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Arch Enemy guitar great Michael Amott was the guest on Full Metal Jackie’s weekend radio show. The guitarist spoke about the additions of Alissa White-Gluz and Jeff Loomis, headlining the Summer Slaughter tour and about the band having their own hot sauce. Check out the chat below.
On the show with us this week we’ve got Arch Enemy guitarist Michael Amott. How are you, sir?
I’m great, thanks for having me.
The 2015 installment of the Summer Slaughter Tour, now under way with Arch Enemy headlining. You’ve got a bunch of great bands like Born of Osiris, Veil of Maya, The Acacia Strain and so much more. Of course, Arch Enemy’s got their latest album out there, War Eternal. Michael, it’s been a year since the first album with Alissa [White-Gluz] came out. How will the bonding of this past year together make the next album different?
Well, I don’t really know. There’s been some bonding going on [laughs]. We’re having a lot of fun and it’s gelled into a really great friendship and a really healthy working environment. It’s too early to say what’s gonna happen on the next album. I think we’re all really excited about whenever we do get back together to do that. We probably will take some time off this touring because I think once we’ve wrapped up this tour it’s gonna be a two year tour that we’ve done all around the world. I think we’ll need some time to collect our thoughts, have some real time off and kind of get hungry again. Then we’ll be back at it, writing new music and putting all that together.
What’s been the biggest way that Jeff Loomis has affected the band?
Just his wonderful, flowing blonde locks are just a pleasure to be around [laughs]. Other than that, I’d say, I’ve known the guy for 16 years and he’s just a really good friend. We get on fanatically onstage and offstage, which is equally as important. He’s just come in with a really positive attitude and he’s just a great accomplished guitar player, of course, as everybody knows. He’s just got such a nice way about him as well. He’s a world class musician with virtually no ego and just a very relaxed attitude. We’re having so much fun, it’s just been very uplifting to have him around.
How much do you think about the next album and write music on the road?
We do a lot of jamming backstage and we stumble across little fragments of ideas that we record and hold onto for the future. We don’t really write whole songs. I have written what would be the skeleton of two songs and I actually demoed those as well with our drummer Daniel [Erlandsson], but that’s the only sort of thing we have at the moment. There’s not a whole lot right now that’s finished music. We don’t do a lot of serious writing, I’d rather get to that later on when we have time off. We like to separate it, we’re very much in tour mode right now. That’s what we’re focusing on.
You’re headlining the Summer Slaughter tour this year. What’s the biggest challenge of being the final band on the night, when the audience is fatigued?
[laughs] Yes they’re been pummeled all night with very low tuning and screaming. I think we’re just radically different to the other bands and hopefully some people are there to see us specifically. I think it’s always the same story when there’s a bunch of bands touring together, package tour, there’s always a lot of loud music for people to get through all day and night. Once we hit the stage, we bring something that I think is uniquely our sound to me and I think people are enjoying that.
Arch Enemy now has its own hot sauce. Why is hot sauce a popular heavy metal lifestyle product?
I don’t know! I think for us it’s just something fun, it was suggested to us to do it. I’ve been a habanero hot sauce enthusiast for many years. It’s just something that landed in our lap and “yeah, let’s do it.” It’s nothing that we take too seriously, it’s just something fun instead of printing out yet another t-shirt. It’s kind of take or leave it kind of thing. Yeah, I’ll save a bottle for you.
Thanks to Arch Enemy’s Michael Amott for the interview. Catch the band on tour at these locations and pick up the ‘War Eternal’ album here. Full Metal Jackie’s weekend show can be heard on radio stations around the country — for a full list of stations, go to fullmetaljackieradio.com.
Source: Loudwire.com
