ACCEPT could have hardly chosen a more fitting title for their new upcoming masterpiece – “Too Mean To Die”. First a virus interrupted the recording process of their 16th studio album back in spring 2020, and now the same rotten thing has caused the release to be postponed by two weeks, to 29.01.21.
However, ACCEPT will not be knocked down by these setbacks. As a consolation for fans and to shorten the waiting time for the complete album, the band will release a very special treat on Jan 15th: their third single ‘Zombie Apocalypse’.
Hard-hitting melodies – a 5-minute classic ACCEPT treat: dynamic, unshakeable, mega loud! There’s no doubt about it: ‘Zombie Apocalypse’ makes you want MORE and provides a perfect taster of the new album.
The single contains a special hint about a widespread disease of our time – and rest assured it’s not Corona…
Singer Mark Tornillo explains: “They’re everywhere, they can’t put them (mobile phones) down. They can’t keep them charged; they can’t take their eyes off the screen! It’s a zombie apocalypse!”
Watch the visualizer for ‘Zombie Apocalypse’ here:
Most of the limited vinyl formats of the album “Too Mean To Die”, which will be released on 29.1.2021, are already sold out! Therefore, Nuclear Blast has decided to release another version in cooperation with ACCEPT‘s partner Spotify: Double vinyl in white strictly limited to 300 copies.
Unfortunately, with a heavy heart we have to postpone the release of the new ACCEPT album “Too Mean To Die” from January 15 to January 29, 2021. Due to a COVID-19 related pressing plant closure the finished product has been massively delayed so that the planned release on Jan. 15, 2021 cannot be kept. We are very sorry about this and we hope that all ACCEPT fans are understanding of this very unfortunate situation and continue to support the band. It has been over three years since the last ACCEPT album, so we hope you can wait another two weeks for the new masterpiece.
In order to shorten the waiting time for their fans, the band has decided to release their video for the track ‘Zombie Apocalypse’ together with a digital single on January 15, 2021.
‘Zombie Apocalypse’ is a classic ACCEPT cracker: dynamic and unwavering, turned up to eleven! Relentless and hard, it strikes the same tone as „Too Mean To Die” in the band’s signature style.
The 3rd single will again be accompanied with a wink – this time about one of our most current diseases – and be assured it’s not Corona:
Marc Tornillo quotes: Cell phone zombies – they are everywhere, they can’t put them down, they can’t keep them charged, they can’t look away! It’s a Zombie Apocalypse! Who doesn’t feel caught in this?!”
There will be an official video for the track – here a first sneak peak:
The album is available on CD, Cassette, 2-LP Vinyl in 8 colors plus as ltd. Edition Delux Box Set containing a CD Digipack, special colored 2-LP with a Pop-Out-Snake, cover patch and a signed autograph by the band as well as digital on all platforms. Pre-order/pre-save here: http://nblast.de/Accept-TooMeanToDie
Jimmy Kay and Alan Dixon from Canada’s The Metal Voice recently spoke to Accept’s co-founder and guitarist Wolf Hoffmann about the bands upcoming studio album ‘Too Mean to Die’ which will be released January 15 2021 via Nuclear Blast Records.
During the chat Hoffmann also gave his thoughts on the departure of Peter Baltes, the influence of Eddie Van Halen and revisited the legacy of Accept’s classic albums Restless and Wild and Balls to the Wall
When asked about the making and style of new Accept studio album ‘Too Mean to die’ “Brand new songs in the traditional form of Accept and better than ever. It’s got a whole bunch of stuff on it which surprised a lot of the people. I have heard comments from people that say it reminds them a little bit of the Blood of the Nations album as far as the vibe is concerned. Another comment I got was there is a lot of surprising variety on this album. When we started recording and writing the songs we never had a goal or a plan of what we are trying to achieve that we must do this or do that, we just basically followed where the songs took us and that kind of shaped the album in the end. “
What were the pros and cons of releasing an album during a pandemic “Ask me again in three months and I will tell you of how good of an idea it was (laughs). We don”t know when everything is going to go back to normal, if ever, so how long do you postpone everything? Is it really such a good idea to let the album just sit there in the archives until day X which may or not be anytime soon or is it better to give the fans now so they can at least enjoy the music and when the day comes we will see each other on tour again. In a weird way this might actually help album sales because people don’t have to buy concert tickets because they can’t, maybe more people will buy the album ? “
When asked about the absence of long time bassist Peter Baltes “It was a little strange for me I was kind of heartbroken and sad when it happened but at the end of the day what are you going to do, you have to keep on moving, the show must go on. We got a great new guy on bass his name is Mark Motnik and he actually contributed quite a bit to this album, songwriting wise which really surprised me in a good way. I miss Peter but it has been two years and the ship rolls on what can you do.
When asked if Eddie Van Halen influenced by his guitar playing “At the end of the day he influenced everybody, anyone who heard him was blown away. He opened up a whole new chapter for every guitar player but I personally was never really influenced by him I was more drawn to Ritchie Blackmore and Uli Jon Roth and other players with a little more of the classical European style of playing.”
ACCEPT’s lineup has also been expanded with the addition of a third guitarist, Philip Shouse, who originally filled in for Uwe Lulis during last year’s “Symphonic Terror” tour, before being asked to join the band permanently.
“Too Mean To Die” was recorded in Nashville, Tennessee with British producer Andy Sneap (JUDAS PRIEST, MEGADETH), who has been responsible for the magnificent studio sound of ACCEPT since 2010.
ACCEPT‘s new album ‘Too Mean To Die’ will be out soon on January 15th, 2021. In the meantime, the band has a special holiday surprise for their fans.
From today, December 1st, until December 24th, you will find snippets of all unreleased tracks from the new album, as well as many other surprises, on the ACCEPT Christmas calendar at: http://accepttoomeantodie.com/
During these difficult times, there is always some positivity to be found when it comes to music. So, we are very lucky that metal giants ACCEPT were not going to let a pandemic stop them and have created their forthcoming 16th studio album “Too Mean To Die” over this last year! The album is set for release on 15th January 2021 via Nuclear Blast.
Metal Shock Finland Senior Manager Alison Booth, recently caught up with ACCEPT mastermind and guitar legend Wolf Hoffmann, who was a guest on her radio show Blackdiamond’s Metal Mayhem at TotalRock. The whole show can be heard at this location. Of course the new album was discussed, plus lots more! You can hear the chat on the audio player below, along with a few excerpts to read:
Discussing the recording of the album, Wolf explained:
“Yeah it’s crazy, we couldn’t finish. We had about half of it recorded and we all went back home to regroup and write the rest of the materialand we wanted to meet again later in the year and all of a sudden the countries were closing down and nobody could come or leave. I mean, we could travel within the U.S. but Andy couldn’t come back. So we had no choice but to try to find a remote solution and after lots of trial and error, we found a solution that seemed to work technicallyquite well. Unfortunately, my internet connection broke down the whole time. But we made it work in the end and when the connection was stable, it worked surprisingly okay. You know, it’s not your first choice, but it worked. It was almost like a Zoom call, it’s kind of okay. It’s not perfect, but it’s still better than nothing if it gets the job done.But you would still want to be in the same room with people you talk to basically.
Wolf discussed how the pandemic has affected ACCEPT:
“Tell me about it, it’s been terrible for us. We had all of last summer’s festivals cancelled and pushed back to 2021. So everything was pushed back to next year for the festivals and then our headline tour was to coincide with the release of the album in January, but that won’t happen. It’s all been pushed back one complete year to 2022. Yeah it’s a long time, so we have to wait and see how things are going.
A lot of bands have been postponing their releases, but we decided that it’s probably not a bad idea to just go ahead and release it now, give the fans at least something to listen to. I’m sure we can all meet again basically, but it serves nobody’s interest if we just wait with the release until we can tour again, because who knows when that is.“
Talking about the new songs:
“‘Symphony Of Pain’ was one of the songs that was actually written first. I had that sort of more or less finished, just sitting there waiting to be performed. And then one of the other earlier songs I did was ‘Undertaker’ which was based on some lyrics Mark wrote. Mark gave me these lyrics and he wrote ’em sort of like a poem without any music in mind, just a bunch of words about an undertaker. I thought it’s kind of a cool subject title and I wrote the music sort of to fit the lyrics and you know, with that little intro it turned out quite a little eery and spooky, which kinda fits the subject obviously and turned out alright.
It’s nice to see people’s reaction. But I’m getting different reactions from journalists and big fans all over the board. Some people like the more moderate songs like ‘Undertaker’ and ‘Overnight Sensation’ and then other people go for the kill basically, with ‘Zombie Apocalypse’ and ‘Too Mean To Die’ – the more in your face metal kinda riffs and songs.“
Wolf talked about the changes in the band:
“Yeah it’s crazy – we lost one guy but gained two new guys, two for one (laughs). I mean with Peter, it’s just sad. It just killed me at the time but I’m sort of over it now, because it’s just after all these forty years, it was a sad departure. But I have to respect it and I mean, people move onand he made the decision. He no longer wanted to be in the band and what can I do? I just move on and move forward. I wouldn’t say Martin stepped right in his footsteps, that would be ridiculous because hey, I played with Peter for forty years. But Martin really is doing his best and he’s doing a tremendous job filling in, he’s great. He even contributed a lot to the songwriting, which took me completely by surprise. He wrote some great songs for this album and that was a blessing, he’s awesome. I really didn’t want the album to be all mine, mine, mine – I didn’t want it to be like a solo album, so I welcomed input from everybody and Martin was the guy who really stepped forward and delivered some cool stuff.“
Wediscovered what a great player, nice guy and easy going and perfect fit for the band Phil is. You know, when we toured with him on this orchestra tour last year, Headbanger’s Symphony, Symphonic Terror tour and we found out what a great guy he is. We basically didn’t want to let him go after this tour, it’s as simple as that. And we decided, why not have three guitar players? We did some shows together and it worked brilliantly. I gotta say I was not one hundred percent sure it would be as good as it is, but I was actually pleasantly surprised how well it sounds and how well it looks and how well it works on stage. It’s a good camaraderie in the band and yeah, it’s just one more guy, awesome! And he plays a lot of lead on the album too, so we deliberately made enough space for him to be on the album and especially with that in mind for live shows. We gave him enough space to play leads and with trading licks and we do a lot of twin leads together – so there’s a lot of room for Phil on this album.“
In uncertain times like these you can rely on ACCEPT to deliver the goods – they will not let anything or anyone get them down, not even a virus.
Metal legends ACCEPT prove this definitively with brand new track “Too Mean To Die”! Released as an advance single today, it is intended both as a gift to fans and to wet the appetite for their full-length masterpiece, their 16th studio album ‘Too Mean To Die’, which will be released on January 15th 2021 via Nuclear Blast.
“Too Mean To Die” is a track full of unrestrained power and pure energy, certain to rip you out of all lethargy and any corona depression, no sooner than the first note hits. The lyric video for the new single can be found here:
ACCEPT mastermind Wolf Hoffmann explains: “We decided to not let ourselves be overly influenced by current events. Fans will get a hard, direct and uncompromising metal album, but of course accompanied with a wink: we are too mean to die! Weeds do not go away! ACCEPT do not let themselves get down!”
That’s exactly how the title track comes across: driving, uncompromising, turned up to twelve! With a feeling of invincibility – “Too Mean To Die”!!
ACCEPT fans had the unique opportunity to reveal the new cover upfront, by streaming the “The Undertaker” on SPOTIFY – due to the great response the contest will continue for “Too Mean To Die“ with a lot of new prices and goodies – check out: http://accepttoomeantodie.com/
