_Global Metal Apocalypse caught up with the lads known as A Hero A Fake during their time of recording their upcoming release 'The Future Again', we spoke to guitarist Eric Morgan.

How did you guys form and has there been any line-up changes, if so why?

Justin and I started the band in 2005 while we were in high school. We were already good friends and both shared a love for heavier music so we decided to put a band together. It was our first time doing the band thing so we definitely had a lot to learn, but we worked hard and picked up so many valuable lessons early on from just trial and error. By 2007 we had picked up Patrick, Matt, and Tim, which is when we started to really carve out our own identity within the music scene.

Lineup changes are one of those necessary evils in this business. It is so rare for bands to span their career’s without any changes (i.e. Thrice) but for us it was something necessary to move forward. This album features two new members – Evan Kirkley on drums and Chris Rosser on bass. Evan had actually been in the band previously during 2005 and recorded our second demo but couldn’t stay since he was already engaged in a couple other bands. We met Chris on tour in 2010 and he stayed in contact showing us songs he had written so when Matt left we felt comfortable bringing him into the band. To be honest Evan has always been one of my favorite drummers and when we had the opening I immediately approached him about joining. 

Describe the band's genre without genre-tagging or using cliches?

It’s an energetic and passionately voiced take on the modern heavy where we have refined our traditional AHAF style quirkiness and blended it with more engaging song structures.  

What makes your upcoming album 'The Future Again' different to the previous two albums?

The music on 'The Future Again' definitely marks the biggest evolution in sound for the band. Our last album was over an hour long and wasn’t quite as focused as we would of liked. So we decided to concentrate on making a shorter album that was a lot more focused and allowed us to pay more attention to detail – quality over quantity. This album is also more powerful sounding which has a lot to do with Evan’s drumming which takes the dynamic energy to the next level.

When you got the call from Victory Records to be signed, what was your response?

I got the call from Tony during the summer of 2008 while I was working in between semesters at college. Justin and I were going into our senior years at The University of North Carolina and were both pretty insistent on finishing our degrees out. Fortunately Victory was on board with the idea of letting us finish and using our first release as a developmental album while still in school.

For those music fans out there who judge bands upon appearance, what do you have to say to them?

That’s a hard question to give a general answer about. For some bands their “look” is what defines them to their audience and so they 'want' the fans to judge them based on appearance. For us, we just never had an interest in doing anything bizarre looks wise (makeup, paint, etc). Actually we didn’t even wear a lot of black on our early tours because we were just nerds who loved to play heavy music. That was actually a bit of a problem for us early on because on tour these kids would see looking more like an indie rock band and it created a mental block for some getting into us for the first time. But music transcends everything so we just made sure to go balls out and make sure we got their attention with our performance. 

Which song from the upcoming release stands out most and which one should fans check out?

My favorite track of the new album is “Princess of the Sun”. It was the first song I started writing for the album and it is one of the longer more complicated structure wise.  Really though, it was after we finished tracking vocals that made it stand out so much to me. Justin’s vocals are so passionate throughout the song and then we added guest vocals from Hudson Hower (Bruised But Not Broken) and Dayan Marquina that really just made the track shine.

Where are you touring this year and do you have any UK tour dates being planned or considered?

We start touring in September and will be on the road heavily from then through next year.  We don’t have plans to come to the UK currently (though I would love to!) but it is always something I’m looking into. 

Finally, what does the band have in store for 2012 and beyond?

Right now we are just looking forward to getting our album out (July 17th) and we also have a new music video for the single “Dead and Done” dropping in the next couple weeks. Other than that we’re gearing up for tour and making sure we get to play these new songs in as many places as possible.

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