 Okay, here we go We are live finally a little bit of a glitch a Little bit Chris impilatory What is going on my friend beautiful day morning? It's breakfast with metal voice for me in Los Angeles. So As we said It's brunch because here's lunch there. It's breakfast. So when you put them together you get Lupper Exactly Chris it's a pleasure to have you on the show Everybody out there where I was gonna be watching right now Just tell me if the audio is balanced well enough as we proceed I know we're running a little bit late We're having a couple of glitches on the stream, but seems that everything is running. Okay now Hey, man, the most important thing is make sure you have good visual because I got my Brian They have a queen shirt on today All right, so let me I just put out the album here I'm gonna put up the album. It's called wake the beast the impilatory anthology So that was released. Oh Boy now. It's been a few weeks, but in Canada. It's actually being released in the next few days So it kind of evens out, right? All right, tell me about this greatest hits why now Why have you decided to? To crank this one out and I should say it's for on global rock records And it probably was just released in Canada just like a day or two ago Yeah, I believe it was actually about a week ago September 30th United States of America and for all of continental Europe and then Canada has a different release date You know to be honest to me. I mean look it's been a long time coming We basically got the legal rights back to our masters and we always pledge that once we did that We would release the back catalog in all the countries that we never distributed our product So hence that was really how we initiated this. I mean we got the masters back at least legally And then we kind of put a plan together to figure out What are the songs that our fans over the over the years have kind of embraced? You know the songs that struck a struck a chord Resonated with you know the fans and so you know ultimately we spent probably about a month or two Just kind of digging into our disography kind of figure out What kind of music do we want to share with the world that has never heard of in Pelletary, right? And so we really you know sat down and discussed the fan favorites We even would go on to things like YouTube or you know kids would rip files and you know Maybe put up a song of ours on YouTube and we'd read the comments and you know It was pretty easy me once you do that you kind of get a sense of what people like or don't like for examples If you see you know the comments are like oh my god, this is the greatest band in the world Why aren't they bigger blah blah blah you probably figure I that's probably a good song Versus oh my god this band sucks. What does anybody see in them? It's like probably not the best song I'm seeing I would say like I did the count I looked at the track list and I would say it's about three songs Two to three songs in every album is that correct minus the last album. Yeah, that's that sounds about right Yeah, yeah, yeah, you have And it's I shouldn't mention it's a three CD set So it's just not like you're one CD You know it's three and so it's really got a lot. There's no bonus tracks on this, correct That's correct. Yeah. I'm the bonus track. Yeah, I mean, you know Realistically this is music that was never really accessible to many countries globally, right? And so and and you know, it's interesting because I think maybe the success we've had in places like Japan some places in continental Europe have kind of spilled over in the other countries and There seemed to be this this interest that was generated on the band and Unfortunately a lot of kids or you know the people that embraced our music were kind of forced to pay these outrageous egregious export or import prices, you know So really the whole idea behind this release is to get the music to them at a very reasonable price Yeah We should also also mentioned that global rock records has released the whole catalog or at least most of it Is that correct? That's correct Yeah, so we're not only getting the greatest hits accessible to North America and the rest of the world But we're also getting all the albums that like you mentioned, you know People don't have to pay 2999 to ship it from Japan to your home or you know through Amazon wherever the case may be so Which albums aren't so which which albums did you not get the license for? Well, obviously our our most recent records, which would be Venom the nature of the beast We're still signed so our record companies are still frontiers for Europe and North America We're still on JVC Victor entertainment for Japan or rather all of Asia So global rock is really doing our back catalog, but to be honest a lot of our fans I mean that's kind of like, you know their favorite stuff. So this is kind of exciting for us All right, so okay Explain the success of Japan. I've asked you this before okay There must have been a point where either a radio station started playing your non-stop Or maybe a combination of you and Graham working together off that first album full album That is what was the point where it just kind of Japan and Asia sort of just took off When we did the first Impellatory black ET We kind of established our sound. We kind of set the foundation of who Impellatory was sonically, right? We're borderline a thrash band with screaming vocals and like the big queen type choruses all the technical shredding guitar solos fast double bass drumming and That resonated really really well in Japan and even in Europe too I remember that that EP was really it got a lot of coverage a lot of press a lot of media gave us a lot of positive reviews But in Japan it kind of set it set the stage for what was coming it was kind of allowing us to come into a very competitive rock or metal market right with a really strong album and You know instantaneously, you know the Musicians embraced us fortunately, you know, we started getting you know the typical accolades of all, you know best musician best blah blah blah and so I think what happened was When we did stand in line Because we had this we had already established a really nice cult following around the world, right? With stand in line. I think this is what kind of put us over the top and and forgive me This is just my theory. It's not proven. It just kind of I have a theory too, but go ahead. Yeah, so I'll tell you truthfully what happened When we did stand in line remember I'm I guess they're throwing me in as like this, you know This guitar hero kid, right? But at the same time Graham Bonnet who at that time was still a legendary rock metal singer, right? He had he'd been the lead singer of rainbow, right and people don't realize especially younger kids rainbow were Passive, you know, I mean I even saw something with Bruce Dickinson of Iron Maiden talking about how he went and saw rainbow at Castle Donnington and Graham was the lead singer, right? And I remember I think even AC DC played before rainbow, right? So rainbow or the headliner it just kind of explains, you know, Graham's notoriety at least at that point in his success And so when I went into Japan with Graham when we did the stand in line record I think there were a couple things one they loved the song stand in line You know, it was just it was the right song at the right time for that particular market At the same time, there was a lot of curiosity of why did Graham Bonnet this legendary singer join in Pelletary? You know this this hardcore metal thrash type band, right? And so that was it and then and then this is kind of where I kind of feel like man Did I really deserve the success, you know getting branded this guitar hero and all that stuff? And I kind of thought you know, I think they gave us a free pass almost like a get out of jail Free card and this is what I mean by this Because Graham Bonnet had played with Richie Blackmore like from Deep Purple and Rainbow who was a legendary guitar player, right? Yep, he had played with Richie Blackmore then he played with Inge Malmsteen who was like the new, you know The new hero to all the musicians After Inge it was Steve Vai. Oh, and I'm sorry and there was also Michael Shanker Right legendary guitar player and then Graham joins in Pelletary So it throws me in with that groove and I used to scratch my hand go man Do I deserve this? You know, I mean these are all great players and they're putting me in that category so I think in Japan there was a tremendous amount of interest of Who is this in Pelletary at least outside of our cold? How can we spell this name first of all they're gonna say how do we spell his name second? Who is this guy? Who's this new kid on the block? Yeah, yeah, right sure plays a lot of notes Um, you know, it's I just you know, I think the culmination of the fact that that in Pelletary black EP Really started Oh, you froze This is the beauty of life Chris you froze Folks I'm just gonna put the album up as we wait for chris to unfreeze. I think he is frozen in time Uh And usually at this stage what happens chris. I'm not sure if you could hear me or not But I think would be best to log off And then log on again. It's probably a weekend or an internet connection that you have In the meantime, I think I'm going to read everybody's comments. So chris Has dropped off but we'll get him back All right, so I'm going to read your comments as I wait for chris to come back. Oh, I think chris is coming back now. Let's Let's bring him on admit Okay The voila And he's back Okay, now try this not try this It won't change look guys. So I was outside, you know hanging out at the pool and I had an iPad on and it just overheated You know what that's what iPhones do they overheat and they have a sensor for that. So, uh, it's okay My apologies and also for whatever this thing is on my phone It's okay, I could skate I could skate I was just kind of stretching the time Hey, dude, there's there's there's a reason why in Pelletary gets compared with spinal tap and here's one of the reasons Oh Don't say that. Don't say that. I love spinal tab, but you're not a spoof, you know Rob I'm going to read some comments because I know people were patiently waiting Rob Johnson sounds great I guess the audio balance guys if it's the audio balance is not great. Just tell me I'll adjust it John is just saying my copy arrived earlier this week. That's wake of the beast. So somebody there you go. Good jing Uh, Pedro saying I have my copy already in Pelletary fan. It's out in Canada receive my copy uh Mike is saying fantastic catalog should have been huge in america true. Okay So you're re-releasing these albums. You got this greatest. It's out there. Would it make sense? To just go out and play a couple of dates In the u.s. And canada like wouldn't that make wouldn't that just lock it? I mean, that's how you break a band, right? Or maybe you think That's just not for you and that's fair enough if it's not for you We're doing it um, but we're in the middle of of our new record We owe frontiers and jbc victor another record and we started recording probably halfway through the pandemic And I should say started writing and recording and we probably have about another three or four months to go So the plan is we're going to probably release the new record I would assume probably middle of 2023 or maybe towards summer and at that point We're going to go play everywhere that will have us. So that's going to be unique for us. I mean, we've always done japan We've done some of the major festivals in europe a couple years ago before we went and did I I forget if it was our Korean run or japan or whatever. We did some secret kind of like live rehearsal shows We did it in new jersey Connecticut new york city. We had a blast. It was so much fun So, you know, we'll probably do the states And you know it the reality is it's really up to the promoters Right because you know in some places like japan obviously in certain places we play in asia. We're really spoiled You know, we're playing huge venues. So in america. I know for promoters. It's a risk You know, they're probably terrified if we if they put us in a 5000 seat or 10 000 seat place Are three people going to come or would we sell it out? You know and our fears is the first one, you know So but the reality is we have to play america. So we will now we'll figure it out All right, so I mean even if it comes down to playing bars. I mean, is that an option or you know, like it's tough, right? It's not easy, right? We've just show dates. You know what it's like Bars don't bother me. We've done it all jimmy. We played in front of 30 40 000 people at our shows We played in front of 20 people and we have as much fun equally. So it's not really about ego It's about production and giving giving our fans The show that people see in japan and places like that You know, I mean we've done places like I remember being a kid when rob and I were first in like, you know club bands Right where we do covers and original music. I remember half the time with our stage stuff We had so much gear sometimes our drums could barely fit on the stage, you know So it's really about you know Bringing our production so so the people that have wanted to see the band for so long actually see an impelatory show Right, could we go in and play, you know a thousand seat club or 500 seat? Of course we could absolutely and it would be just as fun But you know, you have to scale down the production, you know the walls of amps and the pyro and you know all that fun stuff All right. Okay. So all right since you talked about this new album. Just give me what you can about it Okay, so it's going to be released you're aiming for as you mentioned spring summer 2023 is that correct? That's correct What elements Are you thinking of putting into this album or maybe you're not maybe you just want to do what you've continued to do Are there any new elements that you want to bring into The music is there any you know any ideas they're saying, you know what I've done all this now I want to do this You know, I think our records um Mature over the years I mean because look I am still to this day at my age and for doing this so long I still love playing guitar. I mean I play like six eight ten hours a day sometimes You know, it's because I love it. So every day I play I explore the instrument. I realize oh my god This is really cool and I learned something new theoretically or like with music theory and I'm able to somehow Mature as a musician by implementing whatever I learn each day So every time we do an impelatory record, although it always sounds like impelatory and it always will because it's rob's voice It's my guitar playing etc I think the music and the comp the composing part of it always matures. We get a little better Right each time at least I hope we do Right. So on this one, we're definitely bringing in more orchestration It's still gonna have a lot of fast, you know double bass stuff. There's a lot of really cool technical stuff A lot of screaming vocals big three-part harmonies because again queen We love that stuff. At least the heavier part of queen Um, and that's it. And so, you know, we'll see and again at this point We love the music, but you know how it is every band is always like oh our newest record is the greatest So i'm not saying that i'm saying is there any sort of uh directions that you like you said orchestration That's something you want to explore a little more, right? Yeah. Yeah, absolutely Yeah, it's orchestration and you know as we get older We always tend to push ourselves to get a little bit more aggressive and a little faster You know listen, I I listen to so much Music, right a lot of bands even guys that are friends that I know in bands I mean, I love bands like arch enemy, right? And so I let that stuff kind of spill over and influence me a little bit, you know I like avenge sevenfold, you know, I love slipknot So I love a lot of the new bands, but then also I'll retroactively go back and listen to own like a deal record Right or an old deep purple like machine head record, which I love and somehow by listening to all this music And then of course I listen to a lot of evolving like the four seasons the violin concertos all that fun stuff And so all of this is like it's affecting me. I'm a sponge You know and so all of this stuff i've been listening to and i'm sure somehow it's going to spill out into this new record You know, although this still sound like impelitair And what phase are you at now? Did you finish recording all the parts or not? No, no, we're still we probably get about three or four songs that are finished recording But we still have about another 12 songs to go and it's written You know the music's written now, but now it's actually performing it And you know, we're always the type band that we don't we don't try to do this where hey, let's just all send files You know, we really try to go in the rehearsal studios rehearses a band Master our our our music live so we can we can play this stuff live And then we go into the studio and a lot of times we try to track as much as possible live And then we'll go and we'll add the layers and all the big, you know Overdubs and orchestration whatever we feel is missing right to capture that power So that's kind of our process like i'm reading, you know I've always read on you know reviews from you know the band and I always come across these reviews saying They're a christian band But when I first started listening to impelitairi And it never dawned on me. They're you're a christian band. It was is that something that's been implanted? By let's say the press and the reviewers more so than you guys sure there's hints of christian, you know Sort of christian lyrics will call it But where's that line where you are a christian band versus just Talking about some sort of christian topics of good versus evil kind of thing So We're not a christian band. We've never been You know, it's like so for me personally i'm a christian Right rob rock is a christian. So I believe very much in jesus christ, right? That's who I am personally, right? So if someone loves beaselbub, so be it whatever it's your thing, right? Um, so Personally, you know, that's that's my kind of belief, right? Um, but the band as far as getting labeled out. I'm thinking dude, where'd that come from? I mean It never started that way. I mean listen to impelitairi the black ep where it started grand bond It was stand in line and system x You know, um, but I will say this the one thing that I love rob rock does Instead of doing like especially in the late 80s when we first came out. We were so burnt out on every other band It was like sex drugs rock and roll. Okay, great. We get it. You know, we believe we live the life of decadence We we were part of the sunset strip. We were part of that crowd. We did it, right? But Musically, you know, we just didn't want to be like all the other bands at that time, right? You know, it's like, okay, great. You slept with her last night and the next girl, whatever. It's like, okay Who cares? You know, we wanted stuff to be more intriguing. So rob, you know He took a lot of the stories a lot of the content that you hear lyrically and in the music that we do And he extracted it biblically right from the bible and look you go into areas where it's like you go into armageddon You know that kind of stuff It's you know, more like the end of the world kind of stuff It's I mean, dude, what gets scarier than that that to me is cooler It's really cool action. I mean the more majority of metal bands even the satatic ones. They they always use the book of revelations, you know, you know On the other side, right? So I mean the book of revelations has been using movies and bands and you know, because that's the darker part of the bible, right? Yeah, I mean believe me lyrically he'll do stuff from from book of revelations big time Maybe even like from psalms, you know psalms. I mean, it's basically who knows but look at the end of the day I love it because it it gives us a lot of It's almost makes the lyric have almost like a theatrical content There's in-depth meaning and also rob is cunning. He writes in a way that you could interpret it outside Right of the biblical you could apply it to everyday life But for me, dude, I laugh I go, you know, it's funny, you know It's like you look at some of maybe some of the black metal bands, right? And especially more of the satanic bands and I'm always laughing It goes so you want to go up against us remember we're gonna win good always wins over evil, dude Luke Skywalker over Darth Vader. There you go But there are you know, and I agree with that because I would never guess you were a christian band by When I first heard the music it's only when I hear other people review the album say well, they're a christian band They're a christian band I don't see it We're not like I said, we're not look, okay, so let's think about the band Right now. This is important. I'll say it for the hundredth time Impelatory is a band. It's not the christened Pelletary ego solo show It has always been a band with four or five guys. Sometimes we've interchanged right members But it's always about the contribution of four or five guys. So for many years We had a great drummer named glenn sobel, right? I think glenn's jewish. He was not christian, right? I mean he's on many records that many tours with us Um, we had pat torpy god rest his soul, right? So and even on our recent records john deadi who had played with slayer You know, I don't think there was any christianity there, you know, james pulley same thing I don't even know what james is our bass player has been with us forever, you know catholic, you know So it's and again, but I don't want to stray away from because we have a lot of fans that are christians And and like I say i'm a christian, right rob rock is and so, you know, I mean it's like but we've never been A christian band, you know, we're not preaching to people We just happen to use a lot of Storytelling from the bible and just said whether it's revelations or psalms or whatever, you know I mean there's so much awesome content But then also we write about everyday stuff too, right? I mean we did this I was just listening to a song called endless nights that we did on the grin and bear record That's all about, you know sex on the sunset strip, you know The one thing we never wanted to touch we did it really almost as a joke like all right all these bands these 80s bands, you know Would do this and people would say oh we're too heavy or too whatever And we're like all right, let's see if we can do it so we did that one song and I'll put that song up against any of the 80s rock, you know, even though again, we're a metal. We're not a hairband. We never were So well, well, we'll even we'll even metallica, you know I'll just leave you on this on the topic on this part, you know creeping death is about moses, you know And as he sort of you know the that whole moses story, you know, and How we know he gets the slaves out of egypt, right so There are biblical stories in metal, right? You you know that that's all I'm trying to say so Dude, absolutely, you know, I mean look I have a lot of friends that are in metal bands that are diehard christians But you know, they don't they don't say anything because in the media, you know Especially in the metal media a lot of people think it's kind of taboo for me. I'm like screw it. I don't care I'm down with it, you know It's done right as long as it's done right exactly, you know, I got my god, you know, that's it. That's it That's cool. Um, all right going back in time now Is it true that you're like angus young and a cover band of acdc and how long did you do that for true? So when I was in high school, I almost didn't graduate because of this I had opened up for a band called qt hush They were out of I think new york city and it was crazy. I would go see this band in clubs I would sneak in actually because I think it was probably 15 or 16 and these guys were playing I mean, I'm not kidding. They're probably playing to as many as maybe 3 000 people at a single show And they were doing a tribute to acdc and it was around the time of the back and black record And we were doing like van halen and ozzy and stuff like that And I remember their guitar player quit and they came and said hey, we want you to be angus I'm like, well, dude, you know, I love angus, but I'm more into this other stuff. So Anyways, I thought this would be really good experience because they were playing six nights a week And they they were touring like, you know, new york, massachusetts, canada get all of new angland And play in front of a lot of people. So I thought, oh, this would be cool. So I talked to my grandparents who I was living with right I said, is it okay? And they were a little against it because you know, here I am Literally, I remember I was 17 years old by this time, right? And so here I go. I joined this band put the suit on learned all the acdc stuff and I will tell you something I'm forever eternally grateful for that because everybody knows me as the shredding technical kind of metal guitar player But if you really listen to em pelletary, we're actually quite simplistic and a lot of that is because of My influence or or the education from learning all of that great acdc music You know, that's why when we do anything that we do as far as em pelletary It always has to start with an amazing riff and then we have to build a really good song and then the guitar solo comes in And I think I learned that from guys like angish young of course eddie van halen richie blackmore people like that But so when you listen to us, I to this day still hear that You know that that influence of acdc, but I mean you had to put the whole the whole schoolboy stuff on right? You're just going up and down, right? Okay, so i'll tell you a really funny story and this is a true story In rhodi providence rhodi island. There's I don't know if it still exists But there was a very very popular theme park like disneyland. It was called rocky point park. I believe So we were playing that show and I'll never forget it It was there were probably five or ten thousand people there Up the street at the arena the providence civic center. I think it was yeah, I think it was a providence civic center Rainbow was headlining. I think it was saxon. There were like three big bands We ended up I'm told we drew more people than they did at the show and this is where the story becomes funny We used to do an acdc song called the jack And this is where angus does a strip tease thing when the club in the club thing They made me do that. I hated it, but I had to do it. And so it's literally you go out and you do like the Tommy Lee thing you move the audience So we're doing the song and and our stage mare's like doing this like And I didn't know what he was saying. I thought just get out there and do it Take it off. I'm not thinking this is like disneyland. This is like there are a lot of kids here and and You know you turn your back to the audience and you drop the bands and you move in the audience And I almost got arrested I mean The road manager and I didn't I was so young. I was a kid. I didn't know I was thinking. Oh my god It wasn't until after backstage the guys like you got to get out of here right now And I'm like what they're rushing us out to get us on the band and you know, they were irate So that was our acdc story today you have people like peeing on stage, right? I mean that was never like that I mean look what Tommy Lee does on stage It was more like that funny thing, but it was like, yeah, that was an anecdotal story for acdc gone Yeah, yeah, but back then I guess you know what I remember Jim Morrison. He was you know in decent exposure I mean he got arrested for that back in the late 60s or early 70s. So yeah, it was I mean, but but that was my my That was the biggest memory. I have of doing that acdc thing Of just and you don't realize because you're in the moment You know playing for all these people all these people are you know, they're loving it They're rocking out with you and it's just part of the show. You're supposed to do it, right? You know, so that was my thing. That's a pretty funny story. Uh, franca says did impelitari play ever play france No, but I we're going to try to do that in the summer of 2023 Got a part of part of a part of a festival. Is that it like you're looking at that, you know, we're talking right now I know giles, you know giles Um, who's managing this right now giles lavery awesome guy great singers kind of you know, um directing the band at the moment Yes, I know him a bit Yeah He's the one that's he's got more enthusiasm than we do so but but yeah I mean, I think he said he submitted our names for all the big festivals in 23 But also doing doing like a tour there like in europe, you know doing I don't care if we're doing one officer Or we're doing a full run. Um, definitely want to do it. So yeah, all right. So that's cool So it looks like you guys are gonna be serious 2023. All right We're gonna rush through all your albums and just give me a couple of You know this arm came out just give me like a sentence. Okay on your albums your ep What are your what are your memories from your ep? Soundwise how how how satisfied you were I guess you kind of spoke about it We can move to the next album, but the ep just quick thoughts on your ep today. How does it? How does it resonate with you? I love it because we put up a bunch of room mics And basically played live and captured the the live energy of the band Um, and I remember recording that a baby recording studios and in the next room gene Simmons Was then doing kiss demos and I told you guys this in the past But our engineer was going in between work because he was working with us and gene at the same time Um, and I remember the first time I met like the star right because he came over to introduce himself Anyways, that ep it was a blast because we were pretty much playing live and we just we captured it We nailed it sonically sounds cheap because it was a low budget, but we didn't care Still one of my favorite records. There's still it's something magical about that ep. I agree with you Yeah, did gene ever go to say, you know, did he ever give you call call you up later on saying look We need a guitarist these guys aren't working Vinny Vincent. He's a mess. Nothing like that. No Never never never not no that wouldn't have been my cup of tea, but no Would you have done it though if kiss said, you know, we need a guitarist. Are we doing that one again? Look I will kiss was my first concert. I love I love kiss, right? I love the early kiss very much so, right? And so for me, you know, of course as a kid, I mean Let's not even go there But but that was kind of my memory and then of course playing our our first couple of shows in LA First show was the country club receipt of california. I think Ozzy's band everybody was there Great show was awesome. Loved it. So that was the impelitering memories then and exploding and all the other world Worldly places like europe and japan and then we went into Stand in line. All right, where did you here's here's and i'll just read a comment here Declan, I think that's how you're proud soon Where do I get the new album and i'm gonna answer that for him just go on amazon or anywhere else? Can he get it chris? Yeah, the greatest. I just saw that target Like in america it's like target amazon. It's everywhere Okay, good. And is the rest of the catalog strictly online? Or is it available like in distribution and record stores and targets and Big box stores. I think right now just the anthology We're starting with that first and the other ones the full lengths of the back catalog will be released in the same manner All right stand in line. So rob rock. He says listen chris. I love you But I got to move on to this and then you bring in grand body thoughts um Emotional time, you know, we had established our sound with rob rock and he leaves to go work with the scorpions producer Deeter dirks and we're like shit. What do we do now? We just got signed by sony Relativity and graham had fortunately. I mean for us. He had just ended alcatraz. So basically graham and I crossed paths He was like, hey chris. What are you doing? I'm like, I'm bomb my singer quit blah, blah, blah What are you doing? Well ended alcatraz nothing. So graham and I got together And we started writing music and it was a little bit of a challenge for me because as I've told people in the past I wasn't certain if I could take impelitari down the the road we began with which was more like the thrash kind of style speed metal so I had to write More and more in in line with like what rock what graham had done in the past like rainbow And it was a little bit out of my comfort level even though I love richie blackmore And I loved rainbow with teo and graham and all that stuff, but it was a little uncomfortable And I remember doing the record. I mean I was this kid. I had you know pat torpy was like he stored that record He was kind of like steering the ship. He was like a father figure. He was so awesome And I remember doing the record and you know, remember we did stand in line. We were all really happy We thought oh man wrote a really really good song, right? We have something really special And so my my biggest fondest memory of that It's probably when we started getting played on mtv Right because at that point it just it changed our popularity overnight You know, we went we went to I remember they flew me. I did the headbangers ball I don't remember how many people households was like 25 million people in america Whatever watched mtv at that time and I just remember we went from kind of like this kind of cult thing to all of a sudden Almost everybody knew who we are whether they liked us or hated us. It didn't matter. They knew who we are So that was a fond memory and then the first show we did in japan Was at the tokyo dome, which was 65 000 people. So there was a lot of crazy stuff for us And so that those are my fond memories of stand in line and um, what did you think about the cover that you did? you know, uh, since you've been gone, I mean Like were you comfortable with that cover or Did you I think so there were two songs on stand in line that made that record that weren't intentional It was actually we were short by I think two songs literally playing time and so We basically I had seen this amazing guitar player in connecticut I was a little kid his name is uh jade johnson He played in a band called crier and although people like I think richie blackmore Of course did his kind of version of somewhere over the rainbow early on I think jeff back may have done it But but this guy jade did an amazing version and it really influenced me and I remember his band I don't think existed anymore. So we're in a studio at the record plant los angeles california And I'll never forget it was just me and pat torpey right and I remember saying oh my god We need more music. What do we do and I told him I said well I remember watching this guy and I loved it and we all of a sudden So why don't we try doing this so on the spot pat and I arranged that whole Somewhere over the rainbow and then so we finished it. We recorded it. It was pretty much It was almost like one or two takes right just do it and we got it done And then um We needed one more song And we had to make sure it was something that graham was going to be comfortable with and we said all right Let's do stand in line. So, you know, there there are good things. I mean stand in line. I've told people It's never been my favorite record because you know for me I almost kind of wish we had a different name on the record versus impelitari You know if you listen to impelitari record before it and everything around it. It's much heavier Productions big, you know, we've got all the you know the big sample drums and that's it stand in line Was much more of an organic sounding record. So but you know it served its purpose And so when I listen to it, you know since you've been gone somewhere over there involved stuff Yeah, it's cool. Now when I listen back and I'm not I don't remember like so now you're going from 88 to 92 Like graham's not in the band anymore. Like what happened like you have the success things there seem to be going well It was a graham who exited. I don't remember Well, I can tell people exactly what happened We came back after having tremendous success in a great tour in japan. We came back And we came back to the united states and I remember we played The san osa civic center, which was up near san francisco and it was totally sold out I mean it was it was a smaller place probably like three to five thousand people And it was it was a co-headlining bill. It was impelitari and the pat travers band And I'll never forget the show because I remember we played and we killed it. We had an amazing show We were on fire. I think I even remember I think pat travers even said something about like, how am I gonna follow that? You know, one of those really cool Aha moments like wow, you know, and and and so I remember that and I remember we came back To los angeles graham at that time was having some marital problems. So he was really trying to save his marriage So he flies back to australia and we get a call from our manager and he goes to have really good news And i'm like what he goes you have the full end of the iron maiden tour You're gonna you're gonna open up for iron maiden and we were supposed to start in uh, florida And at this point they had arranged everything tour bus crew everything And we got a call from graham and he's upset and he goes look i can't come back and we're like, what do you mean? I mean this is it's we're about to explode here right in the states And he couldn't come back and that was it he had to save the marriage and we were like, oh my god Here we go again You know like we get this momentum with rob of the black e p And then we get the momentum with stan and line with graham and then And I don't blame graham by any means. I love graham to this day, you know, but yeah, it should happen So what are you gonna do right? He did the right thing I would have done the same thing too to save my own marriage, you know All right. So rob rock is back, right? You could have not could you have not saved the the sort of the tour we're getting robbed back or did you We almost did so we actually had a lot of singers come in and audition We had some big people come in and this is with you I'm not doing that because I know you'll try to pry it out of me But we had some very well-known singers that wanted in they tried to join the band like who Exactly. Yeah Nope But but you know we tried them out We auditioned a lot of these guys and it was like I can't believe these guys are auditioned for our band like really anyway, so it just didn't feel right to me and you know Our past cross with graham. I'm sorry not with graham with rob He had ended the thing with the band in germany with that Dieter dirks producer And we said look we we are really good together, right? We have good synergy We have great chemistry. We write well together with perform live together Let's just do this and this is actually where we get really lucky So around 92 most bands especially in our type music in our field They're dying, you know, they're getting killed now. I'll be it. We were never a hair band We couldn't fit in with those bands, but still even a lot of the thrashier type bands or whatever. They were all struggling Rob and I we get signed by jbc victor in japan and By the time we released victim of the system I don't know what it is We are being heavily embraced by the rock and heavy metal community in japan You know, I mean and it may be it may be systemic from the success We had from the black ep and stand in line also have blowing up But all of a sudden, you know, we're selling out, you know, all of our shows You know, I told someone this and it's a true story. I remember we were doing the answer to master tour And our road manager, I think was I don't know if he was road manager for death leopard But you know, they were down so he came out and our first show we did in Tokyo we were playing three nights at some venue And I think we we sold out three nights in a row back to back And I remember we we flew into tokyo I think two days early and our road manager the night we got there said hey come on We're gonna go see this band bush and bush were huge in america huge, right? I think was that gavin rostell Guy married one stephanie or whatever. Yeah, so they were playing the same venue, right? But like two nights earlier And so we went to go to see the show and our road manager goes it just got cancelled We're like what and he said something like the band I don't know if it's true or not But he said something to the fact that they couldn't sell tickets And here's this band. They were massive in europe and america, right all over empty me or whatever And couldn't sell tickets and yet we're gonna play two nights later at the same venue When we're sold out three nights in a row So it was silly stuff like that just started taking off and You know, it was just I don't know. Maybe it was fate locked talent I don't know. I mean there are plenty of fails go to japan. That was the spinal tap moment Yeah, but you know, but we found that a lot of our peers did try to go to japan and they couldn't make it Well, it also depends on the music too, right? If you don't got deliver the if you don't deliver the goods like no one's gonna love you, right? No one's gonna take you in right so there must have been a reason the fans loved you Yeah, you know, I I have a theory why impelatory is much bigger in japan than places like america In the united states of america and this is where i'm gonna get in trouble for saying this but i'm gonna be blatantly honest You know, it's really about who you know Right. Are you embraced by the media? Especially the media with power, right? Um, and if you aren't it's very difficult To tell your story or to be heard In japan, it's a different culture. It's a different world Like aerosmith, right or jope harry project let the music do the talking We couldn't convince the japanese to like us by you know using creative pr people, right? Or trying to spin a story to make us better than we are We had to earn every fan with our music and our playing right our talent And in america, you know, there's a lot of people that can really Kind of put up a wall almost kind of influence people not to like you and i'll tell you a true story We were in tokyo and i went out to dinner with one of the heads of jbc victor our label And i will never forget this story and it resonated with me and also frustrated me There is a head of a major label in the united states And they wanted jbc victor to do their distribution, right? And the label person and this is where this this person made a huge mistake Didn't realize how close i was with the label the label person went out You know had a meeting with this this label head and this label guy Just trashed Impelatary Oh my god that band all they do is they play too fast or they're just you know, they scream like girls, you know It's like they're outdated, you know Shredding crap, you know, whatever you gotta our bands blow them away You gotta you gotta sign this band I mean forget impelatary and literally went on and on it was really derogatory and the label person is just like Literally told me after the meeting said can you believe this idiot? Not to mention the other people that part of that meeting spoke japanese So this person trying to convey or influence them in a certain manner didn't work Right because they didn't even understand half the half the stuff that was coming out of the guy's mouth You know, so I found that very interesting and very fascinating and I realized over the years. Wow That's probably why in japan why we did have so much success because you know There are plenty of people around the world, but would love to rip you apart But there it doesn't work Yeah, you know, and that's a very good point. I mean the pr machine is very strong in north america It's it's it is it's not only who you know. It's how many how deep are your pockets? You know to sort of pay these people who know everyone who are connected and who can make or break you, right? Yeah, there there's Bands just don't appear at the super bowl just like that because people embrace the music bands are put By people, you know at halftime on the super bowl because They either have really deep pockets or they know people with deep pockets or they're connected in some way or form Yeah, jimmy. Look, you know, I know this is gonna sound very arrogant what I'm about to say and I don't mean to do that I mean, we're very confident in our band and like I say we let the music do the talking And we've had over the years Many of our fans they're frustrated like why are you guys not huge in america? Why aren't you as big as metallica and all that stuff and and they tell us we're Equally as good as them if not better now. I'm not saying that I'm just I hear these comments all the time and it's like look We can't force people To accept us so if there are big media outlets that ignore us or think, you know, we're we're you know We don't deserve their attention to love so be it, you know, I mean could we buy our way in dude? We've made plenty money in japan. Yes, we could easily buy our way in if we wanted to but that's not what we're gonna do We've always been a band for the people, right? We love what we do So we share it with as many people as possible and if we're embraced Awesome, and if we're hated it's okay. And if we're ignored same thing, you know, how many people live in japan? Oh my god, I don't know millions Like 20 million 30 million. I don't remember to this day. I have no idea I mean for people that haven't been in japan You go to places like tokyo, osaka, nagoya, sandai, fukuoka, Sapporo the island I mean everywhere I go it just it's like millions of people people don't realize when you go to tokyo I would guess 150 million people live in japan. Please correct me if I'm wrong somebody. Please give me the number go ahead Go ahead. No, no, I'm asking that people are watching if somebody couldn't like just google it fast I I honestly don't know but you know, like I said me when we go to japan Even you know, it's crazy even when we do like we did our first show I may have told you the last time we talked before the pandemic We went over when we headlined the busan rock festival, right? And it was another one of those things where I wasn't sure what the the rock market was like, right? I mean Three people 10 people, you know, and they tell me our our audience was something like 30 000 people You know showed up and and it shows you yeah This is in an area of korea that I never even heard of Right, so I don't know if I'm exaggerating maybe it's 10 000 whatever But it was a ton of people and it was just like wow. This is crazy You know that metal speaks in volumes to so many different cultures And now we're well outside of japan and korea and the same thing. It's just wow. I was right It's 126 million people live in japan. I'm getting people like text Yeah, and you know and 26 million people so just so you know just put in perspective in canada There are 38 million. So it's a four times larger in terms of population Than canada that's a pretty big market now the us is 350 million about right So it's half of the u.s. So it's if somebody says I have The u.s as my go-to market for music you're gonna say hey, that's pretty cool Even if the rest of the world so japan is half of the u.s. So it's it's a lot Yeah, it's always been a major market for music. It's and by the way, it's not all heavy metal I mean it's pop their j-pop, you know, they embrace rap they have it all right They always follow kind of like the western culture right pop culture But japan is massive and people think when you go there, it's only japanese No, it's not there are girls from sweden. I mean it's crazy when you go there. It's very westernized Right, I mean we we go to our shows and I'll see girls with blonde hair in the audience I'm thinking okay, and then you meet them, you know after show whatever say hello and whatever it's like You know they're from sweden or you know finland or they're all over the world germany You know, I mean we've had tons of people at our shows in japan like whether it's osaka You know negoya, tokyo all of those areas from different countries, you know It's a massive. It's a massive metal market. Yeah All right answer to the master answer to the master, you know 1994 Would you say that is the fan favorite? It's certainly one of them. Yeah, it's probably It's between that and probably screaming symphony Yeah, and answer to the master, you know, it was really an extension of victim of the system You know, we use the same engineer mike tachi who did all of the engineering force was amazing He had literally done the entire metallica black album with bob rock as the engineer assistant engineer And so what people told us the other day was people don't realize when you listen to victim of the system and answer to the master A lot of the equipment we had actually used one-on-one studios after metallica finished the black record And it's like I listen to that record now and I kind of laugh because when people don't realize the snare drum When you hear that in a kick drum those are actually larses drums or or i'm sorry his samples right which they spend I don't know mike told me they spent weeks and weeks just getting the kick drum to sound right And so he was probably the only person outside of rock that had a sample of that And so we ended up using that on our kick drums and our snare drums when I hear that I always laugh So what you mean by samples is you know, there's a sound file of the drums That you they borrow and they use it within the album, correct? Yeah, what we do is all right So we record the the drums organically live right so we capture the drums But what happens a lot of times is we get the bass where it's it becomes really full and has a lot of depth and big The problem with that is now the kick drum gets a little smaller or vice versa We get the kick drum where it's massive But now the bass guitar is starting to sound smaller because they're sharing similar frequencies, right? So what you do is we end up adding a sample on top of the original track Right to give it either more depth Or to control it right and so when I hear answer the master and victim of the system I'm always laughing because I'll go it's you know, it's ken berry playing on that right killer drummer Playing on that. It's it's I hear ken Striking the snare drum at the same time You're lars in the back of my mind and I start laughing, you know, does lars know this does lars know this He probably knows now All right, then yeah talk about eye of the hurricane You know your thoughts on eye of a hurricane as you look back at it today, you know, is it one of your favorites Is it still one of your favorites? Is it a fan favorite? I think it is Yeah, you know people love it. My biggest memory of that. So we did 17th century chicken picking with a really well known rock producer named Michael Wagner and for those of who you don't know Michael did the first motley crew record. He did master puppets metallica He worked with everybody great skid row those two great records You know, that was all Michael Wagner. And so Michael did Discreaming symphony record with us and and people just loved it Especially instrumental songs like 17th century chicken picking father forgive them just and rap race was another biggie So Michael decides he's going to move to Nashville And when we did screaming symphony, we did it in a studio called scream studios off of ventura boulevard in uh studio city california Which is kind of like hollywood area and so we did that but Michael decides I'm going to build the studio and he builds it on wolf hoffman's farm So wolf also moved down there. And so I'll never forget Rob rock and I flew down there and we're mixing with Michael every day And every day wolf would come in and I remember I'll never forget wolf was working on a barn He would come in, you know, like and he was like redoing his barn It was this awesome farm that wolf had and michael studio was on the farm So, you know, we did that record with michael But I was a little uncomfortable because michael had kind of left the environment that he was known for like mixing on ssl And you know all the technical stuff and here we were doing everything more digitally So I remember it was a little challenge to try to capture keep keep that sonic integrity that we captured live But you know either way we had fun doing it. It was we probably spent about two weeks in Nashville Oh It was interesting to say the least and you know, and then we did it released it I think that record only went out in japan initially Followed by you know tour and it was a great tour. We had so much fun You know same thing full houses everything was packed, you know um, and you know, I will tell you this what did really, um Change us from victim of the system answer master screaming symphony either hurricane at this point the media were really embracing us Right, like I was on the cover of all the like the biggest guitar magazines. I was on the cover of that Um, I think I won readers poll best rock guitars for screaming symphony record That was barn magazine, which was pretty much one of the biggest metal magazines in the world Um, all of that stuff was taking place during those records. So all right, very cool Very cool. All right, so then things kind of change a bit on crunch I mean, is this the first album you're using the sort of like drop-down tuning is or you're gonna get with the times Right a little darker. I mean, what were your what was your thought process then? I mean, I guess all the albums at the time were kind of Sounding, you know guitar heavy will say yeah So I was listening to a lot of pantera when we did when we did the crunch record. I love pantera Right cowboys from hell. I mean, it was just Pantera it struck a nerve. It's just something really resonated with me about that band You know, I loved it. I love dying. I love the production. I love what they captured with vinny, you know, um It just it just affected me in some way And so when I was doing the crunch record, I was listening to a ton of pantera I remember I was even listening to stuff like rob zombie, right? I was even listening to that stuff and I liked it and of course I wanted to still be true to impeller Terry, right still be who I am And rob of course rob is rob is not going to be filled from pantera. That's never gonna happen You know rob's always going to be more like a deal or a rob are you know? I'm sorry like a rob halver deal or a bruce digginson, right? Versus, you know filled from pantera so but It turned out to be one of my favorite records to this day. It's a great album It's a great album sounds when you mix it up a little bit and you put the impeller Terry stamp It works, right? Oh, yeah. Yeah. I I mean, it's still one of our fan favorite records, you know And again, there's stuff like beware the devil. I mean it was just it's just crazy speed kind of power metal song You know got this crazy story to it That was really cool and as a guitar player one of my favorite instrumentals I did a song called texas nuclear buggy, you know, it's kind of like my homage to kind of like i'm the one by van halen Or even early zizi top isn't it on the new greatest hits album? It's on the greatest hits album. It is. Yeah Yeah, I love it. It's so much fun to play live. It's just a great tune I mean I just it's fun. So it was good time making that record All right, so now graham bonnet, he's back like what the heck happened there here grave You lost graham bonnet, then he's back on system X like I mean, how did you get him back? Yeah, so so rob Decided that he wanted to go in a different direction And you know do it more of a solo record He had a lot of stuff that he felt like he contribute that he might not really feel it was comfortable with him Pelletary and at that time to be honest, we were you know, we were always saying hey We we wanted to make sure we weren't being Too in-depth with christianity, right? I was always like well, let's make sure we're still you know We're still You know a band a metal band at heart and rob wanted to do more of a christian based lyric You know in a full album So he decided to leave the band and work with an amazing guy named roise z who I love roise an amazing player Great producer too. Yeah, he produced bruce dickinson played on those records Just roise awesome And so rob and him decided to go do that and at that point here we go again What am I going to do because we're doing great japan and here's where I like to call this my revenge Because I was never Really thrilled with how stand-in line came out. I always vowed one day if I ever got graham bonnet back We're going to do a full-blown impelitari metal band metal tight music record But we're going to let graham just be graham sing his way. Let's see if it works And so when we did system x I was a little bit nervous to be honest I was thinking man, is this going to work? Right because here we are you're playing this really fast double bass stuff, you know And at the end of the day graham killed it. It's like it gives me chills. I mean I listen to stuff like perfect crime That's one of my favorite impelitari songs And you listen to graham bonnet sing on on the system x record dude. I will put that guy up against Dio Dickinson Halford any day of the week. I mean listen listen to the on the japanese version the opening track, right? We did something about about 9 11 Right and I listen to graham sing and it's just it's insane the power I mean, I don't even think I know another singer that has the power like when he sings. I'm not kidding He literally sounds like a lion if you've ever been to a zoo and hear a lion close up roar Terrifying that's graham bonnet the power that guy And when we did you know it stand in line graham was only in his late 30s So he's still pretty young You know and he still had it with system x. I mean it was like wow So I and off the greatest hits i'm just looking at this Sorry to cut you off falling in love with a stranger rock and roll heroes And is there another one Perfect crime the second crime is on it too. So you know, you got three of those We should have mentioned that as we're going through the albums rich songs, but there you go from three songs from system x Yeah, and by the way, if you listen to falling in love with a stranger, although it's actually detuned Right. It's got a very heavy groove. It also is what people don't realize it's um It's kind of it's probably the one song in that record where we already said let's do a really hardcore version of Of something rainbow would have done at that point in history, right? If they were a much heavier band And so when I hear that especially the you know the opening part where he sings, you know, it gives me chills you know And then we move into wait a second our graham's out of the band now kurtis is in the band as a singer Pedal to the metal as I look at you know, best to worst. It's always ranked at the lower end Even though it's a strange album some people love it some people are not too in love with it Yeah, what are your thoughts now now? You don't have rob rock. You don't have graham. You have kurtis. I forgot his last Kurtis gelson. Yeah, we found him. He actually had done the oz fest You know It's one of he was one of those bands and he was just really cool and it really was going to be an experiment record You know, we wanted to do almost a parody of all the great stuff We love that we really didn't get a chance. We weren't part of the 90s rock scene Right, but we love bands like disturbed and inflames and all that stuff And we almost want to do kind of like a parody to that, right? So it's really a fun record But it was really going to be a one-off because we knew rob rock was going to come back You know So propaganda mind is the only song from pedal to the metal that's on the greatest hit. It's correct. I might be my rock I believe so. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, okay. I'm really good at that. Ain't I I'm good. I'm good at that I really know yeah and kurtis gelson He was a really cool singer very more like a 90s guy amazing musician You know, but like I said, we knew rob was going to come back So it was really almost like one of those those interim records or let's have fun with this, right? And that's what we did and then we get a monster record wicked maiden You know rob is back wicked maiden, you know again a lot of down tuning. I would say heavy guitars uh Tell me about that one a wonderful life A high school revolution like it's just a monster of an album another fan favorite, right? Yeah. Yeah wicked bayden I mean again rob rock is back. So here we are. We're back to the you know, the more thrashier type, you know metal that we're known for And you know, and of course we are still embracing a lot of the detuning, right? So the record starts to sound Pretty heavy, you know And people do I mean a lot of our fans love the song wicked maiden You know, especially when rob kicks in with that that really high scream right in the beginning of the record, you know You know, it's funny when I when I started thinking about these records I start realizing how lucky I am to have had both rob rock and bonnet, you know as singers I mean, look, I've worked with some amazing guys. I've been around some of the greatest singers ever I've been in the studio around guys like deo and guys like that You know and graham to me graham bonnet and rob rock are equally as good as those guys Absolutely. Absolutely off the greatest hits album off of wicked maiden is garden of eden wicked maiden Try to see if there's another one If you remember please tell you said high school revolution, I believe was another one I think there was last of a dying breed off the Off the greatest hits, right? Oh, oh, I'm sorry. You're talking about the anthology. I'm talking about the anthology. I know that there's two I think there's wicked maiden and I think garden of eden. I think those are two two songs on there. Yeah Okay, well, no, it's all great songs. Okay. Oh, yeah, I love playing wicked wicked maiden so much fun to play live The audience goes nuts and it's funny watching the audience scream with rob is hilarious. It's awesome You know, yeah, and then venom venom, right the 2015 release of venom. Yeah, and now that's where we go Now we're on frontiers, right? We're still a jbc victor But yeah, then we've got venom in nature of the beast and that's why nature and venom are not part of the anthology Because those albums are not on the same like you mentioned exactly they're like so if people like want to hear us today, right They're listening to like venom and you know and and obviously the stuff from the nature of the beast record And that's all globally distributed. Everybody has access to that So wait, and you know, it's funny and people ask me what's wake the beast supposed to be What is it supposed to symbolize, right? You know people have always said we're like our music's like this sleeping giant Right, it's just they've been waiting for it to explode in american all those places And someone literally said why don't you call it wake the beast? You know, it's time to let the monster out and that's kind of what we're doing Maybe the next album be called time for a nap nap with the beast Yeah, I don't know after you let him out. He's tired, you know, I don't know Dude never man. We're gonna be doing this until we drop, you know, why quit why we would never stop doing this You know, I mean I still to this day even at stay of my age or this this point of my life I am still a metal fan. I love listening to heavy metal. I love playing metal, you know, it's like why stop You know what your music to me? It's always been like boston meets some sort of speed metal shred fest You know that that's sort of like the vocal melodies of boston in a sense The harmonies and then of course, I wouldn't say it's all shred. I'll just say that Speed metal and shred if I was to define it to somebody if somebody asked me What what do you guys sound like? Overall, that's what I think I would say. I love that you said it because it's exactly what we have always kind of been You know, it's been almost like speed metal power metal I mean you've got all like the the temples of kind of thrash the technical soloing, but the vocals That's the key thing. It's all big three-part harmonies like queen boston. Did I ever tell you the story? This was probably in um, it's probably around 94 we were having all the success right in japan right before screaming symphony I remember My lawyer brought me to a really really big management company and this management company managed one of the The biggest metal bands in history And I will never forget what the guy told me. He literally said something effective, dude I love your music. You guys are you're awesome guitar playing. He goes But your vocal sound like boston and i'm like, oh, thanks, man I was like, oh, well, thank you. I thought he was complimenting his he goes. No, he goes That's outdated. It's like kids don't want to hear that today. And i'm like, what? Yeah, i'm like just turn on FM radio. You got boston going on all the time Yeah, but but the dude literally said that i'm just like this is what's wrong with the music industry You guys are making the decisions of what the public really ultimately gets to hear and who gets promoted and i'm just like Oh god, that's what money does right, you know when people have interests they have and they have money They kind of want to dictate things right because it only benefits their interest the statement that comes from the guy is like So counter-intuitive what what music fans want to hear. I mean he's like he's basically was conforming to a fat He was like saying, oh man. Love you guys love the metal love the music all the stuff But you guys are singing like boston And i'm thinking again. I'm like, well, thank you. That's an awesome compliment And he's like but that's not a compliment. He goes. That's not what kids want to hear today I'm like well, what is it they want to hear today? What you force feed them You know, yeah, exactly exactly to me, you know put on songs like the future is black and fly away You know to me that's like the perfect summary of boston, right? You know the harmonies and the vocals and the melodies And when I first heard that so I go was this boston I just heard what the heck did I just hear here? But then you hear this the guitar riff and it's nothing like boston. Yeah, and you know I wonder sometimes do people realize How freaking difficult it is to sing like boston Right. I mean to do like the three part harmony. It's like queen. I mean rob rock. I mean it's easy for him Right, which shows you his his innate talent. I mean what he's able to do vocally. It's like wow You know and so, you know, I mean, I don't know. I I think the way you summed it up though I agree with you a hundred percent That's exactly probably what embellatory is if you were to kind of categorize Who we are musically or sonically But you know like okay now we're talking about the music but there is a business model So all the bands out there they're you know, who are saying what do I do? I can't make it. I can't make it I think you guys Have proven that If you concentrate on the areas of the world or the model that works for you You can have success You know, everybody wants the us success. That's the problem, right? People just want success in the us But you have to think of your business model if people in japan like you more than they like in the us Then you concentrate over there if you could sell records there, then you concentrate over there Like we said, there's 125 million people who live there, right? That's success. It's just we don't think it's success. It's because we don't see it, you know Uh on television, you know in usa in canada. That's that's why you know, it's a perception, right? Like success well think about it success, right? Yeah, I mean look I hate talking about money, but let's let's think about it So if someone sells A million records in a place like japan the gross revenue starting with retail in the old days I think if you converted the yen to the dollar cds were about 24 25 dollars, right? So if an artist sold a million records, that's basically 25 million dollars of gross revenue Now, of course, then obviously retail gets it the labels get it all the way down to the band But you know, you realize that's a big marketplace, right? And so and it's the same thing I mean you go to other places in europe and there are big markets in continental europe So, you know, but you but you're right. I think the one thing A lesson for for up up incoming artists You don't just have to Focus on one country, you know, it would be arrogant to say oh, it's only about america No, america's just one part metals much bigger in other parts of the world than it is the united states of america So why not go there brass ring is in america alone that measure success if you're not successful in the u.s That means you're not successful anywhere else in the world Maybe that was the case in the 70s and 80s, but that's not the case anymore if I mean what is success success is A recognition for your art and it's also financial, right those two things are that's what success is because If you're struggling and you can't pay your rent. Well, you're not really successful in that sense, right? And if your art is not being loved by everyone, then that's not success either You could play in your room guitar all you want if you just want to hear yourself play you right But success is there is a measurement there And I think bands have this misconception that If they don't break it in the u.s. Somehow they don't have success you can have success everywhere else It's you have to redefine your business model And I think that's what you've done and maybe and I think you're aware of that. It's just not you know, you're more humble about it That's all Yeah, I look again. I don't know. I mean like to say the other parts of the world where we've had a lot of um Good luck. Let's use that right. I think good luck. Well good luck. I don't know hard work, you know like good You have to remember In 88 or 87 We certainly had a lot of popularity in the united states of america I mean, there were a lot of people talking about this, right? I mean just again just being on mtv at the point of mtv It was probably one of their probably the biggest time of mtv at least for rock music was around that time Right and and we were played in rotation and we were embraced. So we were reaching millions of people Right and japan was very aware of that. So were parts of europe So it probably gave us a little bit of a head start Right, but ultimately like I say going back to the music has to do the talking our music has to Has to be respected for these people over 30 years to have stuck with us That's right. You know every year our audience in these places It just keeps getting bigger and bigger and you're like, how is this possible? Then people tell me it's because the quality of our music So what would you say to an up-and-coming band? As we close things off, you know, they're saying, oh man, we're we're trying everything We're on social media. We're playing the bars. Nobody's showing up. Nobody's buying our CDs Because people don't want to buy CDs anymore. What would you tell an up-and-coming band? Be true to yourself Do be in a band play music because you love it not to get girls or to be rich Right do it because you love it because it's that passion That will lead to your destiny right or it will lead you to success Right, I find the people that are most successful in life Are the ones that find passion in what they do the people that hate their lives or hate what they do They they seem to be the ones that you know fail or end up in a life of mediocrity You know, so that would be my my advice to them is is play music because you love it Playing a band because you love playing with the other guys and you love playing your type of music And then go play parties play at your friend's house on the weekend We used to call it the keg-cock parties when we were kids, you know Play everywhere just just say yes to every opportunity, right and then and then If you get lucky it will happen, you know, look, I mean to be successful in the music industry Let's face it. It's like winning the lottery, you know when that first day I remember telling my grandparents I want to be in a rock band. I love this. I love doing this They were probably like, oh god, what do we do? We got him into this old music thing and probably regretted it Because they were realists. Look, you know for every one band that succeeds. It's probably a hundred million fail Right and and it's not that they're not good It's just that it's a very very competitive space, right? It's very difficult to make a Mark right to make a name for yourself in this very very highly competitive industry It's like an iceberg, you know, you see the tip of the iceberg, right? Those are the people who make it But the people who never made it are at the bottom, right? You know that massive part underwater Jimmy, I can't tell you how many amazing bands We grew up with right even players that influenced the way I play guitar Right, these were guys that I thought they were going to be legends and it just didn't pan out for them And so there is I will agree with you. There is always luck, you know You can have a street full of restaurants with serving the same thing with the same Menu with the same quality, but only one guy on that street is going to be successful, right? It's just the luck of that one guy. There is always a sense of luck in life. There's luck, right? If you get hit by a bus, you know, you weren't lucky, you know Yeah, but but here's a better thing to tell those aspiring musicians If you if you're lucky enough to be embraced And you find success in a country or globally or whatever Work your ass off, right? Don't ever slap the gift horse in the hand You know, don't ever slap the hand that feeds you or the mouth to feed you whatever So for me, it's it's kind of like once we got embraced by those markets It was work your ass off and we do we work our ass off to this day You know, we don't you know, we don't make records that we're not proud of You know, we will go back in and lose money making the record if we don't think it's right So so passion so let's let's summarize your passion I think passion is sort of it people feel that they feel when somebody's passion about anything in life Yeah, yeah, and it's contagious and people are are drawn to passion. So passion Yeah, hard to work Don't don't get the easy way out work your ass off, right? Yeah. Is there anything else? Well, that goes along with dead and great songs and great new music, right and great music Yeah, but but obviously The dedication and working your ass off that hopefully will allow you to achieve Composing great music Right and able to be able to play that stuff live You know, I mean again, we're talking what how many years into my career Start the black EP was done in 1986, right? I've been playing professionally like in bars since what I say. I was like 15 somewhere around there I've been doing this and to this day even though look I got enough. I'm very comfortable in life now I still will be in my room playing six seven hours a day Because I love doing it. There's a guitar somewhere that I'm always going to you know, have in a room where I'll be practicing That's my dedication You know and so and it's and we share that equally with the band guys Okay All right on that note everybody. I'm going to put up the new album the image of the new album We talked a lot. We've been talking for about an hour and a half This is fun started outside of my pool and then the then the ipad Then after the phone, yeah a lot of action a lot of action I mean, dude, I haven't got dressed up for you today and again. I told you I put on look at me. I just put on a t-shirt Do you know frank marino? He lives around here. I loved mahogany rush when I was a kid Love that band. Yeah. Yeah. He's it was he in did he influence you growing up? Oh, yeah, I would probably say when I was a teenager He was certainly a guitar player on my raito. I was listening to absolutely Didn't he play like the california or one of those jam festivals those big things the reason why the reason why I'm saying this is because Him it was always about passion and loving to play, you know, and it was always about that and quit early on right He quit in the 80s because he was going out of the hell with the music industry If I want to feel great about myself playing guitar, I'll just play in my room or in front of friends And that's it, you know, so that's the passion that I'm talking about right Well, you know mahogany rush frank marino mahogany rush were huge huge in the late 70s We're talking like they were playing I don't know if they were playing before around the same billion as aerosmith in the 70s, right? I mean, he was huge. I mean we as guitar players, we all knew about him I remember listening to his live versions of stuff like johnny b good You know, it always remind me of a guy that was kind of like a hendrix or whatever But a little bit more technical, you know, so I love my know zack wild talked a lot about him You know, yeah, a lot of the california guitarists talk about him You know, he made a huge impression in california and the rest of the world people, you know, he's And you know what he just he gave it up in 80 something, you know 85 or whatever I didn't I didn't know he gave it up But why don't you can always there's always an audience like if I want to go play right now Go play la well no now now now it's a little different because there's some sort of Issue that he's having sort of physically, right? But I'm not sure what it is But he kind of said he's retired from touring. There's some physical issue, right? Oh, I said, yeah but he quit because Again, I don't want to I don't want to speak for him. I have spoken to him many times But he quit because the hell with the music industry. They just basically didn't pay him, you know And it was just like enough of this So but it's not his main passion in life either. So even though he loved it again, I don't want to speak for him I'm just Speaking from what our conversations were like, you know my impression So he was like screw it. I don't need these people. They don't want to pay me the hell with everyone Not everyone out of fans, but the red labels. So for whatever it's worth So he made an impression on me He certainly had me sitting down learning, you know, some of his techniques and all that stuff So, you know, he made his mark. Yeah, well, I'm a huge fan. So all right, my friend We had a great chat. I'm gonna put it up once more wake the beast He's waking up wake the beast pick it up the anthology. You can also pick up All the other albums minus the last two They're released on global rock records. You could get it on amazon. You could get it at target Maybe at a hardware store somewhere. I don't know I like that. Home Depot Home Depot And on that note have yourself a great day and we will talk soon and we're looking forward To your new album. We'll talk again Thank you, jimmy. No problem