New Music

PREMIERE: Liberties tackle mental health awareness with bangin' new single 'Are You Ok?'

Mar 27, 2019

4 min read

From the depths of Newcastle's severely underrated heavy scene comes Liberties, a four-piece made up of Ciaran Colgan on pipes, Amy Mcintosh on guitar, Kieran Jackson on drums and Brenden Harrold on bass.

The band utilises a glorious combination of rock and hardcore that makes it impossible not to pay attention. Needless to say, it’s no surprise everyone's been showing the love; Since beginning to releasing music in 2016, the band's tracks have seen the likes of Spotify's Homegrown and Heavy and regular plays on both The Faction and Short.Fast.Loud.

Liberties are premiering their second single 'Are You Ok?' from their upcoming EP Broken with us today, so we sat down with vocalist Ciaran to have a chat about it.

So let's jump in! For those who haven’t heard of Liberties, How did you guys come to be?

Well back in 2015 Kieran and I were trying to find new members for our old band. Once Amy joined we had a few writing seasons together and it became obvious that the three of us were on the same page, but that page was in fact something completely different to what we were doing and the result we got was Liberties.

The new single’s all about mental health. What was it like exploring those themes

Mental health has been a staple topic for me, I like to talk from the heart in a lot of our songs and 'Are You Ok?' is very much that. To me, it was an interesting song to write as it’s about struggling with your own demons. It’s a theme I feel like everyone can relate to in some way or another and my goal with 'Are You Ok?' was to write something that not only meant something to me but also had a take away for anyone else who listened to it.

On the note of mental health, what is your go-to self-care day?

For me my go-to self-care is going to the gym and recently going hiking. I like to feel a sense of accomplishment in everything I do and these give me that in a way that lets my brain switch off.

What can we expect from the upcoming EP?

Broken to me is sort of a culmination of everything Liberties has stood ever been. There are elements of our past releases and some new stuff also. I feel like we have always tried to put the energy of our live shows into our recordings and with Broken I think we have final made something that truly represents that.

Has the writing process changed a lot since you began making music together?

Not really, we have always had a very similar writing process. I do think the writing process has become a lot more fluent however.

Will be seeing you guys up and down the east coast any time soon?

You sure will, We have something in the works right now that I think a lot of people will be excited to see.

Looking forward to it, thank you for the chat and allowing us to premiere your new track!

Interview by Bree Vane @Briebrebree

If you or anyone you know needs help with their own mental well-being call Lifeline on 13 11 14 or Beyond Blue on 1300 22 4636 or find your closest Suicide Prevention/Crisis Support Organisation on Google…

Pre-Order the Broken EP right here