Interview: Accept guitarist Wolf Hoffmann on the band’s return and the inspiration for “Stalingrad”

Of all the classic metal bands that have staged successful resurrections in recent years, the return of  Accept seems the most unlikely.

The German power metal monsters appeared to have been the victims of their own success. In the 1980s, when the band was fronted by unearthly lead singer Udo Dirkschnieder and powered by the blazing guitars of Wolf Hoffmann and Herman Frank, Accept created a sound all their own; you may not have been able to tell Overkill from Nuclear Assault (or Winger from Trixter, for that matter), but the second Dirkschnieder began to sing, you knew you were listening to Accept. Really, there was just no one else like them.

The band also created a load of unforgettable songs. “Balls to the Wall,” was the Accept’s signature song — and it’s still the song that every single metal fan knows. The band’s ’80s output also included “Living For Tonight,” “Restless and Wild,” “Fast As A Shark,” and the epic “Metal Heart,” a song that contains the single most badass guitar solo of the decade.

But the problem of having a signature sound is that it seems tamper resistant. When Dirkschneider took a hiatus from Accept to pursue his solo career, Accept essentially stalled.

Although the band recorded three albums in the 1990s, they couldn’t recapture their ’80s success. The band reunited one last time with Dirkschneider for a string of European festival shows in 2005; when asked in 2007 if Accept would record a new album, Dirkschneider dismissed the idea, saying it would be have been a “disaster” and said trying to write new material “would destroy more than we would create.”

Strong words — but the rest of Accept didn’t believe them.

In 2010, Accept — with classic lineup members Hoffmann, Frank, bassist Peter Baltes, drummer Stefan Schwarzmann and new singer Mark Tornillo, of the American metal band TT Quick — released the astounding “Blood of the Nations,” an album that proved Dirkschneider wasn’t the sole source of the band’s fire.

Earlier this year, Accept released “Stalingrad: Brothers in Death,” a disc that is even more powerful than “Blood of the Nations.” If anything, Accept as hungry and ready to shock the world today as they were when they released “Restless and Wild” in 1982. Instead of coasting on their old material as a nostalgia act, Accept — with “Blood of the Nations” and “Stalingrad” — are making some of the best music of the band’s career.

As Hoffmann said in a recent phone interview before the start of the band’s U.S. tour with Kreator, the band’s new life came about almost by accident.

“We weren’t even looking for (a singer) and we weren’t thinking about doing a reunion,” Hoffmann said. “We happened to find Mark one day and we did a fun jam session.

“He came in and we decided very spontaneously, ‘this guy sounds awesome; why don’t we ask him to be our front man?’” Hoffmann said. “He reminded us a bit of Udo and he had some aspects he brought to the table that were even better.”

With “Stalingrad,” the band tackles the horrors of World War II from two decidedly different perspectives. “Stalingrad” focuses on the suffering of the individual soldiers — German and Soviet — and points out that the men who did all the fighting and dying in that battle were a lot more alike than their leaders would have wanted them to believe.

“At the end of the day, mayn people are dying” during the battle, Hoffmann said. “In their last moments on the battlefield, two opposing soldiers realize, ‘this is really for nothing and we’re really much closer to each other than you would think.’”

Was it awkward for a German band to write a song based on the German invasion of the Soviet Union?

“I wouldn’t call it awkward,” Hoffmann said. “There’s a certain awareness; we’ve always been a band that dealt with controversy, we’ve always dealt with difficult topics. We’ve never liked doing lyrics that are cliché.”

The band returns to World War II with “Hell Fire: Dresden,” a song about the February 1945 Allied bombing of the Dresden, where somewhere between 25,000 and 45,000 people were killed after intensive bombing obliterated much of the city. The bombing caused an outcry in both Britain and America over the loss of life and the destruction of a city at a time when the war was already nearing its end.

Like “Stalingrad,” “Hellfire” focuses not on the politics of the war, but on the suffering of those dying in the bombed city.

“This is one of those forgotten stories” of the war,” Hoffman said. “If we hadn’t done ‘Stalingrad,’ we wouldn’t have thought to do anything like that. We came across the firebombing of Dresden, which was totally unnecessary, and we thought, ‘that should be another story.’”

But “Stalingrad” is not a concept album; the band tackles numerous topics, such as the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks (“Never Forget”), economic recession (“Revolution”) and the price paid by soldiers who died for rest in places like Arlington National Cemetery (“Shadow Soldiers”).

Is the album hematically heavy in places? Sure. Is it even downright moving at times? Oh yes (just try not to get a bit teary on the solo for “Shadow Soldiers”). But ‘thematically heavy’ and “moving” doesn’t mean that Accept has forgotten how to rock or have fun.

“Hellfire,” “Revolution” and “Stalingrad” are fist-pumping anthems and the galloping “Hung, Drawn and Quartered” and “Flash to Bang Time” are sonic blasts. You won’t be crying into your beer with this disc.

For “Stalingrad,” the band was once again joined by Andy Sneap, who produced “Blood of the Nations.” Sneap was so excited about a possible Accept reunion that he tracked the band down with an offer to produce a new album before Accept were ready to go into the studio to record the songs that became “Blood.”

For the new album, Sneap acted as both producer and adviser, Hoffmann said.

“He’s part of the team,” Hoffmann said. “In Andy’s case, he’s an engineering guy, but he’s there early on, picking out the right songs. He’s picking out riffs and picking out stuff he likes as an Accept fan.”

The band felt trying to rise to the level of “Blood of the Nations” was a challenge, Hoffmann said.

“A little bit of pressure is quite good,” Hoffmann said. “I welcome a little bit of pressure. If you have a great album that you need to match or surpass, that’s awesome. At every turn of events, I think it’s has good as ‘Blood of the Nations.’”

After several decades in music, Hoffmann said he still enjoys touring — or at least the time on stage.

“It goes through phases; there are times you enjoy it immensely and there are times you wish it were over,” Hoffmann said. “Usually, the payback time is on stage … it’s really why you suffer through that miserable 22 hours, to be on stage for two hours.”

*** Accept will play Phoenix Hill Tavern in Louisville at 8 p.m. Tuesday Oct. 9. Assisting Sorrow, Two Pump Chump, Stagecoach Inferno and Rockaway Drive will open the show. Tickets are $25.  For tickets, visit http://www.terryharper.com

Interview: Municipal Waste’s Ryan Waste talks “The Fatal Feast”

The members of Richmond, Virginia’s Municipal Waste took a good long time — for them — to write and record their newly released punk-metal crossover messterpiece “The Fatal Feast.” To prepare, the band gave themselves a window of time when they weren’t under a pressing record company deadline and weren’t burned out from trying to wedge recording in between tours.

Guitarist Ryan Waste says the extra time spent preparing “The Fatal Feast” made a big difference in the band’s state of mind and in the songs.

“It was more relaxed,” Waste said. “We took a year off and got our heads together in general. We came up with stuff without being so tired from the road; we were excited to write and I think it shows.”

“The Fatal Feast” is fast, nasty and pummeling and combines traditional Waste gory dark humor (“New Dead Masters,” “Jesus Freaks” and the cannibalistic title track) with moments of Dead Kennedyesque political consciousness (“Standards and Practices”) and wacky party time insanity (“Covered in Sick/The Barfer,” “You’re Cut Off”). Musically, “The Fatal Feast” is brutal stuff, like a faster tongue-in-cheek “Reign in Blood.”

“We put the bar pretty high on ourselves,” Waste said. “I think, for our own sanity, we wanted to take a little time off and going between labels (from Earache to Nuclear Blast) was the best time to do that — and the end result is one of our best albums.”

If not as consistently politically active as the band’s last album for Earache, “Massive Aggressive,” it’s clear from songs like “Standards and Practices” that Municipal Waste has a political cutting edge. Waste said the band likes the dichotomy of mixing wacky horror tales with moments of social consciousness.

“We want to have fun — but you have to touch on the serious stuff,” Waste said. Any resemblance to the sentiments in “Standards and Practices” and the Occupy Wall Street movement, however, is purely coincidental.

“We wrote that before all of that (Occupy Wall Street) was coming down,” Waste said. “Maybe that was the Waste predicting the future.”

The album is classic Municipal Waste, Ryan Waste said. “It’s almost like a Waste best-of, with the old-school feel,” he said. “But, we’ve covered new ground and I got to do some new leads.

“There are some Motorhead tempos,” Waste said. “That has always been our specialty — its like A.D.D. speed metal.”

The band strives for its brand of musical perfection, Waste said. “We’ve never been a technical band, but we do want to keep you on your toes,” Waste said.

The band recently finished up a string of dates with GWAR and will be hitting the road for another trek across the U.S. in late May. After that, the band will play a June date in the U.K. and a few shows in France in July.

“This year is going to be the year of the Waste wasting the world,” Ryan Waste said. “We’re doing our own headlining tour and we’re going over (to Europe) to do the festivals.” When not touring with Municipal Waste, Ryan Waste will be touring with his side-band, Volture. Meanwhile Waste bassist Phil “Landfill” Hall will also be touring at times this year with his side project, Cannabis Corpse. Drummer Dave Witte, who also plays with King Generator and Birds of Prey, will also be touring this year.

Side projects, Waste said, do not interfere with Municipal Waste.

“There’s no jealousy,” Waste said. “Everyone wants to give that creative freedom. It’s what keeps (Municipal Waste) fresh.”

www.facethewaste.com

Interview: Michael LePond of Symphony X talks touring, songwriting and the robot revolution of “Iconoclast”

“High concept” metal can be pretentious crap.

You know it’s true, because you’ve heard “high concept” metal, too. Think of all the times you’ve heard one of Yngwie J. Malmsteen’s attempts to classy-up his albums with a bit of classical noodling. Yes, he’s stellar at arpeggios and I like some of his more straight-forward songs (“I Am A Viking!” Yea!)  … but every time Yngwie tries to reinterpret Johann Sebastian, Schubert, Sherbert or Stravinsky through his Strat, I fall asleep.

High mindedness doesn’t always translate well to metal lyrics, either. When it comes to concept albums, for every “Tommy” there are 20 “Mr. Robotos” out there. Sure, Queensryche pulled if off with their rock opera, “Operation: Mindcrime” … but W.A.S.P.’s attempt at rock opera, “The Crimson Idol” sounded … well, it sounded like exactly what you would have expected from the auteur who gave us ”Animal (F**k Like A Beast).”  Hell, even Queensryche couldn’t make lightning strike twice.

So I get a bit nervous when a band goes all high art on me, but the band that did it better than anyone else in 2011 is New Jersey’s Symphony X, with their dystopian, machines-destroy-mankind magnum opus, “Iconoclast.”

“Iconoclast” works because Symphony X — unlike, say, Queensryche on “American Soldier” or the second half of “Operation: Mindcrime II,” doesn’t try to run away from their metal roots. Rather, “Iconoclast” is filled with blistering riffs and brutal musicianship.

Guitarist Michael Romeo is considered on the top guitarists in metal for a reason; the man shreds — but only in the service of the songs and never in a “listen to how clean my sweep picking is” sort of way. He’s got Yngwie’s chops, but he’s no Yngwie — and I mean that in a good way.

The rest of the band – multi-octive bellower Russell Allen, drumming machine Jason Rullo, bassist Michael LePond and keyboardist Michael Pinnella – are equally as powerful. Symphony X are thinking man’s metal with balls and “Iconoclast” is both thought-provoking and heavier than an dinosaur killing asteroid.

Don’t believe me? Then I suggest you hear for yourself.

The band recently wrapped up a sprint across the U.S. with buddies Iced Earth and Warbringer. If you missed them on that particular U.S. jaunt, you’ll have to wait — the band will be playing National Open Air Brazil on April 20 and then will cross the pond for the summer Euro festival circuit before returning home to play the ProgPower festival in Atlanta in September.

Given the choice, bassist LePond would spend much more of the year on the road.

“I’m the guy who likes touring the most,” LePond said, during a quick phone interview on the second-to-last stop of the Iced Earth tour. “As long as I can stay healthy and well, I could tour constantly. The other guys have wives and kids.”

The ominous concept for “Iconoclast” — machines replace, enslave and destroy humanity –came from a rather innocent twist of the knob in the recording studio while the band was working on song ideas, LePond said.

“Michael Romeo was messing around with these robotic little sounds — not industrial, but almost,” LePond said. “We experimented with that. As we put the songs together, we came up with a concept where technology goes too far in striving for perfection and the machines take over.”

But are we already slaves to technology, even without a “Robopocalypse” style machine takeover? LePond said the argument that we’re already enslaved by our electronic “helpers” could easily be made.

“It seems that way. Things have changed so much; when you go out to dinner with your friends, everybody is staring at their phones,” LePond said.

Those kinds of questions come readily to the Symphony X fans LePond meets on the road. While broadening minds is not explicitly the band’s goal, LePond said he appreciates fans who take the band’s interpretations of “The Odyssey” and “Paradise Lost” and then do their own research.

“A lot of them will hear an album and read the lyrics and go back and read Homer and John Milton,” LePond said. “Our fans like to be challenged. They like to learn and listen to the music. They’ll always ask questions.”

Musically, the band is every bit as intricate as the literary sources of inspiration.

“People come to me and say, ‘wow, I’ve listened to that album and I have to keep listening, because every time I hear something new,” LePond said. Considering the amount of music packed into each song, it won’t surprise fans when LePond say the music can be difficult to play.

“They’re very challenging. It takes a lot of practice,” LePond said.

National Open Air Brazil — which also features heavyweights like Exodus, Megadeth and Venom — will put Symphony X on stage in front of 80,000 screaming metal fans.

“It’s going to be the biggest show we have ever done in our career,” LePond said. Over the summer “we’ll go and do Europe for about 10 days; then in September, we’re going to do a show in Mexico City and them we’re playing ProgPower. Then we’ll be in full writing mode for another record.”

“Iconoclast” was released in 2011; before that, the band released “Paradise Lost” in 2007 and “The Odyssey” in 2002. Does that mean fans can expect the band’s next album in 2016?

“I certainly hope not,” LePond said. “What we’re shooting for is, hopefully, this summer we’re going to start working on songwriting. I think the next recording will come out in 2014, hopefully.

“Just putting together the songs takes a lot of time,” LePond said. “That’s the thing we feel bad about — we’d like to put out the albums quicker, but we don’t want to put out any filler.”

Factory Damage to end career by opening for Anthrax Jan. 29 in Louisville

Every rock musician who picks up a guitar or set of drumsticks dreams of sharing a stage with their idols. Very few musicians and bands ever get that opportunity.

But Owensboro’s Factory Damage have had a little more success than the average band; over the past seven years, the band has played shows with major-label metal bands such as Exodus, Powerman 5,000, Warbringer and Malevolent Creation.

On Jan. 29, Factory Damage will play the last show of the band’s career in Louisville when they open for thrash metal legends Anthrax at Expo Five.

“For me, it’s a dream come true,” said band guitarist Ed Young. “If you had said to me when we started this band seven years ago we would be opening for Anthrax, I would have said, ‘you’re dreaming.’ ”

Life in a local band anywhere is difficult — there aren’t any lavish backstage parties, tour buses or bowls of M&Ms with all the brown ones picked out for aspiring garage bands. Instead, hungry local bands can look forward to loading and unloading their own gear, traveling in cramped, overloaded vans and constantly scrambling to find gigs.

“Opening for Warbringer, we saw them pull up in a cargo van (instead of a tour bus),” Young said. “Right then I realized, ‘this is a whole lot harder than anyone thinks.’ ”

Young said the constant search for new shows to play wore the band thin over time. “There’s no metal scene” in Owensboro, Young said. Most local bars require bands to play cover songs.

The band decided to call it quits in September. “It didn’t end on a bad note,” vocalist Chris Hedges said. “We needed time for our families. The stress and hassle of trying to constantly book shows took a toll on all of us.”

“We’re not teenagers,” Young said. “We’ve all got jobs. My kids are getting older, and I don’t want to miss any of it.”

The band was scheduled to play its last show in Louisville opening for Down — a supergroup of sorts containing former Pantera vocalist Phil Anselmo and members of Crowbar and Corrosion of Conformity. But life intervened and Factory Damage had to bow out of the gig.

But the band didn’t want to end their career on a low note. So, when Young learned the Louisville music promoter Terry Harper had booked Anthrax, Testament and Death Angel to play Expo Five, he asked Harper if the band could join the bill.

“Terry was really understanding” when the band dropped off the Down show, Young said. “When I saw Anthrax pop up on his website, I had to ask him, because Anthrax was a huge influence on me.

“Terry has been really great for this band,” Young said. “I guess he likes us.”

Getting ready for the show has been a challenge. Some members of the band, such as longtime drummer Scott Doughty, are unable to perform because of work. To fill out the bill, the Young and Hedges recruited a drummer and bassist from other local bands.

“They’re picking up (the songs) really quickly,” Hedges said.

“We’re practicing pretty much nonstop,” Young said.

Although the band is retiring from music for now, there’s always the possibility of getting back together in the future, Hedges said. But, if not, the band is calling it quits with no regrets.

“We’ve had a lot of fun doing it,” Young said. “There have been more good times than bad.”

“It’s almost cliché … but when you get out on the stage, all the stress (of life) is gone,” Hedges said. “The show hits, and it’s awesome.”

“It’s a whole other world when you get out there (on stage), whether it’s 20 people or 500,” Young said.

Anthrax, Testament, Death Angel, Factory Damage, Stonecutters, Overload and Maltese Cross will perform at 6:30 p.m. Jan. 29 at Expo Five in Louisville. Tickets are $25. Factory Damage is selling tickets to the show; for tickets, e-mail factorydamage@hotmail.com or visit http://www.ticketweb.com.

Interview: Municipal Waste guitarist Ryan Waste ready to get back to band’s trademark punk-metal attack

Reviewing music is a pretentious business. Just look around the Web and you’ll find scads of half-educated, opinionated dolts like me trying to find something meaningful to say about every damn album that plops onto their desks.

Thing is, most of our smart-guy opinions are 99 percent crap. “Oh yes, most people think ‘Deliverance’ is about a man drowning his beloved, but it’s really about a time when Mikael Akerfeldt couldn’t get it up in Japan.” But is it really? Every music review is subjective, so perhaps the reviewer is subconsciously being influenced by the time he couldn’t get it up in Japan. You see? There’s no “truth” in most music reviews, but there’s a ton of bogus-intellectual claptrap and self-congratulatory yap. Take it from me, I know.

And that, my friends, is why I love bands like Municipal Waste. You don’t have to rack your brain on a song like “Knife Fight” or “Blood Hunger,” cuz everything you need to know about the meaning of the song is right there in the title. What’s “Poseur Disposer” about? It’s about a thing that friggin’ shreds poseurs, that’s what it’s about, baby.

But being straightforward lyrically doesn’t mean Municipal Waste is musically simple. On the contrary; it takes a lot of work to cram so many riffs and hooks into a 47 second song like “Dropped Out” or to hammer out a 13 second manic masterpiece like “Death Prank.”

The Richmond, Va. band’s first album, “Waste Em All” was like “Reign in Blood” boiled down to a shorter, even-nastier thrashing machine, with an S.O.D. sense of goofy black humor and a Dead Kennedy’s viciousness in Ryan Waste’s unrelenting riffage. It was fun — mosh-out, head-bang, kick-butt fun.

“Hazardous Mutation” was also a blast — and sonically very much like Metallica on meth (check out “Unleash the Bastards” and tell me that doesn’t sound like “Kill Em All” Metallica if James had given up singing and grabbed a hard-core punk to be Met’s new frontman).

“The Art of Partying” – to make yet another comparison — is “Seasons in the Abyss” at supersonic speed, musically intricate and rifftastic, but not nearly as self-serious as “Seasons.” I mean really, “The Inebriator” is totally “Dead Skin Mask” — but sixteen times faster and not nearly so full-of-itself. And the title track, “The Art of Partying” is amazingly crushing and fun — it’s music for smashing the furniture and throwing the TV out the hotel room window.

While Municipal Waste evolved its sound over the years, there’s a sense that Ryan Waste feels the band strayed too far from its dirty punk roots and gross-out humor on their 2009 release, “Massive Aggressive.”  In a recent interview, Waste said the band — which is recording tracks for its next album – wanted to get back to the feel of their earlier thrash epics.

“It sounds like an old Waste record,” Ryan Waste said of the new material. “We’re bringing the old Waste and bringing the old themes back. We’re keeping the music heavy. (Lyrically), it’s still tongue in cheek – songs about death, with our sense of humor.

“We’re producing it,” Ryan Waste said. “We’re not a pretentious band; we don’t need a big-name producer to make Municipal Waste sound like Municipal Waste.”

The band was about half-way through the recording process at the time of the interview, Ryan Waste said. “It’s totally written, but I’m trying to put some (guitar) spice in it,” he said.

It’s hard to fault Municipal Waste for wanting to broaden their lyrical horizons on “Massive Aggressive;” after all, the band was heavily inspired by punks like Dead Kennedys and D.R.I. — and god knows those guys weren’t afraid of tackling political and social issues in their songs.

“Massive Aggressive” dealt with some pretty serious topics, such as media manipulation, environmental destruction and religion. To be fair, the songs were good and the attitude on “Massive Aggressive” was definitely punk — but the songs lacked the short, brutal sucker punch of “Waste Em All” and “The Art of Partying.”

The upcoming album won’t be quite as thematically serious as “Massive Aggressive” tracks like “Upside Down Cross,” Ryan Waste said.

“We’re not trying to be a serious band,” he said. “We’re just being ourselves. The songs will be more like the quick head kicks of “Waste Em All,” Waste said.

“We started out with songs that were three minutes-plus,” Ryan Waste said of the new material. “We forced ourselves to write some shorter songs.” Keeping the intensity of punk rock at the core of Municipal Waste is crucial to the band, because they’re passionate about punk rock, he said.

“Me and Tony grew up listening to punk,” he said. “The only kind of metalheads I like are the ones that appreciate punk. I always considered Municipal Waste a punk band … it’s a (mixing) of punk rock with heavy metal.”

On previous albums, the band sped through the recording process — something they didn’t want to do with the new album, Ryan Waste said.

“We’ve never really took the time like we did on this record,” he said. “… We took the year off from touring to record. Everything we’ve done has been rushed and we didn’t want to rush this one.”

The time off from touring was needed as well; after a brutal touring schedule for “Massive Aggressive,” the band members needed time recharge themselves and get ready to write and record the as-yet-unnamed new album.

“We had a rough year touring (in 2010); it was non-stop,” Ryan Waste said. “Everyone needed some time off. You don’t want to come home and practice (after) you’ve been sitting in the (tour) van for a year.”

The new album, which is due early next year, will be the band’s first with Nuclear Blast records. “Massive Attack” was the last album the band recorded for their three-album deal with Earache.

Having a new label gave the band new energy, Ryan Waste said.

“We’ve got something to prove. You want to do your best to show it has gotten better,” he said.

Currently, the band has only one show booked in the near future — a Nov. 4 show at NYC’s Gramercy Theatre, as one of the headliners of the “Metal Suckfest.” Ryan Waste said he is starting to get anxious to get back on the road.

“I’m actually missing touring now,” he said. “We usually go out a lot more … You’re not a band unless you’re a live band. It’s feeding off the energy (of the crowd).”

www.facethewaste.com

Interview: Wolves in the Throne Room bring three-album cycle to an end with “Celestial Lineage”

Wolves in the Throne Room (photo by Alison Scarpulla)

 This month, Washington State’s Wolves in the Throne Room will close a circle the band opened four years ago, with the release of “Celestial Lineage.”

In a recent interview, drummer Aaron Weaver and he and his brother, vocalist/guitarist Nathan Weaver, embarked on what they envisioned as a mythic trilogy in 2007, with ”Two Hunters.” The second part of the trilogy, “Black Cascade,” followed during the frozen early months of 2009.

“Two Hunters” was raw and primal, combining black metal with dense, intricate arrangements and moments of acoustic beauty. “Black Cascade” retained the attention to arrangement, but was fiercer in overall assault; while lacking the acoustic melodies of “Two Hunters,” Black Cascade also contained hints of the psychedelic.

“Celestial Lineage” is the marriage of all that came before. Highly structured in places and roaring with power in others, “Celestial Lineage” is a sometimes beautiful, sometimes crushing reach for transcendence and escape from the modern world.

“When we completed ‘Two Hunters,’ the idea for the tracks (for ‘Celestial Lineage’) had already been formed,” Aaron Weaver said. “By the time we started ‘Black Cascade,’ We knew we would make a three-record cycle; we were already planning the musical ideas on all three records.”

The writing for “Celestial Lineage” was finished over the winter, when Nathan and Aaron retired to Calliope Farm and lived like hermits in the wilderness while they worked on the songs.

“We usually like to do our writing and recording in the winter time. It’s a quiet and introspective period,” Weaver said. “That’s especially true in the northwest, where the days are very short and gray and rainy for months on end.

“Definitely I like to avoid contact with other people” while writing, Weaver said. “No one understands the mindset when you’re in a very intense creative endeavor; we need to be in a really quiet space and get into the head space of the record we’re working on.”

While the wild woods and  mountains of Washington State — and the farm where the Weaver brothers live and work when not making music — remains the core inspiration for the band’s brand of black metal, some of the songs on “Celestial Lineage” have the feel of religious ritual. The ceremonial sound of songs like “Woodland Cathedral” was intentional, Weaver said.

“‘Two Hunters,’ to me, sounds feral and wild; that was the image we had … the idea of transcendency,” Weaver said. “With ‘Celestial Lineage,’ we had the idea of, ‘what’s the next step? If someone has that (transcendent) experience, what’s the next step?’”

The ‘next step’ when a person makes a spiritual connection, Weaver said, is often to attempt to codify it into a religion. The need to build a liturgy or ceremony around the quest for a spiritual connection can be both positive and negative, Weaver said.

“I think there’s a really beautiful side to that; We can all agree there’s something beautiful in a great cathedral in Europe … and there’s something dark in turning that into a liturgical (ceremony).”

One of the themes of the record is that, even when the original transcendent connection is cloaked in ceremony, that connection is still alive and obtainable.

When a religion is built, the initial connection “becomes something else,” Weaver said. “But at the same time, that spark is still there.”

The album also reflects changes in the lives of the Weaver brothers as well. When the band was founded in 2002, both Aaron and Nathan were in their early 20s; naturally, they have changed as people and now have more complicated lives — and that is reflected in the music.

“Maybe part of the reason we wanted to do a record on establishing tradition has to do with being older,” Weaver said. “At 34 and 32, we definitely don’t feel as wild and free as we once did. I’ve established a home and am working the farm with my wife.”

In terms of pure sound, WITTR are a black metal band; it’s not difficult to hear the echoes of Burzum in the band’s guitar sound, or feel the larger-than-life atmosphere also captured by Emperor’s “In The Nightside Eclipse.” Like Burzum’s Varg Vikernes (not to turn this into a conversation about him), the members of Wolves in the Throne Room create music that is intensely personal — but not nearly as cold as that created by the Norwegians who initially inspired them.

But one thing Wolves avoids is the “Satanic” fixation of some black metal bands. In fact, when asked if he believes WITTR is a “black metal” band, Weaver said, rather, Wolves uses its black metal influences to express its own ideas.

“We’re certainly inspired by Norwegian black metal and I feel a (resonance) with the themes you hear in Burzum, Mayhem and Darkthrone,” Weaver said. “But, we’ve taken it an applied it to our own situation.”

Norwegian black metal “was so clearly emanated to place — it was emanated from the spiritual landscape of Scandinavia,” Weaver said. “That is something that’s very important to me. I feel very committed to the northwest and the landscape.

“It was clear we could take black metal and express the mountains of the northwest,” Weaver said. “We want (the music) to be reflective or our own experiences and lives here in Cascadia.”

There’s a symphonic feel to Wolves in the Throne Room — not in the “let’s add strings and a horn section” sort of way, but in how the band’s melodies intertwine and move both on and under the surface. When asked if either he or Nathan have studied classical music, Aaron scoffed.

“I don’t even consider myself to be a musician at all,” Weaver said. “… I don’t want to be a musician. I never practice drumming … For me, the music is a means to an end; we’re concerned more with atmosphere and texture than (any) technical aspect of the music.

“All the music theory has been secondary to, ‘how do we convey the emotion and feeling, and how do we express it?’” Weaver said. “I think that fits into the black metal tradition; it’s more about feeling than technique.”

“Celestial Lineage” will be released on Sept. 13.

Interview: Soilwork vocalist “Speed” Strid talks about Peter Wilchers’ return to the band and flips the switch on “The Panic Broadcast”

When Soilwork guitarist Peter Wilchers decided to retire from touring and leave the band in 2005, vocalist Bjorn “Speed” Strid was determined to hold Soilwork together.

So Strid, who had co-founded Soilwork with Wilchers in 1996, hired guitarist Daniel Antonsson to fill Wilcher’s spot. While the band’s first album without Wilchers, “Sworn To A Great Divide” was worthy of respect, Strid felt there was a void in the band.

Meanwhile – even though Wilchers was in the U.S. and Strid lived in Sweden – the two began planning a side project. When Wilchers began sending demos of songs, however, Strid said he noticed a certain resemblance to Soilwork.

At that point, it was only natural that the two would discuss Wilchers’ return the band he helped found, Strid said.

“We did talk about having a band on the side, a studio project,” Strid said in a recent interview. “We started writing songs and he sent back one track that became ,’The Thrill,’” from Soilwork’s newest release, “The Panic Broadcast.”

That lead to discussions of ‘why don’t we do this together in Soilwork like we used to?’” Strid said.

Thankfully, they did – and “The Panic Broadcast” is welcome shot of adrenaline. Heavy and precise, yet melodic, the band’s new album shows why Soilwork has been studied, copied and plagiarized by hundreds of lesser followers of the “Swedish Melodic Death Metal” sound the band created.

On Aug. 11, Soilwork will play Headliners Music Hall in Louisville. Joining the band are Death Angel, Augury, Mutiny Within and Swashbuckle. The U.S. tour is only the beginning of the band’s journey across the globe to promote “The Panic Broadcast.”

Of course, constant touring was part of the reason Wilchers decided to leave Soilwork five years ago. Strid said the break was good for Wilchers, but said going on without him in the band never felt quite right.

“It was hard seeing him go, but after a while, we took it as a challenge,” Strid said. “I think we did great (with “Sworn To A Great Divide”), but when we started touring, I felt something was missing.

“It was pretty much our baby. We started the band back in ’96,” Strid said. “… I guess he needed to settle down and get some distance, since he’d lost the inspiration and the need to tour.”

With the band members spread across Europe and America, the complete band didn’t play the songs from “The Panic Broadcast” together until shortly before they began their current U.S. tour.

“It’s definitely going to be a challenge to play those songs live,” Strid said. “It’s a challenge on each album, because we always take it a step up.”

While every band says their most recent work is their best, Strid said he is especially pleased with “The Panic Broadcast.”

“It’s a really good summary of all of Soilwork’s career,” Strid said. “It’s all the albums. A lot of the playfulness of ‘Predator’s Portrait’ and ‘Natural Born Chaos’ is back and the songwriting is more mature.”

The album was also an opportunity for Strid to push his vocals in new directions. At times – especially on “Epitome” – Strid voice is darker and heavier with emotion. After listening to “Epitome,” Strid said he and others noticed an uncanny (and, for Strid, unconscious) vocal resemblance to Layne Stayley, the late vocalist of Alice In Chains.

“I’d never done vocals like that for Soilwork before,” Strid said. “It was a challenge; it feels wrong, but it’s right. It’s really druggy and trippy.”

Once the band finishes it’s U.S. tour, the reignited Soilwork will do stints in Japan, Austraila and Europe. Strid said the band is happy to be going back on the road.

“It’s going to be a great set,” Strid said. “With eight albums, it’s hard to pick a set list.”

You can purchase tickets for Soilwork’s Aug. 11 Louisville show at Ticketweb. To hear tracks from “The Panic Broadcast,” visit the band’s MySpace page here.

Interview: Exodus guitarist Gary Holt talks about his tribute to Paul Baloff, angry music and “Exhibit B: The Human Condition”

When Gary Holt – the founder, chief songwriter and co-lead guitarist for the perpetual motion machine that is Exodus – began writing material for the band’s new album, he decided to pay tribute to one of his biggest musical inspirations.

That inspiration, of course, is Paul Baloff, the legendary singer who fronted Exodus when the band recorded its classic debut, “Bonded By Blood.”  Although Baloff recorded only one studio album with Exodus – Baloff died of a stroke in 2002, while the band was in the planning stages for a new alubm - Baloff’s spirit was what kept Exodus going, even after his death.

For Baloff, Holt  wrote “Hammer and Life,” an anthem salutes Baloff’s energy and passion for life and music. The song appear’s on Exodus’ blazing new album, “Exhibit B: The Human Condition.”

“I never meant to write a song for Paul using all of his classic one-liners,” Holt said, during a recent interview to promote “Exhibit B.” “I wanted to use something more valid.”

The song, Holt said, was a way of acknowledging his debt to Baloff.

“Speaking for myself, he has been a big part of my inspiration to keep doing this,” Holt said. “He is forever the spirit of the band. We’ve had three different singers … but Paul is always there. He lives long in Exodus lore.”

Exodus is deservedly venerated for the band’s role in the creation of the San Francisco thrash metal scene, but the band has resurged phenomenally since Holt rebuilt the band with lead singer Rob Dukes. With Dukes at the mic, Holt and Lee Altus on lead guitars and bassist Jack Gibson and drummer Tom Hunting completing the lineup, Exodus has reemerged as one of the best bands in thrash metal.

While the “Big Four” – Metallica, Megadeth, Anthrax and Slayer – are given credit for being the leaders of thrash metal, discerning thrash fans acknowledge Exodus was every bit as important as the others in the creation of thrash. Although Exodus broke up between 1992 and 2002, the band always stayed true to extreme metal; while Metallica toyed with alterna-rock on “Load” and “Reload” and Megadeth flirted with the mainstream on “Cryptic Writings” and “Risk,” Exodus never attempted to compromise their way to commercial success.

Metallica and Megadeth have returned to their thrash roots, which is good … but in terms of musical style and dedication, Holt and Exodus never went away.

For Holt, Baloff’s memory is what helped Holt carry on with Exodus after the shock of Baloff’s death.

“‘Hammer and Life’ to me just kind of represents Paul’s spirit and some of the things he did for me – coming out of the dark days and becoming stronger than before.”

“Exhibit B” is a bludgeoning thrash opus that is both incredibly punishing and heavy while being as intricate as anything produced in the band’s career. Lyrically, the album is equally blistering, with songs about human atrocity (“Nanking”), global destruction (“Good Riddance”) and school violence (“Class Dismissed”). Holt writes most of the music and lyrics. Despite the bleakness of the material, Holt is not as bitter and misanthropic as his lyrics might make a listener suppose.

“Class Dismissed” is a controversal song, told from the killer’s point of view. But the band is not advocating school violence as much as commenting on contemporary society.

“It’s something that has become such a part of American culture – the good, old-fashioned school shooting,” Holt said. “It is something that is becoming quite prevalent in our gun-happy culture.”

Holt said tackling tough subject matter such as school violence and religious hypocrisy is cathartic for him.

“It gives me a chance to rant and rave, get it off my chest and go on with my life,” he said. The music hopefully serves the same purpose for fans – providing an avenue to release tension and stress, Holt said.

“Our shows are still about having fun,” Holt said. “Even though we’re touching on dark material, we’re still smiling and having fun and so is the audience … We hit the stage and it’s like a bomb goes off.

“You would be hard-pressed to find people playing music like ours that are constantly depressed,” Holt said. “(For audiences) to leave a show depressed, that’s why we have Morrissey.”

Even after almost three decades in metal, Holt said he still has passion for creating music and playing live for the fans.

“This is the hardest job in the work if you don’t love it,” he said. “It’s all about performing live. We all have our bad days … but when you get back on stage, it picks you back up.”

To hear complete songs from ”Exhibit B,” visit the band’s MySpace page. Also, here’s the demo version of “Hammer and Life” and “Class Dismissed.”

Interview: Mnemic’s Guillaume Bideau talks about “Sons of the System”

The members of Denmark’s Mnemic are in the middle of a big year.

In January, the band released “Sons of the System,” a precise, punishing and shockingly melodic piece of staccato, mechanized Orwellian art, which is also the band’s first album in three years.

In addition to a summer of playing festivals in Europe, the band will travel behind the bamboo curtain for three shows in Beijing China in early May. Plans for a U.S. tour are also in the works.

Over the years, the band has garnered accolades from Meshuggah and Metallica’s Rob Trujillo. Vocalist Guillaume Bideau recently answered a few e-mail questions from Noise Pollution about the genesis of “Sons of the System,” the three year hiatus and the band’s dystopian worldview.

There was about a three-year gap between “Passenger” and “Sons of the System.” What was happening with the band in the time between albums? Was there a deliberate decision by the band to step back after “Passenger” and not try to rush a new album?

Guillaume Bideau: We’ve been touring so much for Passenger that we wanted to take a small break to record a new album. Of course 3 years is pretty much a lot but we had to take this time to be ready to give the best out of us once again.. We also had to grab back the musical inspiration because we were really dried out after so much intensive touring.. It took some times but we are today really proud of this new album so we think this break we took was a benefit for the integrity of the band.

This is your second album with the band. How do you and (guitarist and songwriter) Mircea (Eftemie) work together on lyrics and lyrical concepts?

GB: We never write lyrics together but when he submits me some lyrics I decide if I use / sing them or not. Then if I use them I do minor changes and that’s it. I try to fully respect the theme of the thing he tried to express. But it’s about our own vision of the world. The system…

Personally I describe the society as it is today through my eyes and own sensibility. But most of the times in a very subjective way. I like people to be able to suggest different visions of the lyrics I write. Mircea does pretty much the same in a less subjective way but this is more his vision of the future in 50 or 100 years for example. It’s about some revolt against a greater evil in a way.

Your vocal style calls for both harsh roars and soaring melodies. Is it difficult to perform such versatile songs live?

GB: Sometimes it’s not that easy of course, especially when you have more than 10 gigs in a row without a single day off. It happened and it was hard.

The life on the road is special. Both cool and stressful. But I like it this way. It not that easy to alternate clean vocals and screams but it’s my job so I try to do it as good as I can. Some days are better than others but I don’t complain.
You worked again with Tue Madsen. How does Tue influence the band’s sound? What does Tue bring to the process?

GB: Tue is pretty much the 6th member of the band. He’s been more or less with the band on every albums so he’s the one who knows Mnemic the best. Plus we wanted to experiment way more different things for Sons of the system. But he didn’t really influenced our sound. We explained to him what we wanted and then we shared opinions until we found a common sound direction – a sound direction where he and us would be 100% satisfied.

The choruses on “Sons of the System” are very melodic, which is quite a contrast to the brutality of the verses and music. Was that juxtaposition deliberate? What has been the reaction of fans?

GB: We tried to give this album a lot of relief and this contrast between aggressivity and melody was totally deliberate for me. Music is relief and music is all about emotion contrasting. I don’t really know what the fans think about it and personally I don’t really care. As long as I’m proud of our work it’s all that matters.

Is there a “concept” or theme for the album? It’s not a concept album in the traditional sense, but are there themes that tie the songs together?

GB: As you say, this album is not as conceptual as the previous albums could have been. We are different persons today and we write about more personal things. Personally I describe the society as it is today through my eyes and own sensibility. But most of the times in a very subjective way.

I like people to be able to suggest different visions of the lyrics I write. Mircea does pretty much the same in a less subjective way but this is more his vision of the future in 50 or 100 years for example. It’s about some revolt against a greater evil in a way.

What are the band’s touring plans for the coming year? Also, are you planning a U.S. tour?

GB: Yes, the U.S. is in our plans but we wait for a good band to tour with out there. We just came back from Russia and it was great times once again.. Then we’ll go to Spain, China and other cool countries. We really love playing our new songs live on stage so we hope to visit as many countries as possible once again to give the fans as much pleasure as we can!

For songs from Mnemic’s “Sons of the System” and other albums, visit the band’s MySpace page here.

Interview: Ihsahn discusses new solo album, his past with Emperor and black metal

Former Emperor frontman Ihsahn was never afraid of taking musical risks.

At a time when the early Norwegian black metal movement was still lo-fi and jagged-edged, Ihsahn led Emperor into a fuller sound, paring classical arrangements, strings and – occasionally – clean vocals with the band’s blistering black metal. The music was both genre defining and genre defying and the albums “In The Nightside Eclipse” and “Anthems the to Welkin at Dusk” are still considered black metal classics.

However, all things end and Emperor is no more. But Ihsahn has continued to push his creative boundaries through the Peccatum project and through his solo albums. Ihsahn’s most recent album, “After,” is a progressive giant that blends elements with black metal with hints of classic rock and the chaos of free jazz.

It’s challenging music – and while “After” may turn off black metal purists, Ihsahn is unapologetic about wanting to reach beyond the confines of the genre he helped found.

“While of course I appreciate that people are interested in and like my music, I don’t consider that when making albums,” Ihsahn said during a recent phone interview to promote “After.” “Metal in general was never about that. We’re still in a genre where a majority of the fans want to have the album artwork. It’s album music, not single music.

“I don’t think I would honor that very well if I tried to please the audience,” Ihsahn said. “The only way I can honor that is to make the best music I can.”

Ihsahn co-founded Emperor in the early 1990s and the band had a contract with Candlelight Records by the time Ihsahn was 16. “In The Nightside Eclipse” and “Anthems to the Welkin at Dusk” were epics that showed the how free from musical convention black metal could be.

Today, Ihsahn finds it ironic that many black metal bands limit themselves to a painfully strict black metal formula.

“If you listen to (early) Emperor or Darkthrone or Mayhem, they don’t sound the same. There is very clear individuality between the bands. But when (the scene became) big enough, there were copies of copies of copies.

“For me, it’s almost a paradox,” Ihsahn said. “It seems there’s a lot of rules of what black metal can or can’t be. But, to me, even the term ‘black metal’ means not giving a sh*t … it’s the individual against the mainstream. At the moment you even consider having rules … at that moment, it’s not black metal.”

“After” is not confined by musical rules. Ihsahn does reference black metal – particularly on the bruising “A Grave Inversed.” But Ihshan pulls also from prog rock, folk and free jazz. As part of the process, Ihsahn collaborated with Jørgen Munkeby, saxophonist with the Norwegian avant garde jazz ensemble Shining, to solo on “Grave” and provide melodies for several of the tracks.

“I always find it hard to (determine) what musical influences I had for certain albums and projects,” he said. The songs on “After” are “a mix of everything I’ve heard in my years,” he said. Much of the inspiration was not musical.

“My main (inspiration) for this album has been visuals and pictures I’ve had on my lap top,” he said.

“After” is Ihsahn’s third solo album, following 2006′s “The Adversary” and “AngL” in 2008. Considering the aggression of the previous two albums, “After” might be unexpected, Ihsahn said.

“Something people probably grab onto in the album is the sax,” Ihsahn said. “… It was a bit risky. I really liked the sound of the sax but I had no real reference in recording the sound of the sax.”

The first introduction of the saxophone on “A Grave Inversed” might be startling for some, Ihsahn said. “On the initial listen for people, there might be some shock effect, especially because it’s included on the most brutal song on the album,” he said.

Ihsahn said he did not worry the saxophone would seem out of place in the songs. “I kind of guessed it would fit quite smoothly. I was never my intent to use it for shock effect. I’ve used synth strings before … and I wanted to blend it that way.”

“… When starting the process of making the three solo albums, with the first I had a go at genres I hadn’t experienced before,” he said. “For the second album, I tried to focus in on what became my solo style. With this album, I’ve become more comfortable with my solo effort.

“Where “AngL” and “The Adversary” were full of conflict, (“After”) is more about the inspirations that lie underneath,” Ihsahn said. “They’re harder to pinpoint, but they’re always there … If I did the third album the same as “The Adversary” and “AngL,” I’d feel I’d paint the project into a corner.”

In creating his solo style, Ihsahn said he had to reconcile with his past with Emperor, he said.

“I will always kind of live in the shadow of my own creation,” Ihshan said. “Emperor lives a life of its own now, but I don’t really care. I didn’t try to escape my past with Emperor … Those parts of me (that did) the Emperor albums are part of me today.”

While the style Ihsahn created for Emperor will always be a part of his music, Ihsahn said he does not simply want to copy the work of the past.

“There are so many people who wish for that,” Ihsahn said of fans who want Emperor to reunite for a new album. “But would they really want one? Would they want an album that would make us a lot of money (by copying previous Emperor albums)? … If we did that, it would be turning everything I did in the past into a lie.”

For now, Ihsahn is preparing for live shows and festivals in Europe. A U.S. tour is not forthcoming, considering the difficulties to getting visas to the United States, he said.

While Ihsahn is anxious to begin work on new material, he said he does not know what musical direction he will take next.

“I don’t know what the fourth album will be,” he said. “… If anything, I’m as black metal as I ever was, because I (keep) doing whatever the hell I want.”