With Orthodox preparing to return to Australia as special guests on Wage War’s upcoming headline tour, vocalist Adam Easterling has taken us inside the band’s live set to reveal the five songs he loves performing most and exactly why they continue to stand out.
From fan favourite openers to deep cuts that no longer make the setlist, Easterling‘s selections highlight the different sides of Orthodox‘s catalogue while offering a glimpse into the band’s live philosophy.
Whether it’s a crushing breakdown, an unexpected crowd reaction or simply getting to catch his breath between vocals, every choice has earned its place for a different reason.
‘Sacred Place’
“Sacred Place is the song that we’ve been opening our set with since a year before it was ever out, before anybody had ever actually heard the song. We wrote it and then we were in the studio for A Door Left Open, we had six days between that and then doing a tour with Boundaries. We opened that tour with that song deliberately to be like, “hey, this is what our new shit sounds like.” We wanted it to circulate, we wanted videos to be out. We wanted people to be like, “when is this coming out?”. That was really cool. I do think we, in a good way, shot ourselves in the foot because I don’t know how we’re going to write a better set opener than that.”
‘The Anticipation’ / ‘Panic’
“This next one is a two-parter. Our LP called Sounds of Loss starts with a song called The Anticipation, and it leads into a song called Panic. It was very deliberate to have this big intro song, and then it does this long spoken push then pull. Then it catches, and it’s like: now it starts. I still feel very proud of that transition. I still feel very proud of both those songs. I do think I have beaten them to death playing them for the last almost 10 years now. We don’t do it very often, but when we do, it is a huge moment. We did it years ago, as well as on our headliner and a show we just did a couple of weeks ago, we played Anticipation and then we do the push, then pull. And then on the catch where Panic starts, we just catch it and then we use the intro of Prison Song by System of a Down as an interlude. Then right as it goes into where the verse of Prison Song would start, we go into Panic. That little thing is a lot of fun for me. I mean, my dog’s name is Serj, System of a Down is my favourite thing. I love when we do that, and everyone knows Prison Song too so it’s a pretty fun moment to have. We do the catch, which is expected. And then when people don’t hear the song, you just have the same reaction of “what?!?” every time. It’s a lot of fun.”
‘Head On A Spike’
“I would also say Head On A Spike is a favourite because it has a straight-up nu metal chorus, but it also has one of the grooviest breakdowns ever. I’m not this big, strong, tough, scary guy. Well, I wouldn’t say not tough, but I’m not a hard individual, I don’t try to be an overpowering person. And, again, with System of a Down being my favourite band, I always love that they would dance to their songs as if they were dancing to Armenian folk songs. In that, I try to think of ways like: how can I react? My favourite part of my band is the groove element, and the majority of the music I listen to is R&B, hip-hop, soul, and funk, things like that. I try to react to our songs as if I’m listening to that music because that’s what I grew up listening to. And the breakdown in the middle of Head On A Spike is just the most thug-it-out ass beater. It’s just ridiculous. So that would be another one of my favorites for sure.”
‘Keep Your Blessings’
“Keep Your Blessings is another one that’s a lot of fun, specifically with the Wage War audiences, with the barricaded audiences. And that is because it is not a mosh song. What I say every night is: we have two songs played and then it cuts to this spoken sample, you hear if you’ve watched the music video. It’s not on the record, but it’s this guy, it’s literally a quote that Mike [White’s] co-worker said. We got the actor in the music video to say it. In that moment on stage, I’m always like, “scoot up, this is not a mosh song.” And then I’m like, “you what you do to this? You crowd surf to this”. Then I entice everybody, “get up here!”. I don’t know if you’ve ever stood on stage for a band that has a lot of crowd surfers. It looks insane. It looks absolutely crazy. It’s genuinely the coolest thing. And then also in that song, I think because it has this calamitous build, musically, we finally get to this part that has a two-step type thing, it’s just four on the floor chugging. We get to that point and it’s like, “oh, now we’re going to play the dumbest thing we could possibly play”. And we get the crowd to jump during that part. By that point in the set, we’ve usually won the crowd over, if we’re going to at all. And we get this sea of people just going crazy. That’s a big part of why I like it so much. And also that song is so hard to perform because there’s so many words that by the time we get to the end of it, I’m like, “thank god!!”. I think that’s another reason why I like playing it because I get a nice moment of relief afterwards.”
‘Leave’
“And lastly, we have a song off of our album Let It Take Its Course called Leave. We don’t play it anymore, we don’t play anything off that record anymore actually. It’s kind of the ugly stepchild record to us. And that song to me is the creepiest song that this band has ever created. It’s just very eerie, and it’s a song that’s kind of about: I caught you, you’re trapped, what the fuck are you going to do about it? The entire song is spoken and it’s just drony. It’s kind of like our version of Slipknot’s Purity. It’s this really unsettling, drony, slow tempo song. By the time it gets to the end, it is so heavy, it’s really cool. When we used to play that song, it starts out with this guitar that just drones by itself four times. Whenever that started, I would just pull a mic stand out. I don’t use a mic stand at all for anything aside from that song. So when we had that song, I would use the mic stand in really kind of provocative ways. By the end of it, I’d be putting it in the air, maybe throwing it, whatever. It was just really intense. We haven’t played that song in years, but I loved playing that song for the obvious notion of: I can just talk this one. It’s like I can perform and be performative while also catching my breath, which was really nice. But also it was a true “this is a character” song. It makes that one so much fun.”
Wage War Australian Tour 2026 with Special Guests Orthodox (USA) and Heavensgate
- Thursday, July 30th – Perth, WA – Freo Social
- Saturday, August 1st – Adelaide, SA – The Gov
- Sunday, August 2nd – Melbourne, VIC – Forum (Venue Upgrade)
- Thursday, August 6th – Brisbane, QLD – The Tivoli (Selling Fast)
- Friday, August 7th – Sydney, NSW – Metro Theatre (Selling Fast)
Find out more and pick up your tickets here.
Orthodox will join Wage War and Heavensgate across Australia from July 30th, bringing one of modern metalcore’s most uncompromising live shows to Perth, Adelaide, Melbourne, Brisbane and Sydney.
After reading Adam’s picks, don’t be surprised if a few of these songs become the moments you’re waiting for when the tour rolls into your city.
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