Alan Dixon from Canada’s The Metal Voice spoke to Steve ‘Lips’ Kudlow from Canada’s ANVIL in Montreal Quebec Canada on April 28, 2017.
Watch the interview here:
Lips goes in detail about the filming and coincidences of the making of the documentary The Story of Anvil in 2006.
When asked about the status of a follow-up Anvil documentary
“There has been talk and there has been filming but what’s going to happen, it’s just like the music business, you can write songs it doesn’t mean your making a record, it’s really the same thing. Who knows, let’s hope so. Is it going to make any difference to me personally? No, as far as I’m concerned the job is done, I’m not doing deliveries anymore. I’m in Anvil full time, I’m making a living. I got what I wanted. In essence I got the success I was looking for. All I wanted to do was make a living from my band . No we are not AC/DC and if you expected Anvil to be as big as AC/DC your on glue.”
When asked how fame has changed the band since the documentary
“The things that come with fame are actually extraordinary people want to feel like they want to have an affect on you or they want to be part of it. There is a certain undertone of negativity. Somebody gets on Facebook, finds out who my wife is and writes a letter to my wife. telling her I am having an affair with somebody and it’s like what the hell’s that about? As it turns out it was some guy in a support band who was trying to get a gig and couldn’t get the gig and got pissed off at me so he goes and writes my wife saying I am having an affair. Because of fame stuff happens like that I didn’t do anything, I don’t know what I did to deserve it but somebody felt I deserved some kind of trouble, that’s is just one example.”
“The positive thing that has happened is I don’t have to go back to work and that I am actually making enough money on the tours to not go to work. We have done more shows in the last 5-7 years than we have in our entire career. It is the most popular we have ever been is now. Our audience has expanded mostly to young kids a new generation which is a big deal for an older band.”
When asked about issues in regards to past bassists
“The new guy Chris Robertson has been with us for 4 years, we have been the most happy we have ever been. I think that the band is at the best shape it has ever been. no attitude problem. we have had situation with two bass players with attitude problem feeling that they are entitled. You get a guy joining our band and were selling promo pictures that we sign and he goes where is my money? I go wait a minute what are you doing to contribute to this did you pay for the photography, did you pay for the production of it? I’m making you famous, why are you asking me for money? That’s attitude. That’s entitlement.”
“Anvil Is Anvil” last album, which came out in February 2016 worldwide via SPV/Steamhammer.
Jimmy Kay and Alan Dixon from Canada’s The Metal Voice spoke to Queensryche singer Todd LaTorre on a recent live stream. Todd told The Metal Voice about, how he got into the band, the directions of the new album, news about his upcoming solo album, a Queensryche Live Album, participating in the Reaper All Stars relief for Steve Grimmett and answered fan questions.
Watch the interview here:
When asked about where Queensrych is in the writing process of their new album (44:00)
“Right now we have around 15 songs not all of them are completed there are many that are. We just worked on arrangements. Right now we are in the tentative recording timeline is to get in the studio for September 2017, it was suppose to be March. As far as direction goes it’s still premature to answer that, we have a song that Eddie Jackson wrote and its a total Beatlesish, it’s a really cool song it’s not a heavy song. I would say the stuff that’s on there so far I think has more upbeat, more driving, faster tempo songs. I think Condition Human in Hindsight lacks that, it could have used a couple more faster songs. Out of all of the ideas there is more odd time signatures, a little more progressive. In some aspects there is definitely some Rage For Order reminiscent sounding songs. Once we get into full pre-production with Chris Harris then I will have a better answer for you. ”
When asked about Details on a Todd Latorre Solo Album 1:06.00 (Todd Plays a snippet of a rough demo at 1:08)
“I have a life long friend names Craig Blackwell (did the mixing on the Metal Church Fake Healer duet), we played in bands together. I would says musically it is probably like Fight meets, meets Pantera, meets Black Label Society. It’s definitely got that southern power groove but has thrash elements. Then vocally I’m singing a lot more chest voice, I’ve got some brutal gutter vocals on it. The album will be done on Rat Pack records (Todd Plays Song) that;s has got gutter vocals but will open up with more high Halford like singing, gritty. The original plan was to have it put out this year but looks more like a middle next year. Brutal more Thrash but the vocals more power metal operatic, very aggressive. ”
When asked about participating on the Reaper All Stars relief song for Steve Grimmett or Grim Reaper (1:17)
“Rock you to Hell, it had that classic rocking groove. It used to come on all the time this video. I always found myself stopping and watching the video and song and I always loved it and loved Steve’s voice. I was 14-15 years old and it left an impression on me, a good one and you fast forward to now I’m 43, these circumstances come to be and you go like wow I’m being asked to be part of something to benefit and help the singer that when I was a 14 year old kid I watched him on my TV. I looked up to these people. I found out he had his leg amputated. I was honoured to do anything on it I don’t care if its signing background vocals. I hope to get to met Steve Grimmett in person one day, with gratitude and shake his hand and thank him for all of the decades of music and still out there doing it
When asked if they will be doing a live record with Queensryche (1:36)
After the next studio album we will put effort to do a live album
QUEENSRŸCHE has tapped Chris “Zeuss” Harris to produce the band’s new album, for Century Media. The CD is being recorded at Uberbeatz Studio in Washington.
Jimmy Kay from Canada’s The Metal Voice recently spoke to former SAMSON/IRON MAIDEN drummer Barry Graham Purkis aka THUNDERSTICK about the early years in NWOBHM band SAMSON with Bruce Dickinson on vocals (IRON MAIDEN). Thunderstick also spoke about a new book and new album called ‘Something Wicked This Way Comes’
Watch the interview here:
When asked how Bruce Dickinson first joined Samson (Prior to Iron Maiden)
“Samson had been playing as a three piece and we had been approached by then CBS record company and they were looking at signing a hard rock band and they had their eyes on us. They had told our management we would stand a better chance at getting a big record deal if we had a singer up front.”
“We just finished touring o support the debut album ‘Survivors’ and we went down to this pub and there was a pub band playing and sure enough it was Bruce singing. Paul Samson and I looked at each other and said this guy is really good singer. Part of Bruce’s stage show was that he would start picking holes (making fun of) in the audience and having jokes at the audiences all done in a lighthearted way. At this particular gig the only place Bruce could use as a dressing room was the men’s toilet. Bruce was doing a costume changes in the toilet, so we went into the toilet after Bruce and he thought because he was picking holes at me (making fun of ), he thought we went there to beat him up. We got talking, and we said would you mind joining our band and he said I cant I want to finish my history degree. So what he did was when we had those three piece gigs he would come out and join us just for the encore and that was it. As soon as he joined the band for real we started recording. He had a lot of material, we had a lot of material, we joined forces and that is what became of Samson’s second album ‘Head On’.”
When asked what Bruce had the same business smarts back then with Samson as he has today in Iron Maiden
“Bruce had a zest for life. He was hyper all the time and he thought rather than have an agency to book our gigs, he could get on the phone and book all the gigs himself. Bruce just sat there in the offices of our management, got on the phone and booked a tour.”
When asked how he helped Bruce Dickinson find his voice in Samson
“His voice was very juvenile in the early days. Bruce had never recorded an album before. I took a lot of the production credit, I sat there with our sound engineer during HEAD ON. we did all his vocal tracks and he was finding his own voice.”
“Bruce loved Ian Gillan, first time he met Ian Gillan we were recording our album in studio doing some overdubs and Ian Gillan came in and came into the control room. Bruce then ran out to the toilet. Gillan said to us you better go get your singer cause the last time I saw or heard him he was in the toilet farting up. That was due to the nerves of meeting his all time hero Ian Gillan.”
When asked how Samson and Iron Maiden toured together
“It was because of me that Iron Maiden came out on the Heavy Metal Crusade tour package. Our management were the ones responsible for putting this package together, they said let’s put a tour together and who can support us. I said a band I used to be in Iron Maiden they are doing the circuit again with new members lets have them on the tour. I was the one who suggested it, it was Angel Witch, Iron Maiden and Samson.”
When asked about the success of Samson and the NWOBHM
“It was big at one point I was the focal point for the NWOBHM because there was a magazine called SOUNDS and they put me (Thunderstick) on the front cover. Inside there was a huge two page spread on one night of the Heavy Metal Crusade with all three bands and they called it the NEW WAVE OF BRITISH HEAVY METAL that was the first time they used that phrase and I was the focal point for that. We had a lot of success but did not have the right management we lost ground.”
When asked if he had any demos, rehearsal tapes from the days of Samson with Bruce Dickinson that have not been released
“Yes, loads and loads. We used to record everything with Samson, rehearsals, pre-production, arrangements yeah I got loads of stuff. I even got Bruce Dickinson in the toilet, we stuck a mic up in the toilet we thought it would be a good idea.”
On why Thunderstick quit Samson
“Paul Samson was starting to get fed up of me (Thudnerstick) getting all the press all the time because the press loved the image. Paul said he wanted to be treated seriously as a band. Paul wanted to wear street clothes and I left because I wanted to take the theatrics a bit further.”
On Thundersticks new album and book
I was keeping a day to day diary of my experiences in Iron Maiden and Samson days, so I am able to pull on that information and I intend to do a book this year. Then I have new album so I am looking forward to that, Thunderstick the band will be all new members fronted by a female vocalist.”
In Part 1 with The Metal Voice
Thunderstick spoke about the holy grail 1977 Iron Maiden PRE-Soundhouse rehearsal tapes which featured many of the songs on the first Iron Maiden album as well as two songs off Iron maiden’s Killer albums
Jimmy Kay from Canada’s The Metal Voice recently spoke with Jeff Waters guitarist/vocalist of legendary Canadian Thrash Metal band ANNIHILATOR.
Watch interview here:
When asked about the release date and the musical direction of their new album the follow-up to Suicide Society
“I am guessing late October 2017 is going to be the release date that is what we have been talking about with the label. I’ll have the album finished before the summer Canadian tour. I just finished my first song on vocals this afternoon should come out in October 2017, if everything works fine should go out on a huge tour of Europe afterwards. New record started out writing and recording it right after the 70,000 tons Metal Cruise that we did in February 2017 and it was off three days writing. For the vocals, initially the only plan I had was ok you got to stop doing singing the Hetfield, Mustiane, Ozzy singing style cause I had too much of that style of singing on the last record. It was too much of a fan boy. It was like 65% fan boy, 35% Waters, so now I sort of leveled it off to 75% me. I wanted to do this new record and try to put more importance on the vocals but not with layering with four voices and fixing the shitty notes. I meant more like one track get back to what I did on albums like ‘King of the Kill’ and ‘Refresh the Demon’, get back to more that style. I just wanted to be able to do that once and if things don’t work out, maybe I will consider someone else as a vocalist, that is always a possibility.”
“I am not going to worry about commercial catchy choruses on this album. Forget the formula’s I have been leaning towards the last ten albums or more, just wanted to write something messed up that doesn’t make sense to do. What ended up happening is, the music started sounding like the first two records (Alice in Hell, Never Neverland). I also brought in another producer, writer, co-writer of the music and I sat there with Rich Hinks (producer) from the UK, he is actually our bass player for the last year. There was something about him that I knew after I met him and spent a year on the road with him I realized this is the guy I want to come in and kick my butt, he knows the band and he knows music and studio as well me but he knows a different way. ”
When asked why it took so long to come back to Canada and do a full tour
“1989 was our first studio album and until 1993 we got to tour the States and Canada and after that then the scene pretty much tanked for most metal stuff 92-93 and I was lucky enough that Europe and Japan and eventually South America just got really big for Annihilator and that kept us going since then. When I tried to come back to Canada when promoters and clubs were starting up again and metal was getting some publicity in the early 2000’s. By the time I tried to get back in, the answers were pretty clear, it was like well you guys were never really big here and it’s not like a big reunion and you won’t let us screw you over with a terrible contracts so we would kind of like to put our money into some younger bands to have a new twist on things. So I was like oh well that sucks and I just stayed over seas and everywhere else and had a good time and things are going fantastic. Basically it came to the point where screw it I don’t need a tour agency or a record company here, I can just call all the club owners up and the in-house booking people and say who we are and we would like to do a tour and I was pretty surprised at how easy that was by passing the agencies and the people you are suppose to need to do a tour. I guess people figured out well at least Annihilator are good for one good Canadian tour cause people hadn’t seen us for so long they want they want to go check it out.”
When asked if he would consider finding a new singer for Annihilator for the future
“The only other singer I would hire would be if Stu Block defects from Iced Earth or if Rob Halford wanted to join but I don’t think any of those are going to happen.”
When asked about participating in a Big 4-6 Canadian Thrash festival and his thoughts on who would be included
“Weeks and weeks ago I actually tried to put together a Big 6 kind of vibe for Canada, Razor, Anvil, Exciter, Annihilator, Piledriver, Voivod and I talked to most of them and most of them were in and wanted to do it. Then Anvil had a tour at the time and another band same thing and I sort gave up on it for now but I think it would be fun to do like Canada’s Big 6 vibe because as small as a population we sure have an original style for bands that came out of here cause we are sandwiched between the UK and the USA, we get the best of both worlds.”
When asked about saying no to joining Megadeth, his relationship with Dave Mustaine and any future collaboration
The first contact I had with Dave Mustaine wasin 1989 where we were on tour with Testament in the States, Chuck Billy comes into my hotel room and says Jeff Mustaine’s on the phone. Dave was clearly by his own words was messed up back then. I was on booze at the time. Mustaine essentially said I got a couple of guitarist I want to talk to, I like your Alice in Hell Album ( I was blown away) I had to turn him down as I just signed with Roadrunner Records for a couple of albums and the album had just exploded, my manager said no you cant do it. So I had to tell Mustiane no. But then after a while years later 2004-2005, when Mustaine was doing a record with Chris Poland he called up and said do you want to come and do some solos, can you come down tomorrow and then he called back and said well no I worked it out with Chris. Shortly after that he got the Drover brother in, we were talking about writing together, it was all kind of back and forth he was going to play on Annihilators METAL album in 2007. But I see him over the years, we have diner and I am friends with David Elefson and I asked Dave to ask Mustiane if we could write just one song together, which would be really cool, I think that would be something fantastic.”
When asked about being nominated for a Canadian Juno Award (Like American Grammy)
It was fun and it was weird to be nominated because we never really been part of the industry here. Canada has a weird way of not generally not supporting artists that go outside of there own country to sign their deals. When you go outsider your country like we did sign to New York Roadrunner Records, its kind of like a black listing in a sense and the only way it works out for you in Canada if you become so big or commercial or radio friendly everywhere else they have to recognize you here they have no choice. So it was just easy for them to just leave us out of their history.”
Annihilator tour will see the band kick off their first date in Victoria, BC on June 13th and travel east wrapping up the tour in Cornwall. Annihilator tour to return to Canadian soil for over 20 years.The Canadian shows will also included the 2014 Canadian Wacken champions thrashers Mutank
On January 27, 2017, ANNIHILATOR released “Triple Threat”, a three-disc collection.
“Suicide Society” was released in September 2015 via UDR Music.
Tour dates:
June
13 – Victoria, BC – Distrikt Nightclub
16 – Calgary, AB – Dickens Pub
17 – Edmonton, AB – Starlite Room
18 – Saskatoon, SK – Saskatoon Event Center
19 – Regina, SK – The Exchange
20 – Winnipeg, MB – Park Theater
23 – Waterloo, ON – Maxwells
24 – Toronto, ON – The Opera House
26 – Ottawa, ON – The Brass Monkey
28 – Quebec City, QC – L’Anti
29 – Montreal, QC – Café Campus
30 – Cornwall, ON – The House
Jimmy Kay From Canada’s The Metal Voice caught up with Mille Petrozza vocalist guitarist of KREATOR in Montreal Quebec Canada on April 12 2017. Mille Spoke about his influences, how his music is a reflection of the world war events,responds to fan questions and Teutonic German 4 in Canada.
Watch the interview here:
In regards to his influences, in Brutal, Melody and Thrash
Anything from the Beatles to Kate Bush, I listen to everything all kinds of music. I don’t really think about it, when i write an album it’s very spontaneous. I absorb a lot of music, I try not to sound like anyone else.
On how his music is a reflection of the world war events
I write about stuff that moves me on the inside , once my lyrics are done i can see it mirroring reality. A lot of artist write about personnel stuff, i do write personnel stuff but its very hidden. I avoid current events to pop up in my lyrics saying names or mentioning places or attacking certain people, I try to keep it more general and maybe that’s why we could take Gods of violence as the soundtrack to the Syrian war, whereas as you could have taken Phantom Antichrist as the soundtrack of whatever was going on then. All my lyrics are reflective of stuff that is actually happening
When asked what one album he would take on a desert Island, if he could only pick just one
Iron Maiden, Killers
When asked if the 4 German Teutonic bands will ever come to Canada on tour
Its not up to me, that would be great wouldn’t it, I would be into it
Jimmy Kay and Alan Dixon from Canada’s The Metal Voice recently spoke to Rock Author Martin Popoff about his new book, ‘Hit the Lights’ The Birth Of Thrash the first of a three part book series on Thrash Metal.
Watch the interview here:
Popoff told The Metal Voice, “The main questions answered in this book is who invented thrash? This book starts in the late 70’s it gives some key touchstone points from the New Wave of British Heavy Metal that Thrash guys had really appreciated and that sound somewhat like thrash back then. But as we go on there is a little bit of the punk touchstones as well and then hard core as you get into 81-82. Then things really heat up with essentially with Dave Mustaine and his Pre-Metallica band and James Hetfield and his Pre-Metallica band Leather Charm where they do the song Hit The Lights. A very important Thrash song, probably the first Thrash song, made in the Thrash environment and it also starts off with birth of Exodus. Before that Motorhead with Overkill which is one of the first double bass songs which is double bass all the way through plus a little bit of that Low-Fi recording on purpose idea, a gruff vocal on purpose and Motorhead is really the first band that had no mellow songs on their albums.”
Martin now brings us Hit the Lights: The Birth of Thrash, attacking heavy metal’s next wave of faster, heavier, angrier sounds, with a geographical shift in the axis to San Francisco and Los Angeles, with a bit of New York, Germany and Canada thrown in for good measure.
Come join Martin, along with dozens of his old school headbanging buddies (including multiple members from thrash’s big four and beyond), as they together tell the tale of thrash’s forging from the influence of punk, ‘70s metal and the NWOBHM. Venom, Anvil, Exciter, Raven, Exodus, Anthrax, Metallica… they’re all here and willing to explain candidly and at length how and why metal past the implosion of the NWOBHM suddenly found itself barreling down the tracks at breakneck speed.
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