How’s it going today, it being the first night of the tour?

Luke (Vocals): It’s going alright; it hasn’t gone as bad as it possibly could have done. First nights are usually disastrous but it’s been alright.
Harj (Guitar): We haven’t played yet though Luke.
Luke: I meant sound checking and set up really. 

You’ve toured with bands like American Head Charge, Disturbed, SOiL, Devildriver to name a few, has that made a name for Panic Cell in the UK?

Harj: We’ll find out tonight.
Luke: Tonight is our first headline gig since we’ve done any of that lot, so we have no idea if anyone is going to turn up and see us not. It’s quite interesting.
Bobby (Drums): This is our first official headline tour, when we first released the album back in February/March 2004, Bolton was actually the first place we played at the Alma Inn and it was an awesome gig, there were even people standing outside. So I’ve got my fingers crossed for tonight. I reckon we should be alright.
Luke: If Bolton still has the same metal crowd it has had, then it should be brilliant.
 
You’ve also brought along some upcoming support acts like Forever Never and Speedtheory, any particular reason?

Harj: Well we like ‘em.
Luke: We’ve toured with both bands before.
Harj: We’re kinda fans of theirs as well.
Bobby: They’ve played round the country a fair bit and they can bring people to the shows which is what it’s all about, bringing people to the show and exposing the music.
Luke: When you look at the bands we’ve played with and Forever Never have supported Stone Sour etc, they’ve done a similar thing but on a slightly smaller scale than us, we’re just in a more advanced state than Forever Never are.
 
Can you tell us a bit about the new album that’s just come out?

Luke: It’s great, buy it!
[All laugh, before going through scores the album ahs received]
Harj: We had a bit more time to record this one really, the logistics of it. The first album we had to do fairly quickly, this one we had plenty of time and better production basically. I think it shows all round because the final product is a bit better than the first one.

 Do you think that Myspace has helped you get out there a lot more?

Luke: Absolutely.
Bobby: Myspace is really good, it’s good for bands to get out there, however it’s just so saturated now. With things like “friend bots” bands can just go and request anyone they want and people get pissed off with it. The aim of the game is to get yourself out there gigging, get some good profiles, get your videos on TV, get your songs on the radio and people make the connection if they can actually see you doing some work and getting some good gigs out of it.

What do you think of labels just picking up bands off Myspace?

Bobby: I’ve heard a band or two have been picked up.
Luke: In This Moment were picked up by Century Media.
Bobby: Yeah, In This Moment got picked up.
Luke: They did have 150,000 friends on Myspace.
Bobby: But again, I think that’s because of “friend bots” really because we got a friend request from them.
Luke: but they are a great band at the end of the day.

How was playing Download this year?

Luke: It was really good.
Harj: First time was good but the second time was better.
Luke: We did it in 2005 and it rocked and doing it this time was even better.
Harj: People were actually there to watch us.
Luke: We had a full tent as well and it was just fucking outstanding.
 
So what do you have lined up for the rest of this year and then early next year?

Luke: We’re doing the headline dates in October and November, we’ve got a few shows in December supporting a band, though that’s not all confirmed and announced yet, so we can’t really go further into that. Then next year we are looking at organizing another UK tour for March but we will also be looking at a couple of support slots in January and February. We’re also working on a worldwide distribution, there are so many things going on from that point, from movie soundtracks to worldwide distribution of the album. If the next six months pan out the way they are looking, it should be really exciting.

You mentioned you have a few more support slots lined up, and you’ve had a fair few support slots in the past. Are there any bands you would love to support?

Luke: Well we’ve done a few of our favourites. I mean Disturbed was great, and me and Harj are big Disturbed fans so we loved that.
Harj: Machine Head, Iron Maiden, loads of bands we’d like to tour with.
Bobby: Testament.
Luke: I wouldn’t mind touring with Testament. There’ll be plenty next year; they’ll be loads of them coming over again.
Harj: There’s the Backstreet Boys of course, and Kylie.
Luke: Wouldn’t you love to see that from side stage every night!
Bobby: Backstage! [All Laugh]

Well on that note, thank you for your time…

To find out more about Panic Cell you can check out their MySpace site at www.myspace.com/paniccell and you can check out the HRH review of What Doesn't Kill Us via this link