Not since the days of Roxus has Australia produced a band as true to the melodic rock genre as White Widdow. Armed with three newly recorded songs available for download from their website for free (see links above and below), White Widdow is destined to create a buzz worldwide amongst those who worship anthemic keyboard driven melodic rock.
The storming "Cross To Bare" with blistering guitars and symphonic keys displays a heavier side to the bands melodic glory, in the way of bands such Pretty Maids, Treat, Bonfire and Jaded Heart. With healthy lashings of AOR goodness, the wrenching, yet uplifting "Don't Fail Me Now" relives the glory days of Stage Dolls and Harem Scarem, masters of the melodic rock ballad.
With driving rhythm and stabbing keys, Change Of Passion is destined to become a live favorite"
We caught up with lead singer Julez to help us unveil White Widdow to the masses.
White Widdow - how and when did the band come together and what is the inspiration behind the name?
White Widdow came together in April 2008, Trent our Bass player and myself had been wanting to put together an AOR / Melodic Rock band for many years, however wanting to be a live performing band rather than a studio project we just could never seem to find people interested. We would often go and see a Van Halen tribute band called X-Halen that had an amazing guitar player called Enzo, we became friends over time and Enzo would come out to see us perform with our other band (The Deadthings), one night after a show Enzo let it be known he would be keen to work together if I ever wanted to do something outside The Deadthings. From there Enzo, Trent and I began looking to complete the line up. Finding our drummer turned out to be very easy, in the form of Trent's housemate Nick, the four of us then began writing and rehearsing. However I knew there was something missing, something very obvious.......Lots of Keyboards! So I enlisted the help of my younger brother Xavier behind the keys, an accomplished artist in his own right with the two time Aria Nominated Illusive/Mushroom recording artists X & Hell.
The White Widdow name doesn’t come from anywhere in particular apart from when I was a kid I had a "thing" for rock bands that had White in their name, like White Wolf, White Sister, White Tiger, White Lion etc, from there for some reason I always wanted to be in a band with white in it’s name. I thought “Widow” worked cool with it and decided on White Widow. However there had been a couple of other bands use the name through the years, so I made the change to "White Widdow" using two “D’s”, I've always been a fan of Double D's anyway!!
The band has been described as "Melodic Hard Rock" and "AOR" how would YOU describe the sound of White Widdow?
I think that both are accurate, as there are both elements and that some songs are more Melodic Hard Rock and others more AOR. I think our sound has a pretty equal influence of both European AOR/Hard Rock and US AOR/Arena Rock.
Those who have seen you live would be aware you are blessed with a
mighty talented band. Can you introduce each member of the band please?
Enzo: Guitar - One of the most amazing guitarists I've seen and known, an absolute talent, a great guy to work with and a fantastic live performer.
Influenced by Van Halen, Dokken, Savatage and many other Hard Rock bands
Trent: Bass - My partner in crime, Great Bass Player, Great Friend, very easy to work with, a great live performer. Influenced by Kiss, Pretty Maids, Pink Cream 69, Danger Danger, Journey, Harem Scarem and countless others.
Xavier: Keyboards - My Brother, great with song compositions and arrangements, great on the keys and a great singer. Influenced by Survivor, Journey, Night Ranger & King Kobra amongst many styles of other keyboard driven music.
Julian: Vocals - that would be me, well I try to keep the whole thing together, steer us in the best direction and host the live party!
You have recently launched your "EP" featuring 3 tracks that are
available on your Myspace page. Tell us about the songs on this "EP".
The three tracks available for free download from our myspace are the first of our recordings to be available, these were all written over the last 12 months or so and are all musically a group collaboration, lyrically they are all very personal to me and some of the relationship rollercoasters I've been on in the last few years. I'm very proud of how the songs have turned out.
What are some of your personal favorite melodic rock bands/AOR
bands and how much of an influence did they have on the sound of White Widdow?
There really is so many great AOR/Melodic rock bands to name, but there is only so much space, so here are some of my personal favourites.
White Sister - A huge influence all round , great Guitar/Keyboard blend in their songs and awesome hooks
Survivor - The inventors of montage Rock, again a big influence all over, great songwriting, great melodies
Journey - The AOR Kings, there's none smoother, none slicker.
Bon Jovi - Those first three albums are Melodic Rock bliss, for sure a big influence in every way.
House Of Lords - Great Keyboard work, Great sound, Great songs.
Roxus - Australia's AOR Champs, big influence on me personally as a teenager seeing them perform live regularly.
Treat - Awesome songs, great pre choruses, huge hooks, another all round influence.
Icon - More hard rock than the others listed here, their "Night Of The Crime" album is a great slab of melodic hard rock.
Despite Australia not really being known as a major market for
"melodic rock", where do you see the band fitting into both the
worldwide and Australian music landscape?
On the Worldwide scale I think that there is enough market for us to be able to do what we love and put our music out there, and for that we are looking for a home in the form of a label that understands AOR & Melodic Rock that can help us do that in areas like Europe & Japan.
In Australia it’s actually rather interesting, as we are clearly not a Glam or Hair band nor a Metal band, but we have played shows with bands of all styles. We’ve found so far that our style of Melodic Rock in the modern era seems to be accessable to all these crowds and they don’t deem it as anything but Rock music with an 80’s style.
What has the interest been thus far in White Widdow both locally at
your shows and also internationally via Myspace and word of mouth?
People here in Australia at the shows seem genuinely excited to be seeing a band like ourselves perform this style of music again, it’s something that has been missing from the Australian Rock seen for a very long time. I can remember during the 90’s bands like Empire, Serpentine, De Arrow, De Mont and of course the mighty Roxus all playing regular live shows, but by the end of that decade it had dried up and we’ve really had nothing to replace it for 10 years.
It’s a thrill to have people enjoy it because we love this style of music so much, it’s the reason we are doing this. So far our approach with Myspace and online has been very soft, we posted up the songs from our “free Download EP” for people to be able to download and hear our music. We’ve been contacted by people wanting a pressed hard copy of the EP, but we do not have one and will be saving that for the album release, hence why we made the songs available for free. We’ve already been contacted by some lables, but want some more songs recorded before we go any further with them or start contacting any others.
If you had the choice of touring with 2 bands, past or present, who
would they be and why ?
Wow, well I think Journey on the “Frontiers” tour with Steve Perry would have been breathtaking and Survivor on the “When Seconds Count” tour would be amazing also, I’d love to have the chance of warming up the crowd before I go and stand in it myself every night!
If you had to pick one song to introduce someone to the genre of
melodic rock/AOR, what would it be?
Hmm, what a question! As a mainstream answer I would say Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believin”. In a more obscure answer I would say Signal’s “Arms Of A Stranger”
What lies ahead for White Widdow in the coming months?
Album, more live shows, some interstate shows (Adelaide and hopefully Sydney) , more writing and recording in the lead up to a full album by the end of the year with a release early 2010. Thanx to all our friends, fans and to May the Rock Be With You, we really appreciate the support!
Julez.
