Is the life of a successful travelling musician more of a long-winded holiday than actual work?
Someone who does manual labour for a living might think so, whereas the musicians themselves enduring the interminable hours of travel in between shows may disagree. Joe Hottinger, long-time lead guitarist and backing vocalist for American rock sensation Halestorm, ponders this during some very rare downtime at home in the lead-up to the band’s very first tour of Australia and New Zealand this December.
“I haven’t been to Australia before, even as a tourist,” Hottinger says. “We don’t get around, man. We’ve never actually been on vacation. Granted, we travel constantly, and to me, life is kind of a vacation. I do what I love with people that I love, and it’s awesome! But yeah, we’ve never vacationed before, so it’s kind of exciting to get to these new places, and maybe one of these days we will.”
Being that it’s his first trip to Australia in any capacity, Hottinger is reserving his judgement as to what he is expecting from our country and its crowds.
“I don’t know what to expect, which is kinda half the fun, but from what I’ve heard from all of our rock buddies that go to Australia and New Zealand, [they] say you’ve got some of the best rock crowds in the world. That sounds good to me – I can’t wait to experience that for myself.”
Halestorm, fronted by Lzzy Hale and rounded out by her brother Arejay (drums) and Josh Smith (bass), promise to bring a big, cathartic and emotional but no-nonsense rock show to Australia, taking in all three of their studio albums and some tracks from their earlier EPs.
“We always say that when you come and see Halestorm, what you see is what you get,” says Hottinger. “There’s no trickery, there’s no backing tracks, we don’t even use a click track. We like to be able to do anything at the drop of a hat. I just love feeding off the energy of a crowd, and I know Arejay our drummer does too. If it’s a great crowd, sometimes the songs are going to be a little faster, and that’s alright!” he laughs.
“So yeah, we’ve been building a lot of improv into our set. Like, we try to trick each other, you know? It’s a blast! It’s rock’n’roll – we’re not saving any lives here, it’s a rock show.”
In fact, the band members are tossing around an unofficial title for the upcoming tour. “As Lzzy was saying, we’re calling this the ‘Do Whatever The Fuck We Want Tour’,” Hottinger laughs again. “We’ll probably play some of the new record, play a bunch of the old songs, stuff we haven’t played for a decade.”
Joining the December dates are the originally Australian but now Los Angeles-based rockers Bellusira, and Hottinger can’t wait to get on the road and share the stage with them.
“I love those guys!” he enthuses. “We met them in LA when we went out there; they’re the sweetest people and they’re so good. We went to see them there when Will Hunt [Evanescence] was drumming for them, and it was such a good rock show. It was just awesome. They are true rock warriors.”
Halestorm have been on a very steady rise since the release of their self-titled debut album back in 2009, to the point they have a list of tour dates in front of them stretching out as far as the eye can see. The demand for them to play, worldwide, is virtually non-stop.
“Yeah, it really hasn’t slowed down, it’s been just growing,” says Hottinger. “Since I joined the band 12 years ago, it’s been nothing but a growing behemoth, really.”
Halestorm, supported byBellusira, play the Manning BaronSunday December 13.Into The Wild Life is out now through Atlantic/Warner.
