Hello everyone ! We're here today with Wings of Steel.

You guys opened the second day today at the Heavy Weekend Festival. How do you feel about it? Did you feel any pressure going up on stage?

Leo - Just a lot of joy and excitement to be back in France and get to play in front of the biggest audience to date and biggest show to date. Yeah, I think it went really well.

Parker - Yeah. This is the first show on our tour. This was the best, I think, the best possible way that we could have started this. Totally kick ass. 

Leo - I think so ! 

Parker - Great show, great audience, great energy, awesome sized stage.

Leo - Great venue in general too.

 

How did you feel about the crowd? They seemed to really enjoy the show !

Leo - Yeah, I mean, we could tell that some people came out, they knew us beforehand. But I think the cool thing too is that a lot of people here, they don't necessarily know who we are. And when you get to be introduced to a new band with a live experience, when the live experience is the first thing you get, I think that's the most authentic way to get to know a band. So I think that was really cool.

Parker - It's my favorite way.

Leo - Yeah, me too.

 

Me too. So in the past you've played in Paris, in Lille, now you play in Nancy. How do you feel about the French audiences?

Leo - Oh, it's great. We absolutely love playing in France. We're happy that we have one more stop for now in France throughout this tour that we're currently on.

Parker - It'll be in September. We're playing in Torreilles.

Leo - Yeah, we love the French audience and we already can't wait to come back.

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Do you know some French words ?

Leo - Some words? Oh, you know, just. Just a very basic… 

Parker - Bonjour. Oui.

Leo - I know “merci beaucoup” and “je m’appelle Leo”.cAnd then some things that we should not be saying in this interview.

Parker - Yes.

 

Generally that's the first words we learn from another language.

[laugh]

 

Is there any other French festival that you'd like to play at?

Parker - Hellfest !

Leo - Yeah, we have our eyes on this one.

Parker - 2026 ! Let's do it ! [laughs] That's not an announcement. But we would very much like it to happen.

Leo - But yeah, like I said too, we're playing Pyrenean Warriors. That's going to be really cool to do. And we're keeping our eyes and ears open for any opportunities and possibilities.

Parker - As soon as we get the opportunity, like, going to France ? Let's fucking do it, man !

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It seems lately heavy music is coming back strong. What do you think about it ?

Leo - I think it was inevitable, really. Especially, you know, throughout the years you've seen a lot of genres making a comeback, a lot of styles making a comeback, stuff like that. And there is already a big audience for heavy metal. And I think it's about time that new younger bands get the opportunities that they deserve. And this is a great demonstration of that thing happening today, as we are not maybe the biggest band, but we do share a very big sound with a lot of these artists. And getting the chance to come out to a stage like this, being put in front of a lot of people who support you, who love it, that's how you spread the word. So big shout out to Heavy Weekend for putting us on, for taking the chance. This is exactly what heavy metal needs. And it's great to see it making a comeback.

Parker - There's a general thing in the music world where now, 30, 40 years ago, it was a little bit of a more controlled thing of who put the record in all the stores and put on the radio and all the major TV shows. But nowadays with the Internet, I think there's more of an opportunity for more bands from different styles to reach a bigger audience and to get out there and be in front of people. And that's something that Leo and I have definitely noticed in doing what we do. It's a phenomenon that's happening. It's all styles of metal, all styles of music. That's really cool.
 

So you just announced a new partnership with High Roller Records. So what drew you to this label? How did it go?

Leo - Ridiculous shipping prices to Europe. It's not been easy for our European audience to get a hold of our stuff. And it's something that's bugged us for a very long time. And we have been trying to find a physical distribution deal for quite some time. We're really glad to be working with High Roller Records for this as they are a very prominent player in the game of physical distribution here in Europe. So I think this is going to turn out great for us, for them and for the fans.

Parker - We've met with a lot of labels and I mean, it's not to say that we're against a traditional record deal per se. But you know, Leo and I, we produce everything and we've done everything ourselves up to this point. And if we were going to accept a full on deal with a label, we wanted to make sure that we got every single thing that we needed. And so we hadn't found that. So what we would always propose would just be “okay, well let's just do a physical distribution”. And nobody that we had talked to was really interested in doing that, even though that was what we really wanted to do. And then we finally got in touch with the High Roller guys and we were able to work something out. So we're really excited because it means that we're able to. We don't have to worry about the label telling us “write this kind of music” and “do this or that”, “we're not going to let you release it because it's not what we want”... Our creative freedom is important. And not to say that there are a lot of labels out there that respect that and cherish that very highly…

 

We had the chance to hear your first song from your upcoming album today. Thank you for that. We appreciate it. Was it the first time you played it live?

Leo - It was actually the second time we played it. We played it back in March at Up the Hammers festival in Greece as well. 

Parker - It's the first time we played it in France.

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You're gonna put out this new album and you're gonna re-release your last EPs. Why did you choose to do that?

Parker - We're re-releasing the previous records on the physical format only. So the original release of us on all the digital is still there. But again as Leo said, the high shipping prices for Europe, it's very difficult for people to buy our CDs and vinyls out here. And I mean we know it's such an important part of our style's music culture and you know, for us too, we want everybody to be able to afford it. So this is why we are re releasing the CD and vinyl formats of our previous releases.

 

All right. Do you have other projects in Europe with that new partnership? Maybe the current tour ?

Leo - This is our Europe tour, yeah. This was the first show right here of our tour that we're embarking on.

Parker - Flight Over Europe 2025.

Leo - Exactly. So this was the start. It started out pretty good, I think. This is going to take us to a lot of corners in Europe. And if you want to know the exact dates and find tickets and stuff, you can find it on our website. 

Parker - Germany, Austria, Italy, Poland, Finland, Germany again, then France again, then Spain again, then Belgium and the Netherlands.

Leo - He's good with memory things.