Highlights from the interview;
Dark Void IS a heavy song – 3:56
I mean Dark Void is heavy you know it’s yeah you can’t argue that it’s not heavy I’m sure some people will argue with me and say it’s not heavy / Danny doesn’t enjoy screaming like he used to because he’s really damaged his vocal chords back in 2013 / so the fact that he stepped up to the plate and he’s done some he’s done screaming on this record and he has been yelling that’s because we do love and respect our fans and we hear them we hear people going we want something harder we want you know a bit of that old energy back and so you know I feel like we’ve gone and delivered that without it being so over the top that Danny risks ruining his his voice
Will they ever play “Not The American Average” live again – 8:34
it’s a whole different ball game in the studio, Danny blew his voice out a few times recording these songs and he had a horse voice for days afterwards but it was okay so when we were doing the songs it was like okay let’s get all the singing done yeah and then we’ll record the screams and then he’s out for like four days he can’t do anything so even live we have to be very careful with what we put in our set list
I mean if you go back and listen to him it’s constant screaming screaming and screaming he just he just physically can’t do that anymore so we tried to throw some older songs back in the set list too um and Danny’s like okay I can’t physically do these though so we’ll put some screams on tracks to help to help him and he’ll like he’ll he’ll do the screams with them but just less brutal and people would be upset with it going well why is he doing tracks so it’s just like well because we we know you want to hear the songs and we’re trying our best to give them to you but we can’t physically perform them the way we used to so it’s a double-edged sword you know I do think most people understand a lot of people get it sure uh but it’s tough you know and I think we just have to be smart when we’re picking a setlist so we can actually make it through uh the entire tour without Danny blowing his voice up so so don’t count on that track
He calls Sinister Gates the most underrated and best guitarist of all time – 16:18
Sinister Gates might actually be, after listening to this new ‘We Love You’ he might actually be the best guitarist of all time, but I feel like he’ll never be given that title for some reason because he’s not maybe a classic guitarist that that springs to mind
Why the breakdown in “Dark Void” is so heavy – 30:19
That bridge is it’s heavy man and no one no one can sit here and tell me it’s not heavy because I know when I was recording it, one of the notes one of the big notes that goes ‘BONG’ it’s not even a note like we detuned they get to we just twisted all of the pegs down like it was the heaviest thing and then we get it we did it again with an octave pedal on so it’s even more indistinguishable like I’ve been sat here trying to figure out how I’m gonna do it live because it’s just it’s it’s impossible
but that was the point we were like we want this to be really really really heavy how can we create something heavy there’s that’s not obviously heavy, like we didn’t want to just go down the road of, okay well people say breakdowns are heavy so let’s just go write a breakdown, we didn’t want to do that, we still wanted to be creative and do something different but still get that that heavy energy and that feel and in this in this instance you know it just felt right the guitar was already tuned to like a sharp it was already really low yeah um and then just to be like I was like okay this is this is very very ugly sounding
Gatekeeping metal band t shirts – 37:00
it’s tough because I don’t think that there’s a rule against it you know, but I I do find it odd that you would do that unless you know maybe some people buy a T-shirt and they’re like I like this design and then unaware of the band that’s on it. I don’t know yeah, but for me it’s just kind of like I would never go up to someone about it. This has happened to me,I went to a bar not too long ago before I left America and I was wearing a Metallica t-shirt and someone was like oh you like Metallica, I kid you not, like a stranger and I was like ‘yeah I love Metallica’ and they were like ‘oh yeah well what’s your favorite song then’ I was like man I’m not gonna get into this
Nu Metal is the greatest era of metal – 40:49
People say oh what a terrible era, I think it was one of the best eras of metal ever because it was so huge, but they alos spawned some incredible bands. Nu metal was so diverse, when you say nu metal an automatic sound goes into your head but the reality is you’ve got slipknot on one end of that spectrum, Linkin Park on the other end of the spectrum you’ve got Evanescence somewhere in the middle you’ve got System of a Down you’ve got Korn you’ve got all these great bands that came from nu metal and they all sound so different they’re so unique like Slipknot is a nu metal band they are right but they do not sound anything like Linkin Park and Linkin Park do not sound anything like System of a Down you know and I just think it’s such a great era, I still listen to it if I’m gonna put on a metal album chances are 9/10 it’s gonna be a nu metal record from from that era probably Toxicity or something or Iowa yeah but it’s gonna be it’s gonna be from that era you know and I still love listening to Metallica and all kinds of other metal bands too but nu metal I don’t know holds a special place in my heart, maybe it’s my age
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