January issue…
Lucy Lawless talking about her favourite music to have sex to: “I really like Portishead. No, no, no, The Deep Field by Joan As Policewoman. I know it’s not metal, but do it! To that! Now!”
Lucy talking about the perfect soundtrack album: “I really like FernGully: The Last Rainforest! So there! Ha ha ha! But I like that song that Tone Loc does – Now I’m gonna eat somebody, it might as well be you! when he’s the iguana. I’m an environmentalist so I think that’s probably why I like that movie.”
Lucy talking about music for her funeral: “I’ve never thought of that before. I’ve been killed so many times on screen that you’d have thought I would have thought about this all the time! I think I’ll have to go for Lungs by Florence Welch. It’s pretty emotional.”
February issue…
Alice Cooper talking about how he picked up knife-throwing as a hobby: “Before all of my shows, I watch really bad Kung Fu movies, like, C-movies. In all these movies they have these little Chinese throwing knives, so I found them in a Chinese store, I got a little dartboard and it took me about two days before I got the feel of how to throw them then I got really good at it. I got to the point where I could put 30 knives inside of a circle the size of a grapefruit. From there, it got addictive.”
May issue…
Chris Fehn (Slipknot) talking about Venom: “Before that, I was into Michael Jackson, Duran Duran, Culture Club, Journey and Queen – records that my parents would be OK with.”
Mick Thomson (Slipknot) talking about why that he would want Electric Six’s Fire played at his funeral: “Electric Six is an incredible band. They can write a catchy song that’s funny and it does that while still being smart. I think it’d be great to turn this up on a solemn occasion. You can’t be down when that record is playing.”
Mick explaining why Exile on Main Street (recorded by The Rolling Stones) is the album that he wish he made: “Show me a better record top to bottom. Every song is amazing and it’s a double album, so that’s a lot of amazing songs. It comes out firing and it’s untouchable. One of the greatest records ever.”
Mick naming Doomsday for the Deceiver as his favourite work-out album: “The speed of the songs, like She Took An Axe (which is a song about Lizzie Borden), are really fast and it sets an aggressive mindset which is good for a work-out. You can’t go wrong with either of the first two Flotsam & Jetsam albums.”
Mick explaining why Fishbone’s Truth and Soul is an album that no-one would believe he owns: “The monster bass on it is one of the reasons I love it but that puts you in a good mood. Some days, I just need to hear Bonin’ in the Boneyard then I’m set for the day.”
Mick explaining why Metallica’s 1991 LP is the album that should not be: “I understand (now that I’m in a band) that you have to stop repeating yourself or you’ll be bored, but I loved the first four albums so much and I was horrified when I heard the black album. I felt insulted and didn’t listen to them for years, but that’s over now. Are there any similarities to how Slipknot have changed? I don’t think so and, besides, I certainly never cut my hair.”
Mick talking about Malevolent Creation: “But the album you need to hear is Envenomed, especially Kill Zone. It’ll make you want to punch a baby! I was in a vehicle with Phil and other friends in Florida and they were playing it for me before it was released. We were speeding to it then we ended up crashing into the back of a car in front and totalled it!”
Michael Shawn Crahan (Slipknot) talking about art: “My first week of school, I made a phallus out of Play-Doh. A big and hard penis, made from all kinds of colours and with a big ballsack, and I put it in the furnace so it would get hard, and straight away I was sent to the principal’s office. To me, the importance of art is temperature. Music is temperature. You write a song, it’s got a tone – it’s either minor or major; it’s dissonant, it has crescendos. It has all these things. So when I work, it’s about temperature – how does this music make me feel? Where does it take me? What’s the colour? Art and music go hand in hand. Art doesn’t have to be something hanging on the wall. It can be the design of the new Pepsi can. Art’s all around us, man, from the carpet we choose, to toilet paper and forks.”
Sid Wilson (Slipknot) talking about why he injured both of his heels: “I did all of the Volume 3 tour in dress shoes and white socks – paying homage to Michael Jackson!”
Gene Simmons defending himself: “A lot of people don’t like me, but a lot of people didn’t like Jesus either.”
June issue…
Anneke Van Giersbergen talking about A Perfect Circle’s Mer De Noms being the album that she wished she had made: “It’s like Tool but with romance and sadness.”
Anneke talking about why Metallica’s …and Justice for All is the best way to introduce a kid to metal: “I had this album on vinyl, I borrowed it from a friend, and I played it so much. It’s a classic album. It’s heavy, it has deeper meanings and great lyrical content, but it’s also pop-orientated with catchy melodies and good choruses.”
Kerry King talking about Jeff Hanneman’s afterlife influence such as When the Stillness Comes reflecting his calling card: “That one came out surprisingly good. If you know our history, I never did the clean or spooky stuff. That was always Jeff. It was the one thing musically that was just his. I’d do the crazy, punky fast stuff and he’d do the moody stuff. So When the Stillness Comes was my first attempt and it gave me goosebumps. I thought – This is pretty good! The first song is called Repentless. I call it the Hannemanthem!”
Tom Araya talking about Kerry: “Kerry’s very black and white. I’m not a black and white person.”
July issue…
Mike Patton talking about what makes Faith No More special in 2015: “Even after all these years, someone will come in with a crazy notion, and you know where they’re coming from. If that was someone I met a week ago, in a symphony hall, I’d go – You’re out of your mind, what are you talking about? There’s a trust level with Faith No More that’s just…deeper.”
Billy Gould (FNM) talking about his experience of watching MTV with Roddy Bottum (FNM) as his room-mate: “It was another universe; something we never thought we’d connect to. At the same time, it was something that was like a little code you could crack. We looked at it like we were hackers – Imagine if we could actually get through that. How would you crack that? It was like robbing a bank.”
Bordin talking about replacing Chuck Mosley with Mike Patton: “It was like trading it a model T Ford and getting a turbo Lamborghini or a McLaren. He was interested in adventuring, exploring and going there. He had the talent and vision to get there.”
Chris Poland (Megadeth) talking about Gar Samuelson: “Dave hit the jackpot when he met Gar. He had swing. He was a huge Who and Zeppelin fan, but he was a jazz guy – no one else in that scene listened to jazz drummers. He brought an element to that music that no one else has brought to metal to this day.”
David Ellefson (Megadeth) talking about the early years: “There was a major heroin issue. Dave and I were more pot and beer, but we’d do coke and heroin if you gave it to us. Others had serious addictions. Hollywood in ’83, ’84 was the epitome of sex, drugs, rock ‘n’ roll and decadence; and we were further on the edge than most.”
Dave Mustaine (Megadeth) talking about the inspiration for the title track of the first album: “I was reading a comic book called The Punisher, and I thought it was cool that it had this twist whereby you’d paid someone to kill somebody and then they come back and go – By the way, someone has paid me to kill you.”
Marilyn Manson talking about the influence of Billy Corgan: “Billy was around when I was making Mechanical Animals. That’s when we spent most of our time together. He was a good inspiration, musically. I would play him things and he’d play me stuff. He told to be more musical and I told him to wear more make-up.”
Marilyn talking about another surprise friend: “I’ve seen how successful my best friend – Johnny Depp – is. He’s got two very, very smart kids. They’re definitely ahead of the curve. I’m his daughter’s godfather. Whenever I see them, I’m always respectful to not curse.”
August issue…
Jonathan Davis (Korn) talking about a song titled Need You: “Do you remember the band Human Waste Project? Well, this song is about their singer, Aimee Echo. No one knows that, but you can print it. We were really good friends back in the day, and we never hooked up, and never did anything, but the vibe was there. I don’t think I ever told her this, but I guess she’s going to find out now.”
Munky talking about a song titled Divine: “This was one of the first songs we wrote at Underground Chicken Sound. I remember Robert Trujillo coming to the studio because we were considering having him produce our first record, and he said – Let’s work on one song to see how we work together – so we picked this one. We didn’t form a relationship with Robert to the point where he got to produce the album, but we liked the ideas that he had, and the song structure we created that day is the one that’s on the album.”
Munky talking about a song titled Faget: “When people first heard this, they were like – It’s kinda like Rage Against the Machine on steroids.”
Jonathan talked about said song: “Growing up, I was a New Romantic. My favourite band was Duran Duran, so I’d wear make-up and long shirts, and in Bakersfield – an oil and farming town – there were a lot of macho jocks who took offence to that. I got called a faggot all the time. I wasn’t gay, but it got to the point where I thought that maybe I was gay, and just didn’t know it. Bullying is not some rite of passage that people should accept.”
Lzzy Hale (Halestorm) talking about the weirdest gift that a fan has given her: “A couple presented me with a box they’d painted gold. Inside was a gold pacifier, like a dummy, for babies. It had fangs on it so if sucked on it, it looked like you had fangs. I felt bad because they asked me – Can you put it in your mouth for the photo? – and I was like – I’m not going to stick it in my mouth, I’m sorry – I still have it. I kept it because I knew I was never going to get a gift like that from anybody else ever again. I’m not sure what they wanted to get out of that scenario. Maybe it was a fetish.”
September issue…
Mikee Godman (Sikth) talking about Pantera’s Far Beyond Driven: “The most kick-ass album ever. It is groove-laden, extremely angry, passionate and played to perfection. Pantera are my favourite metal band and Phil Anselmo is my favourite metal vocalist ever. Screaming in tune is a very important and essential thing for metal vocals.”
Burton C. Bell (Fear Factory) talking about the future of technology: “When Fear Factory wrote Demanufacture and Obsolete, we were writing about a future that was far away, but (as computer scientist Ray Kurzweil says) technology advances every year exponentially; it happens faster and faster.”
Bruce Dickinson (Iron Maiden) talking about what conclusion he came to about his cancer treatment: “It’s fascinating. Basically, I am my own science project!”
Dave Murray (Iron Maiden) talking about a quirk regarding a recording facility for the making of The Book of Souls: “It’s an old French cinema converted into a studio, so the ambience and the vibes are brilliant.”
Philip Anselmo (Pantera) talking about the original band name of Down: “I was thinking slow-paced tempo music, slow-tempo music, and the first thing that came into my head for a band name was Down Syndrome, but we didn’t wanna go there. Down was good enough because it seemed like a slow word, y’know?”
Phil talking about the origin of the band: “We all grew up together since we were kids, and we knew each other before we were in bands, so it was a very strange schoolyard kinda thing as opposed to a big conglomerate of people telling us what to do.”
Jason Hook (Five Finger Death Punch) talking about the cover of Got Your Six: “Originally, it had a child in the middle. Knucklehead was supposed to be protecting her from the zombies and ghouls but it didn’t look very aggressive.”
Jonny Hawkins (Nothing More) talking about his favourite album artwork: “The front cover of RATM’s self-titled record has always has been the most haunting image and artwork, mainly because it is a real photo. That one stands above the rest and will forever be burned into my psyche.”
October issue…
Mark Weiss talking about photographing Dee Snider’s hearing against the PMRC: “It was September 19, 1985, one year after I shot the infamous Twisted Sister album cover, Stay Hungry. I can remember feeling like he was speaking for me and for my freedom to choose the music that I wanted to hear. I can recall them talking about some of my photographs, in particular one of Ozzy Osbourne with his ‘Ziggy’ doll with a knife through its head, fake blood everywhere and saying – Have a nice day. They asked – Who would think of doing that, but some sick individual? – I thought they were talking about Ozzy, but it was about me! I was part of the moral decay of America. The PMRC had their infamous list of The Filthy Fifteen, and I shot most of the bands in it.”
Saraya-Jade Bevis (a.k.a. the WWE wrestler known as Paige) responds about which band she would recommended to a kid wanting to know about metal: “I love Skid Row. My mum was much more of a metalhead, so all that we listened to was 80s music. Skid Row was always my favourite, and the first album is amazing.”
Paige talking about the best album to work out to: “Slave to the Grind is good but I prefer the other one.”
November issue…
Jamie Graham (Heart of a Coward) talking about Meshuggah’s influence: “I remember reading an interview with Deftones in Metal Hammer when I was a teenager, and their guitarist, Steph Carver, said that Destroy Erase Improve was the album that made him want that heavy guitar tone.”
Brian Slagel (owner of the Metal Blade record label) talking about artistry that comes out of rivalry: “Metallica and Slayer were in constant competition. Each wanted to know what the other was doing. Metallica would release something and Slayer would ask how heavy it is. Slayer put out a record, and Metallica asked if it was faster than them.”
Kerry King (Slayer) talking about religion: “When people come up and talk to us about the Church of Satan and stuff, I’m like – You’re talking to the wrong dude. You might want King Diamond, not Kerry King! – I’m an atheist. I don’t believe in either of them. I tried writing a song about atheism but the dark, Satanic-inspired songs are more compelling! Perspectives are valuable whether they’re mine or not.”
Biff Byford (Saxon) talking about where he was when he heard the news about the assassination of president Kennedy: “I was at home, following it on TV. I was 12 at the time, but captivated as the events unfolded. Even at that age, I realized this was momentous; history was happening right in front of me. I’ve read a lot about the assassination since, and I really don’t think it was the work of one gunman. I don’t normally put any store by conspiracy theories, but in this case, I think there’s a lot of truth in there.”
December issue…
Rhys Fulber (top-notch remixing professional) talking about Fear Factory’s Demanufacture: “Producers hear things differently sometimes, but Dino was vehemently opposed to doing it Colin’s way. It’s a little bit sad that it was allowed to roll and a whole bunch of money was spent, but Colin did contribute great stuff to that record.”
Dino Cazares (Fear Factory) talking about Colin Richardson’s mixing contribution: “Nothing against Colin, he’s brilliant, but I felt that we’d moved in a different direction. If he’d mixed it, it would’ve sounded like a typical metal record, and we needed to be outside the box. The first mix was HORRIBLE; the keyboards weren’t in the forefront, and we wanted them LOUD, so we took back control of the record. We started mixing the album with Rhys and Greg Reely. The first song that Greg mixed, we were like – Oh my God, this is it.”
Pop Cult Master 