The honest and heavy messages spread throughout Toe To Toe’s latest album Rise Up make it an easy release to fall in love with. “I think a lot of our albums can get to the stage where we beat people over the head too much, so with this one we wanted to beat them slowly and make them like it,” says vocalist Scott Mac.
It’s slow effective torture Mac agrees, with the video for the lead single and title track carrying some very cool anarchist animations and an epic colour scheme. Toe To Toe do have a clear agenda for what they want the people of Australia to rise up against. Themselves.
“That video and the song, people are tagging us as [being of] certain political movements and sides, and it’s definitely not about that. This band is more about the individual standing up for themselves, not the collective thought.
“It all fell into place and looked a certain way, ‘Rise up out of you grave today/chained to the world/we’ve got to break away,’ that’s the sort of stuff I’m thinking about, how do we get out of this? It’s not as politically motivated as it may seem.”
Though political motivation is the impression Rise Up gives with its sound, lyricism and imagery, as Mac says, he’s not taking sides per se – Toe To Toe’s take is more that of the individual’s stance on the world. “We’re living in very, very interesting times but we don’t hitch our stuff to any side or any movement. Toe To Toe has always been about you, your own rights and standing up for yourself.”
A potent message, Mac is clearly disenchanted with the world. “It’s not going real great at the moment is it – did you notice that too?” he laughs.
“I’m quite into politics, I’m more into discussion of it, not quite either side of it. It’s hard, my whole thing, I’m into the philosophy of the discussion, I’m not into ‘This is the way it’s got to be and you’re stupid if you don’t believe that.’ I’m more about, ‘So what do you think about this?’ That’s me.
“I think one side has a lot of emotion and the other relies on facts and statistics – those two ideologies. I describe myself as straight down the middle, some things are right, some things are wrong.”
Perhaps there is some personal political undertone in the new album but nevertheless, the lyrics for Rise Up are powerful indeed. Mac explains he firmly believes there’s power in people to make change. “If we still believe in democracy we have to make it work a little bit better. Again for me, the power is the power of discussion and debate. To me, we’re really undermining ourselves as a species by not being able to talk about things.
“The parties, just vote them out – believe it or not, the Sex Party has better policies than anyone else, they’re just calling themselves that so everyone’s ears prick up, they’ve got other things going on. It’s a strange time in politics and the world at the moment.”
For Toe To Toe’s upcoming tour, it’s Mac’s hope that the band’s audience are filled with people of different opinions, beliefs, colours and creeds. “That’s what we’ve always been about, that was my upbringing. To me it’s normal – all this talk of exclusion, are we worse people, are things worse or are we being told things are worse? Is there an industry in that?
“We like all shapes and sizes, black, white or pringle, whatever tickles your fancy, we’re down with everyone.”
When & Where: Bendigo Hotel, Melbourne – June 3
Release: Rise Up is out now via Golden Robot Records.
Written by Anna Rose
Via Beat Mag