Sunshine Coast metal band Holistic has risen like a phoenix from the ashen remnants of the now-defunct Ablaze Withsin.
“I’ve been playing music with the other boys for quite some time on the Coast and we ended up forming a band called Ablaze Withsin; that was mid-2012, somewhere around then,” explains frontman, Steven Polwarth.
“We played for quite a few years, we put out an EP and had some fun, but our drummer ended up moving on and we were pretty stagnant there for a while, just not really doing much at all.”
After writing new songs and finding replacement members, Holistic was born. “Ben the guitarist, he kept writing some tunes and got us all back together again, and we got a couple more members: we got a new guitarist and then we ended up finding another drummer which is good because they’re pretty unheard of,” he says with a laugh.
Consisting of Steven on vocals, Ben Nielsen and Chris Downs on guitars, Chris Booy on drums and Dean Morcombe on bass, Holistic made their major comeback in 2014 at Mosh For Daniel. “Dean was the bass player out of Ablaze Withsin, so I’ve been playing music with him for quite some time. He’s doing great; he does a lot for the Daniel Morcombe Foundation as well, he spends his free time behind the scenes. The whole family is very strong.”
Holistic also played Metal Heart Festival at The Triffid earlier this year. “It was really good; awesome stage, great sounds [and] the crowd was amazing. It was a really good experience, and to play with the big backdrop behind us that was something we haven’t done as a band before.
“It had our logo up the top and a bit of a demon behind us which was cool; we sort of roll with the whole ‘dancing with demons’, which is going to be our EP coming up, so that was fitting at the time.”
Holistic are currently recording their first EP at RTD Studios on the Sunshine Coast, which is run by Darkc3ll guitarist Matt Shorter, a long-time friend of Steven’s. “We’ve got bass, vocals and lead guitars to lay down, then whack some solos on it, so we’re pretty well over halfway which is a good thing. We’re going to be laying down bass and hopefully vocals next week so it shouldn’t be too far off from getting out there.”
METAL HEART FESTIVALBoom!!! Posted by Holistic on Friday, 1 May 2015
Holistic Tour Dates
Fri 14 Aug - New Globe Theatre (Brisbane)Fri 4 Sep - The Helm (Mooloolaba)
Fri 9 Oct - Sunshine Coast Brewery
Sat 10 Oct - Metal United Down Under @ New Globe Theatre (Brisbane)
