Taking Back Sunday

"There's times where things have happened, but I wouldn't say it's a dangerous thing, I'd say it's a lively thing," drummer Mark O'Connell says of his band Taking Back Sunday's pulsating live show. "We put the most energy that we possibly can into every single show. We want the kids to go crazy. So that's what I would say about a Taking Back Sunday show. I wouldn't say it's dangerous, I would say it's fun."

Recent events, however, might beg to differ. The band, apart from being the world's premier screamo-rock outfit, are famous for frontman Adam Lazzara's dextrous microphone tricks - as anyone who caught the band at Fowler's Live in March will know, he hurls the microphone around the stage and over the audience on around ten metres of cord with remarkable skill. But, in the UK earlier this year, bassist Matt Rubano caught the wrong side of the show...

"Yeah, he caught that microphone real hard," O'Connell laughs. "He was actually running up at the time, so the contact of the mike hitting him was so much harder. All of a sudden I just see him getting down on the ground and I was like, 'what's he doing? Is that like a new move that he's trying to do?' All of a sudden he looks up and blood starts spraying everywhere. And I didn't know what to do! So we kept on playing and finished the song and he went backstage. He came back and he had a huge bandage all over his face and he was playing all bloody, but it was great! I mean, it wasn't great that he got hit, but it was great that he came out and played the rest of the show. Then right after the show he went to the hospital and got six stitches in his forehead!"

While it can be pretty crazy being a member of Taking Back Sunday during a live set, O'Connell remains calm, "I'm behind the drums. The mike has come close to me as well, it's come and hit my cymbals, but for the rest of the guys, they definitely gotta be careful, to say the least. [Lazzara's] hit everybody in the band except me, pretty much," O'Connell laughs and then, deadpan, adds: "it's funny to see everybody else getting hit."

The 'mike-swing' has become such a crucial part of Taking Back Sunday lore - the band actually had t-shirts made up featuring a bloody microphone hanging from a cord wrapped around the neck after the incident in the UK - and I've always wondered just how fundamental it was to Lazzara's performance in the beginning.

Apparently, very much so, "Adam didn't sing in the beginning of the band, he played bass, and then all of a sudden our singer quit and then Adam was just singing. I'd seen him before shows just twirling around the mike and doing all these things and I was just like, 'what the hell are you doing?'" a baffled O'Connell admits. "And yeah, it just went from there and he has new moves...he loves working with that mike."

Australian fans haven't had to wait long for the frenzy to return - after playing a set of amazing sold-out shows here earlier this year, the band will be returning in October to headline the Australian leg of the Taste Of Chaos tour. A humble O'Connell assures me the band couldn't wait to get back, considering the reception they got last time.

"The first show we did, the kids were all singing and going nuts. I didn't expect that. I mean, we knew that the shows were selling very well and we were all excited about that and then once we got there, to see the kids wowing out like that, it was awesome.

"We would get emails from kids like, 'come to Australia, I swear to God the shows'll be great,' but it's so weird. Even anywhere else, just playing shows anywhere, any recognition that we ever get is always a huge surprise to us. We started playing shows in front of ten or 15 of our friends and then all of a sudden it just started getting more and more. So it's always a surprise. Every single tour that we do, we're just like 'holy shit - what is going on right now?'"

Matt Vesely

Taking Back Sunday play at the Entertainment Centre on Thurs 12 October for the Taste Of Chaos tour. 'Louder Now' is out now through Warners.