Rise Records

And then very shortly from there, we went in and recorded an EP, and the MySpace popped off.

We got signed to Rise Records.

We got, like, the dream team of that era, which was, you know, all the bands we looked up to, um, you know, which was Dave Shapiro booking, uh, Eric Rushing managing, and, uh, Rise Records.

And then I've, yeah, you know, we started touring, and we made a record called Someday Came Suddenly when I was 15, and it was full time on the road ever since I was 15.

And, um-

They've been doing all this international touring as well, um, you know, UK, US.

Um, now they're signed to Rise Records, doing just amazing things.

So I ju- I've just, I've followed their journey really over the last, you know, seven or eight years and just seeing their growth has been really inspiring.

So they're already one of the biggest up-and-coming bands in Australia, but I think we'll continue to see them grow.

Screamo, like s- yeah.

But I think it was, like, the early, like, Rise Records stuff, like The Devil Wears Prada, Of Mice & Men, I Wrestled a Bear Once.

Um, Alesana was a really big one that I've, like, kind of really been into recently again.

I don't remember them.

Okay, yeah, yeah, of course.

Like, scene core, like, Rise Records kind of stuff.

And, yeah, that was kind of where I got my start.

And that whole era of music was, like, people singing really high.

Today we welcome Ocean Sleeper guitarist Iona Heckenberg to the podcast.

The new Ocean Sleeper album, Peace When I'm Dead, is out today on Rise Records.

Iona talks about choosing music over a more typical lifestyle, the shifting nature of metalcore as a genre and sound, the joy of touring in the United States, and a lot more.

This was a wonderful conversation with just somebody who appreciates and loves music every bit as much as I do, and it was a joy getting to talk to Ione and have him on the podcast.

cool as an effect and like yeah just embrace the technology and like i don't like i one of the things i've appreciated as i've gotten older is like the good hook that pop hook i'm just like no i love a good chorus that's stuck in my head like i want that now like

Yeah, yeah, exactly.

It's so it's so funny, because it's like, when I think back to like the cheesy era of metalcore, like 2008 to like 2012, like all those rise records, records, unfortunately, that's some of my favorite records ever.

So it's like, physically influences, like so many of my decisions now.

But there are a few records that I released a long time ago on CD that people have been interested in that I, I'm going to repress, like this band The Subtle Way, who's a really great screamo band, sort of like Poison the Well or Grade or early Cave In.

Um, or the, or, or the, you know, Rise Records type stuff, Underoath.

And, uh, they, they have gotten a lot of steam sort of I, I guess just through Spotify and the algorithm.

So people seem really interested in, in their EP and full length, so I'm gonna repress those.

But in the late 2000s, a group of high school kids from McAllen Memorial started making an enormous amount of noise in a place nobody was listening for it, and somebody in Beaverton, Oregon, heard it anyway.

In December of 2009, Rise Records, at that moment the single hottest label in heavy music, signed them.

Some of the band hadn't graduated yet.

Their debut album got made with Joey Sturgis producing, which in 2010 was like getting handed the keys to the kingdom.

All right, today's guest.

Scarlet O'Hara formed in McAllen, Texas, in the late 2000s.

Rise Records signed them in December 2009, and Loss in Existence followed in 2010, with Joey Sturgis behind the board.

After Rise, the band came apart and stayed gone for the better part of a decade, until they regrouped in 2017 and self-released Welcome Back to the Brodeo in 2018, which hit number 19 on hard rock album sales and number one on the South Central Heatseekers chart with no label behind it at all.