I feel like I've matured more musically than I have personally. But I totally embrace what becoming older has to offer. I find the wisdom that comes with each passing year is a trip.
I was really, really wild in my early twenties and a bit self-destructive.
My musical tastes change every week.
Deep Purple definitely belongs in the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. 'Cause they had great songs, great musicianship, they had an impact, and they're a huge influence on the heavy metal community as a whole.
It really shocked me just to hear of the fans' response to 'St. Anger' not having guitar solos.
When I see my kids totally into their Legos, it brings me back to the days I was hanging out and playing with my monster models. It brings me there in a second.
If a guitar is too easy for me to play, it makes me too laid back. I like to battle with my guitar.
I've learned that there's a signature Metallica sound, and if we stray too far from that, our fans get impatient, or they just don't understand, or they miss the point. And I'm not saying that's a good thing or a bad thing; it's just something we have to contend with.
One thing I've noticed over the years is that young players - I mean 10- and 12-year-olds - really like my guitar style. There's something in my guitar style that they totally can latch onto and learn quickly, and then go from there to your Yngwie Malmsteens or your Steve Vais or whatever.
There's something about a wah pedal that really gets my gut going! People will probably say, 'He's just hiding behind the wah.' But that isn't the case. It's just that those frequencies really bring out a lot of aggression in my approach.
Getting sequestered and not really knowing what to do with your time and then discovering, 'Oh, I can watch a bunch of horror movies' has probably played out in a lot of people's discovery of horror.
I love 'True Blood.' I love 'The Walking Dead.' Those are fantastic series.
Although I'm a lead guitarist, I'd say that a good 95 percent of my time onstage is spent playing rhythm.
When you're first starting out, there's always the temptation to hide behind distortion because it lets you get away with murder. But, when it comes to rhythm work, you've gotta back off that gain control a bit, especially if you're playing with another guitarist.
A good horror movie should have peaks and valleys, a good horror movie should move you emotionally; a good horror movie should be exciting to watch and energizing in a weird kind of way.
For a while I was collecting Satan and devil stuff - you know, anything that had to do with old Beelzebub or Lucifer. But I had to put the brakes on it, because there's a lot of stuff out there, and the collection was just growing too quickly.
The same sensations that you get in heavy metal are in horror movies. Heavy metal sounds evil and horror movies are evil, ha ha!
Technology has given us convenience, but at the same time it's making musicians work harder in that if you really want to make money making music and selling albums, you have to go out there and perform. And hope you sell stuff like merch, and get on YouTube, and all the other ancillary sort of things that go along with that.
I've always loved horror, I've always loved collecting, I've always loved weird and macabre things, and I've always loved conventions. So what could be better than having your own Fear FestEviL where all those great and crazy things can be enjoyed by like-minded people under one pretty cool roof? Nothing!
Much of my playing is rhythmic and choppy; I use a lot of double stops. The wah just accents all those stops and chops and brings out the rhythmic aspect that much more.
