If they ask us we’ll be there again, no problem!
(Neil) Obviously we’re in talks to have our own one.
(Ryan) It’s whether they can afford the seven million pound fees we want.
I dunno, I reckon you could put it up a little bit.
(Ryan) Yeah that’s a bit cheap.

You guys are a steal! So, with such a lot of great bands hailing from Wales - you’ve got the Manics, Phonics, Lostprophets and Feeder – what sets Attack! Attack! apart from the rest? And how have you found your feet in the Welsh rock music scene?
(Ryan) Good question to start. We’ll skip that. We find ourselves, I mean we’re a community, we help each other. There’s no bitching about or whatever. We’re friends and we just get on with it. Everybody helps each other out.
(Neil) I think that’s why you find so many successful Welsh bands because the bigger bands, like Lostprophets, help out bands who are coming through. They give them gigs playing to thousands of people a night.
(Ryan) And then that band takes off and then it just continues.
(Neil) Guitar Hero. That’s what separates us.
(Ryan) Yeah Guitar Hero separates us. Me being from Aberaman separates me from the rest. We are much more Welsh than any of them!

So Ryan, you’re from Aberaman, where are the rest of Attack! Attack! from?
(Ryan) I’m from Aberaman, which is Aberdare.
(Neil) Mike our drummer is from Aberdare. I live in Caerphilly.
(Ryan) And Will’s from Tongwynlais. He’s posh. He’s technically English.
I’m from Cardiff so I’m almost definitely English, sort of.
(Neil) What you’re living in Caerphilly?
Yeah!
(Neil) Cool. You might live by me, where do you live?
Castle View.
(Neil) (GASP) I live in Castle View!
(Ryan) That’s weird.
You could be my next door neighbour and I didn’t even know it.
(Neil) My next door neighbour is the Mayor.
I don’t think my next door neighbour is the Mayor.
(Neil) Do you actually live in Castle View?
Yes.
(Neil) Where do you live in relation to Tesco?
You know where the park is with the moat? I live right by there.
(Neil) Small world! You live by the woman from Pagoda then?
Really? They do delicious szcheuan chicken in that place!
(Neil) It’s a great Chinese!
Anyway…
(Ryan) Yes, we digressed.

What reaction have you had to you latest album ‘Attack! Attack!’?
(Ryan) Everyone loves it!
(Neil) It had good reviews in the press which you know when you get good reviews it’s great but as band, you hope you get good reviews but if you don’t get a good review then it’s one guy’s opinion at the end of the day.
(Ryan) We’ve been all around the world. We’ve been to America, done all of Europe a few times. It’s been awesome.

If being in Attack! Attack! or any other band was not an option, how would you fill your days?
(Ryan) Probably play Fifa 10 all day and walk my dog.
(Neil) I’ve got a baby so I would just spend all day with her! That would be amazing. Take her down the park, might bump into you.
Ah yeah, me walking Roxy round the park.
(Neil) And then I’d spend an hour a day in Pagoda Chinese.

That sounds brilliant. Out of all of your songs, which is your favourite to perform live and why?
(Neil) Too Bad Son for me.
(Ryan) Oooh…well we just finished out second album so a few new songs we’ll be playing off that. There’s one that I really love, it’s called Blood On My Hands, which I think is going to be the next single.
And what’s that about? Dare we ask?
(Ryan) It’s not as violent as it sounds. It’s about our life and principles.
(Neil) Basically it touches on the concept that you can wash it away but what you’ve done is still there so it’s not this graphic or as aggressive as it sounds. It’s a visual thing: I’ve got blood on my hands. The lyric says ‘To wash it away wouldn’t help us escape the truth’ which basically means you can’t just wipe things off like that. You’ve got to deal with stuff. Deal with problems and life.
(Ryan) All our songs are about life.
I’m looking forward to hearing that then.
(Ryan) I’ve give you a shout before we play it.
How can your fans make your sets go off?
(Neil) Jumping around, singing along, enthusiasm. We’re quite an energetic band anyway but when the crowd’s energetic it takes us to another level.
(Ryan) Especially headline shows you know, they’re here to see you and sing along or whatever so it’s great.
(Neil) I don’t think there’s anything better than people singing your songs.
(Ryan) No. It’s up there.
(Neil) That gets us going and we just try to get them going by being as mad as we can on stage by getting them involved, shouting as loud as they can, clap, jump. Sometimes throw a circle pit in there, watch people smash into each other.
Why not, if you’re in the mood!
(Ryan) If you’re in the mood.
(Neil) Someone emailed us this morning actually and said ‘I’m coming tonight. I want to see a wall of death.’ We were like, we think you’ve got the wrong band here. We’re not really a wall of death kind of band.
(Ryan) He probably thinks we’re the American Attack Attack.
(Neil) No he said he saw us in Abertillery on Friday. He said he was disappointed there wasn’t a wall of death so he’s coming tonight and there better be one. He’s gonna be disappointed isn’t he.
My heart bleeds for him. All over my hands.
(Ryan) Saw what you did there.
I know. I’ve been listening. So what’s next on the Attack! Attack! agenda?
(Ryan) New album scheduled for October, we just finished it last week.
(Neil) Just a massive tour then.
(Ryan) Yeah we’ve got a UK tour, going over to Europe as well.
(Neil) Basically we leave for tour on the 7th October and don’t get home til 7th December. It’s going to be a couple of months of our lives on tour. Then we’ll come back and probably tour more and just tour and tour and tour and tour!
(Ryan) My body is going to be severely distressed.
Are you doing any festivals this summer?
(Ryan) No cos we were supposed to be doing the album over the summer but it things went quicker than we expected because now it’s done.
(Neil) So it’ll be next year now for us which will be nice
(Ryan) We did it all last year as well so we can take a break and come back when the new album is out. Plus most festivals don’t like you to play two years in a row. We’ll be back next year!
Here’s a random question that we ask every band; if you had to be an animal would you be either a giraffe or a zebra?
(Neil) (very, very decisively) Giraffe because you see far less giraffes being killed on wildlife programmes. I reckon if I was a zebra I’d get killed by a lion, so I’m going with giraffe.
(Ryan) I’m going with giraffe because I’m short and I’d like to experience being tall.
(Neil) It’d be nice to try it.
(Ryan) I like their print as well.
You don’t see many giraffe prints anywhere but you do see a lot of zebra prints about.
(Ryan) You don’t get giraffe prints on these leggings the girls wear these days. You get a lot of, what do you call ‘em? Leopard print. Well in fact you don’t see any zebra print either but, I was going off on one there.
(Neil) I’ve seen kids wearing zebra print hoodies these days. I think your setting yourself up for a lion attack wearing a zebra hoody. Imagine, you’re walking down the street, walking round the moat down by Caerphilly. Next thing you know, lions there, you’re in your zebra top. Bang.
Don’t go to Longleat wearing a zebra top.
(Neil) No.
(Ryan) That’s good advice.
(Neil) Or Caerphilly Castle. They’ve got a moat.
(Ryan) It’s the second biggest castle in Europe with a moat. I love cheese.
Neil: Cheese? Caerphilly cheese.
(Ryan) It’s made in Chessire.
(Neil) Go to Russia isn’t it, I heard.
(Ryan) Probably.
(Neil) It’s all gone.
(Ryan) They come over here, taking our jobs see.
(Neil) Taking our cheese aren’t they!
Well thank you so much guys that was cracking! And you have definitely picked me up from my Glastonbury blues.

Interview By Jessica Acreman