Post-hardcore band Acres weave personal tales through their heavy, emotionally-charged debut album, ‘Lonely World’. Singer Ben Lumber tells us more.
Hey Ben, congrats on reaching your debut album, has it been a long time in the works?
Yeah, I guess it has. I know fans have been asking for a long time for a full length, so it feels good to finally be able to deliver! I feel like we waited a while until as a band we felt we were ready, you only get one debut, and we didn’t want to disappoint!
Did you have a clear idea of what you wanted the record to be from the outset?
Yeah, we did for sure. We had a lot more time to write and demo this time around, and that’s something we’ve never had before, we knew going into this record we wanted to branch out and really cement a sound for Acres.
The lyrical themes sound super personal, were there any topics you were unsure about broaching?
Yeah they are all super personal, I try to write honest lyrics that I feel people will relate to and understand, every song on ‘Lonely World’ has a true story behind it, either from personal experience or someone close to me. I don’t think there was anything I didn’t feel too uncomfortable writing about. For me, it’s pretty much a nice therapy to get these things off your chest and in this day and age it’s important that people speak to each other and ask for help if they need it and this is my way of speaking.
Have you played the record to friends and family yet? What do they make of it?
I think we all have! We’re all super proud of the record, and we all have supportive friends and family. I always show my friends new demos and songs to see if they like them and luckily they did!
Did you come up against any unexpected challenges while putting the album together?
Weirdly no, everything fell into place nicely, and the whole process was pretty great! The only challenge was that we started writing this album as an unsigned band and had absolutely no idea how we were going to fund it, luckily we signed to A Wolf At Your Door Records, and they’ve helped and supported us in making ‘Lonely World’ happen.
What do you hope listeners will take away from the record?
For me, the whole album is just a message to people that if they are dealing with shit and have problems then they are not alone and other people have the same feelings, don’t be afraid to talk and ask for help.
What else have you got coming up over the summer? Lots of shows?
We’ll be playing some festivals this summer. We just done Camden Rocks and Jera On Air in June, then will be heading out for Wacken on 1st August, Burn It Down Festival on the 31st and also a really cool headline tour in September with some killer bands!
Taken from the August issue of Upset. Acres’ album ‘Lonely World’ is out 9th August.
