Milestones: Metalcore Redefined
Based in Sheboygan, Wisconsin, the post hardcore and metalcore band Milestones has been working hard to put as much raw, real emotion into their music as they can.
The band, formerly known as Among the Restless, is eager to shed their old identity and show the world their new selves.
“We’ve always wanted to do something that had to do with some sort of more aggressive style, but still have the emotional meaning that people can attach to,” said vocalist Aaron Holstein.
After losing their guitarist back in December, the band saw the dramatic change as an opportunity to change musical directions and try something new.
“That’s why we named our EP Reborn, because we completely did a 180 on our style,” said guitarist/vocalist Jake Schwab.
When it came to creating their new sound, Holstein explains that it is important to the band to stay true to themselves and their direction.
“We kind of put our own spin on [the genre],” said Holstein. “That’s one thing we always wanted to do to. We never want to be like everyone else. Even from how we write our music, it’s not that cookie-cutter pop style that every single side band out there has.”
Keeping things real and authentic is an important value every member of the band holds. It’s an especially important one for Holstein.
“When it comes to my side of vocals I like to do the rawer, more real form of what I do because it just adds to the emotion,” he said. “I kind of feel like if I wouldn’t do that it would lose all the depth that we have.”
When writing their music, Schwab says each of their personal influences combine and melt into the Milestones’ sound.
“For me personally, I would say that Vanna is a big huge influence for me,” he said. “Probably like a little bit of August Burns Red too — definitely for the breakdowns that I write.”
As the main lyricist, Holstein lists spoken poetry music as a big influence on his work “mainly because of the word structure and style of it.” Specifically, he looks to September Stories and Hotel Books because of how they use their words and “the fluidity of it.”
“I feel like our scene’s kind of lost that; they kind of just write lines to write lines, and then rhyme everything together and it just doesn’t have any meaning to it,” said Holstein. “I like all my lyrics to flow as one so when you’re reading it, it’s not like reading lyrics it’s more like reading a story. So you can look at it and picture everything inside of it.”
In addition, Holstein and Schwab mentioned that drummer Michael Gilhuber constantly looks to mainly deathcore music for his influences.
“That kid just listens to everything,” said Schwab. “Every time we talk to our drummer, there’s always some new band he’s showing us. He’s the biggest one out of all of us that just sits there and constantly listens to new music.”
Aside from the challenge of changing their lineup and sound, Holstein and Schwab say the biggest one for Milestones by far has been their location
“Being from Sheboygan is probably the biggest,” said Schwab. “If we want to get out there, we can’t really play shows in Sheboygan. Nobody comes, there’s no venues for us — and I mean were from a town of what, 40,000 people? We go down to Milwaukee and we do that whole traveling struggle.”
Recently, the band had the opportunity to film and release their first music video for the song “Final Goodbye.” Both Holstein and Schwab admit it was weird, a little strange and ultimately rewarding to film.
“I wasn’t fully used to it,” said Holstein. “And playing the song 15 times in a row was really tiring. If you watch the video, we progressively get sweatier.”
“The video turned out amazing,” said Schwab. “I think a test for us doing future music videos was getting this music video done.”
While Milestones hasn’t yet been on tour, they hope to on the road by the fall of this year — and definitely by the winter. Holstein and Schwab promise an intense and energetic live show for audiences
“Michael is behind the drum set doing stick tricks and nonstop head banging, I don’t know how he does it,” said Schwab. “I bounce around the stage like a maniac; I’ve hit Aaron a few times with my guitar. I’ve ripped off my strap locks — which are supposed to keep your strap from falling off — like three times.
For Holstein, he prides himself on injecting realism into the performance and connecting with people in the crowd.
Looking toward the rest of 2016, Milestones have a few local performances lined up for the rest of the summer. As for their end-of-year tour, they hope to expand into new area and go on a successful first tour of the New York/ Boston area. A piece of advice they got for tour?
“Don’t eat gas station sushi,” said Holstein.
Schwab agreed.
“That’s a bad idea,” he said.
Originally published on Metal At the Gates, a former metal and hard rock music webzine.