Interview by Kris Peters
New Zealand/Aotearoa metalcore quartet No Life announced themselves with their crushing 2022 debut EP Delinquent. Their fresh spin on established genres such as nu-metal, metalcore and hardcore almost dared you not to listen, with an aggressive and uncompromising sonic delivery of epic proportions.
The band have followed that debut with their latest single, Obnoxious, which sees the band team up with vocalist Frankie Palmeri from Emmure.
A cut-throat and aggressive offering from a band with a chip on their shoulder, Obnoxious is unapologetic at its core, calling out 'deadbeats' that leech off of others and carry little respect for those around them.
HEAVY sat down for a chat with vocalist Connor Dickson to find out more about No Life and their music, starting by asking how people have liked the new single.
"It's been crazy," he smiled. "We didn't really expect too much. We always try to manage our expectations as much as we can, so we weren't really expecting too much. But, man, it's going off. The numbers are racking up, the video is racking up as well and we're super humbled. It's a great feeling."
We ask Connor to tell us more about the musical side of Obnoxious.
"Obviously, we're big fans of Emmure," he offered. "Myself and DJ, the guitarist, we both love the song Gucci Prison by Emmure so we said we need to write a song like that. Then DJ wrote it so quickly and I heard it and said we have to get Frankie on it. I wrote the song just to call out deadbeats, but the more I think about it, it's probably a bit of a slight at my father and my upbringing, because he's a bit of an alcoholic and a bit of a partier. It's kind of taken its own shape, but it was meant to be a not-so-tongue-in-cheek call out of deadbeats, and I think a lot of people can probably relate to that."
In the full interview, Connor talks more about the genesis of Obnoxious, how they got Emmure vocalist Frankie Palmeri involved, what he brought to the song musically, previous single Identity Crisis and if the two songs are part of a bigger picture, how the new material differs to the music on their previous EP Delinquent, their current tour and how it has been going, upcoming shows and more.
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