Davey McArthur - Seek Misery 'Everyone You Love Will Leave'

Australia is known worldwide for its offerings when it comes to heavy music, and that list continues to grow with Seek Misery. Forming in Whyalla, South Australia in 2020, and currently made up of members of A Dead Silence, Exhuminator, Chrome Cage, and 23/19, Seek Misery slowly made their mark in the local music scene, releasing their debut EP in 2022, before really coming into their own in 2024.

If bands like The Acacia Strain, Emmure, Whitechapel, or even Knocked Loose are on regular rotation for you, then Seek Misery is a band that should be on your radar.

Ahead of the release of their debut album, Everyone You Love Will Leave, Wall Of Sound caught up with bassist, Davey McArthur, who I first met nearly 20 years ago through a mutual friend, and have shared the stage with on many an occasion in that time. We talk about his journey into music, including filling-in for members of Confession and he gives us the low down on the writing and recording process for the album, as well as what's next for the band.

Hello Davey. You and I, we've known each other for a long time. Nearly 20 years.

Yeah, crazy.

We met through an ex-girlfriend of mine in about 2008 we've played a lot of shows together over the years.

Your various bands.  

Yes, and your singular band for most of those but, tell me, about your introduction to playing music?

That's a hard one. So I was raised on like metal and punk through my parents, so I always had a love for heavy music. It was my early high school days or maybe even before that, you know, I'd started to venture into heavier music. I had friends that were giving me burnt CDs of bands like Rammstein and Slipknot. Actually, I remember waiting in line to buy Slipknot's self-titled at Sanity on the day that come out. We would burn CDs and share them around school and stuff. So I got introduced to Rammstein, and I got introduced to Slipknot, Korn, Deftones, and then you naturally progress into like heavier stuff. So then it was going to the extreme like Cradle of Filth, and then going from Cradle of Filth to Cannibal Corpse, and then Deicide, and it just turned into a big web of music.

That seems to be a common for people growing up in Whyalla, like yourself, because the aforementioned ex-girlfriend was from that area as well and, same thing, she and every person that she was friends with was just all into metal.

Yeah, like mid high school, after I'd ventured into that realm of heavier music and found myself in that web, there was a couple of shows that were announced for Whyalla. It was all local bands and, you know, we were lucky enough to get bands such as Crymurder come through, or bands like Double Dragon and Tidal, back in the day. They were all local to South Australia, and they would come through Whyalla and we would think that they were the biggest bands in the world.

Then you're adding them as friends on MySpace, and you're seeing they're actually just local kids from Adelaide, which is four hours down the road I was playing guitar at the time, and that was my introduction to like the local scene and it kind of planted thoughts in my head of "Oh, maybe I could start a band and do stuff like that."

So I went through a whole heap of high school bands, just jamming with friends at school doing covers. Nothing really special. I had a band after school finished that was only around for maybe a year and, I think, we played like 2 or 3 shows. That was just like old school metalcore, Prom Queen/Parkway kind of style because, you know, 2006. They were the two biggest bands in Australia at the time.  

I'm literally wearing a Prom Queen jumper right now.

We literally just wanted to be Prom Queen or Parkway, and then that band broke up, everyone moved all around the country, I found myself in Adelaide and I hooked up with the guys from A Dead Silence.

Naturally, that was like your next progression, and that's the band I played shows with. You guys were around for, what, half a dozen or so years?

Yeah, we were around from 2008 to 2014.

Nailed it. [both laugh] Tell me about A Dead Silence. Obviously that's where you really started to progress and develop as a musician.  

Well, A Dead Silence for us was just a bit of fun at the start. A Dead Silence came about, and we played a whole heap of local shows around Adelaide. In fact, our first show as a full band was actually at the Squatters Arms with you when you were singing for Audreyindanger.

The Squatters Arms, what a time. I nearly had to fill in on vocals for that show because your singer was crook in the toilets.

‍Haha. Yeah. We were lucky enough back then, as you know, to have the old Underground, and shows every weekend, you know. There $5 shows, $10 shows and like, the level of like bands that were coming through, was like The Acacia Strain, or Shai Hulud, and anybody that was anybody played there. It was just a little hole in the wall venue in Adelaide.

It was like a 100-150 cap venue, like tiny little place with no licence, so no bar. This is wild but, talking about Parkway Drive earlier, in 2007 or 2008 they toured with Have Heart supporting and played, you know, a 2,500 cap venue. Then Have Heart did a headline tour with Carpathian the following year, and played to 150 people the Underground.

Yeah, crazy. We were just happy playing little local shows and just to all of our friends. It got to the point where we were selling out The Underground, and we started to think, "Maybe we could actually do something here?" and that led to us signing with Halo Music Group, who were Adelaide's premier booking company at the time. We wrote and recorded our debut EP, Catharsis, and with the release of the EP, as well as having Halo backing us, it was full steam ahead. We started getting the support slots for bands like Suicide Silence, All Shall Perish, and opening Thebby for Amity and Asking Alexandria. We went on tour with My Children My Bride, and it just snowballed from there. We were getting absolutely everything and sent all over the country.

Unfortunately, towards the end of 10 years as a band, we went into the studio to record our debut album, had everything ready to go and then we called it quits, shelving the record before we released it.

What was next for you after A Dead Silence?

Towards the end of A Dead Silence, I started doing session work. I was pretty much filling in for bands all around the country as they needed. I'd just get a phone call or an email like "Oh, I need somebody to fill in for this show in a month's time", and I would say, "Yup, sick. Let's do it."

I remember this period quite distinctly but for those reading, who are some of these bands that you were playing for?

I filled in for Lake Nyos a bunch of times. I filled in for pretty much like every local band in Adelaide at the time as well. I filled in for Confession, and went on a tour with House vs Hurricane, and In Hearts Wake.

That was an absolutely incredible experience, and that really opened my eyes to what it was like to play in a band of that magnitude because I think every show on that tour was basically sold out.

‍Not only was Confession big at the time, but this was probably House vs Hurricane's peak, and In Hearts Wake starting to make a name for themselves.

That tour was actually for the release of Crooked Teeth by House vs Hurricane at the same time, and In Hearts Wake had maybe just released Divination. In Hearts Wake were blowing up and Confession had just come back. This was after all the controversy with the band members trying to hijack the band before getting kicked out, and I was asked to fill in. It's memories that I hold dear and an experience that I'll never forget.

‍Oh, man. I had forgotten about that. I made a meme about Crafter taking the band back after they tried to kick him out, and he reposted it. I probably still have it somewhere.

After that and A Dead Silence breaking up, I had a 10 year gap where I didn't play music. I was a bit over it at that time. I'd spent a lot of time and effort travelling the country to play music, and I was always broke, so I decided let's slow down, let's do a little bit of overseas travel for myself, and work on like getting a career.

Early to mid last year, I had a little bit of an epiphany and realised I missed playing music. The stars aligned and I ended up joining Seek Misery. I was only meant to fill in for the show at Southern Death Festival but, after the after the show, Ryan and Skinner asked me to join the band. I was so stoked on it and ever since then we've hit the ground running, culminating in us writing and recording our debut album earlier this year.

‍Let's talk about the record. That's the big news here. What is it called, and when is it coming out?

‍So the new album is called Everyone You Love Will Leave, and it is being released on November 14th of this year.

‍And why has it called that?

[Notes from Ryan]: Everyone You Love Will Leave, just like a lot of metal albums, it represents my pasts darkest times, my battle with depression and how I perceived those moments. I try and make it special and unique, crossing those themes with references to video games, and how they helped me shape a better understand to what I was feeling. One of the biggest inspirations for most of this album was from the Silent Hill series, particularly the SILENT HILL 2, SILENT HILL 3 and SILENT HILL 4. How those games made me feel, especially in those times when i was struggling.

The songs 'IN MY RESTLESS DREAMS', 'FLESH AND RUST', 'TO VOMIT A GOD', 'YOU KNOW YOU MIGHT DIE TOO' all reflect heavily with the series. For fans of the games they know how it felt playing them all for the first time, this eerie loneliness to it all, everything felt disjointed and it was hard to make sense of what was happening, until you dug that little bit deeper. That's exactly how it felt with my life’s reflections.

Aimlessly running through the fog, trying to find something with meaning, the monsters as they represent the fears and obstacles that had to be overcome, and what is known as the “other world” everything looks like its from a nightmare, walls with the texture of rusted metal and blood stains with is aggressive droning soundscape representing the darkest parts of that depression.

Those games help me understand what I had lost, but they also helped me understand that from that loss there is a place of rebirth, to turn that negative emotion back into something positive. To fight those fears and overcome something that felt hopeless to survive.

Let's talk a little bit more about, I guess, the writing process. How did that kind of work, and then leading into the studio?

With the writing process, the bulk of the writing is done by Ryan, our vocalist.

He will write a lot of songs on his computer and flick them around to the rest of the band members. We have a group chat, and a band Dropbox. We'll have a listen, we make changes that we think need to be made, or write new sections ourselves. Skinner will write a lot of organic stuff and sends wave files, Tristin writes a lot of stuff on Guitar Pro and, myself, I try and do a lot of stuff with Ryan, but I like to noodle around at home on my guitar or my bass.

‍So Ryan basically writes the skeleton of a song and then everybody else comes in and adds their own touch? That's the smartest way to do it, in my opinion. I think if you too many cooks in the kitchen trying to write a whole song at the same time, it gets messy.

We just played a show with Diesect, and it was less than 24 hours later that Ryan had dropped a song into the Dropbox and said he had a wave of inspiration after the show and I've written this. It was a near complete song that I don't think needs any changes too. And then a couple of hours later, there's another riff in the group chat.

‍I have huge respect for people who can do that because when I was writing for my old bands, sometimes I would have a song down in a couple days but other times I would go weeks between riffs that I thought were any good.

‍Everyone needs somebody like that in the band. I can't sit down with a guitar and say I'm going to write a song from start to finish. I'm the kind of guy who needs somebody to write the skeleton and then I can expand off that, otherwise I'll pick up the guitar or pick up the bass, and there's just nothing there.

Or you end up writing a song that's got like, you know, four different subgenres in one and is just kind of a bit messy. Tell me about the recording process then. In this kind of modern era, people have got all sorts of pro level recording equipment in their homes, and with this back-and-forth that you've got going on with the writing, how much of the recording is done together?

We did pretty much absolutely everything ourselves. Ryan, being the guru, when he's in Adelaide, we will pull out Reaper, and I'll record my bass parts for songs. He has his home studio in Whyalla as well, so Skinner will either go round to his house and they'll record in the studio, or Skinner will record at home and send WAV files. I had a little bit of extra bass work done through Header Studios with Rohan Jurkowski, whose Tristan's brother, and that was because we were starting to run out of time. I'd record three quarters of the album with Ryan but we needed to pump things out so that we can get them sent off for mixing and mastering if we really wanted to hit the November release date.

‍So you didn't do the mixing and mastering yourselves? Who did you choose to do that?

We sent the tracks off to Italy, to Simone Piertroforte, who has worked on bands like As Blood Runs Black, Distant, and Signs of the Swarm. The guy is an absolute wizard and has just made this album sound so crystal clear and massive. It's just unbelievable and we're so happy with it.

Was he always the number one choice or did you throw a few names around when it came to deciding who to work with?

We have always had our stuff mixed and mastered by Simone, so he and Ryan forged a friendship a couple of years ago, prior to Simone getting so big, so he was always our number one choice. We did consider other people but, in the end, we decided to go with someone we have a good relationship with. He's very quick and communication is always so clear with him.

That's sick to have that relationship with a person like that. Almost like another member of the band. So when the record drops in November, what are the plans as far as releasing goes, you know, is there a release show planned or some kind of tour lined up as part of the release?

By the time this interview comes out, we will have announced a tour of the East Coast with Pray4Me and Cultists. That will be running from the 30th of October to the 2nd of November. We'll be playing the Gold Coast, Sydney, ArkFest in Albury, before finishing up in Melbourne. Then we're coming back to Adelaide to drop the record, and playing Six One Eight Fest on the 15th of November. After that we have no immediate plans, but we are expecting to get out on the road as much as possible for 2026 to make it our biggest year.

We say that every year and we've been lucky enough to make every year a bigger year than the last.

Thank you so much for your time, Davey. It's been wonderful catching up, reminiscing, and hearing about what you guys have got coming up. An absolute pleasure as always.

Interview by Ali J. MacBean @ohalistair

Pre-save/Stream Everyone You Love Will Leave here

Seek Misery - Everyone You Love Will Leave tracklisting

1. In My Restless Dreams
2. Flesh And Rust
3. Scars Bare Your Name (feat. Dane from To The Grave)
4. Inside Your Head
5. Everyone You Love Will Leave
6. You Know You Might Die Too
7. To Vomit A God
8. Ground War (feat. Hate Complex)
9. Distorting, Twisting, Bending And Bleeding
10. All Of My Suffering