Live-Metal.Net - Interviews: Trivium

August 17, 2009

The Live-Metal.net crew began the 2009 Rockstar Energy Drink Mayhem Festival with a trip back in time. In February 2006, Greg Maki interviewed Trivium bassist Paolo Gregoletto—the first interviewed ever conducted for the site. Both Trivium and Live-Metal have kept busy since then. Trivium has released two albums and already is thinking about a third. A massive U.S. headlining tour—their first in three years—is set for the fall. Greg and Jeff Maki sat down with Paolo when the Mayhem Festival came to the Nissan Pavilion in Bristow, Va., to talk about Trivium’s latest album (Shogun), the Mayhem Festival, the upcoming headliner, the negativity the band has faced from many metal fans and more.

Greg Maki: When we first started this site about three and a half years ago, you were the first interview I did.

Paolo Gregoletto: Really? Awesome.

It’s been incredible. It’s been probably one of the most fun summers we’ve ever had as a band. I gotta say, every night we have parties and the shows have been great. So this has been awesome.

Every band’s really been killing it live that we’ve had a chance to see. I think Black Dahlia has been slaying it. They’re tight as shit. And God Forbid, man, that band has always been tight. The first show I ever played at club, before I even joined Trivium, I was like 15, they were touring on Determination and my band got to open for them. And they were tight as shit back then, and they’ve only gotten better. I think that’s a band that people need to really give some attention to ‘cause I think they’re tight and they deserve everything.

Greg: How are you handling all the heat this summer? It’s pretty hot today.

This isn’t that bad, man. I’m from south Florida , so it gets humid as shit. It’s not too bad, as long as you stay hydrated. That’s the main thing, just drink as much water as you can.

Greg: I’m sure this [pointing at Paolo’s shaved head] is cooling you off a little, too.

This is definitely, definitely helping me. I fuckin’ got sick of hair and I made the right choice this summer.

Jeff: Trivium’s been on a lot of these festival tours now, Ozzfest, Sounds of the Underground and now the Mayhem Fest. How would you rank the Mayhem Fest with the other ones you’ve been on? Not just here, but overseas, everywhere.

Hmmm … I would just count the States because the States ones are so different from overseas. The festivals overseas are individual festivals where these are big package things. I’d have to say, this one and Ozzfest have been the most beneficial for us, but I have to say, this one has the best vibe overall. I think between getting along with the people that are actually running this festival and all the bands getting along, this is hands down the best.

Greg: When you have 30 minutes to play and three albums, with some longer songs on the new album, is it hard to put together the set list?

No, it’s not that hard. We’ve also got Ember to Inferno, as well, which we’re actually playing a song off of. There’s a killer song on there called “When All Light Dies” and we played it over in Europe . It went over so well and we knew that most of the people had probably never heard that song in their life, so we’re like, “Well, it’s a good song, it’s got some good riffs, let’s put it on the Mayhem set list.” It’s been going down really well every day. It’s hard to fit in all four CDs, but we’re just playing songs that go over well live and just impact and have a lot of energy.

Jeff: Most bands will say that their new album is the best, it’s the heaviest, it’s the greatest. In your opinion, what do you think is your most well-rounded effort of all of them?

I still think Ascendancy is. I think Shogun has some of the best shit we’ve written, for sure. But I think Ascendancy flows very well. When we made that record, we weren’t really thinking about anything and I think that definitely helps. That’s one thing, like you can never go back to that. I wasn’t in the band and neither was [guitarist] Corey [Beaulieu] when Ember was written, but I’m sure it was along the same lines. You have forever to write those first albums. You don’t have any pressure, no one’s expecting anything. So you’re just not thinking and you make that.

But with Shogun I think [producer] Nick [Raskulinecz] definitely helped us to kinda get back to the roots and get back to the fundamentals of jamming as a band, being a band again when you’re writing, and I think that was something that we were missing on The Crusade. I think that’s why Shogun is a step back in the right direction. But I still think overall Ascendancy was the best—from start to finish, it flows well together. But I think the next CD, we’re gonna top it. We already started it.

Greg: The title track on Shogun, I think it’s an amazing song. Did you set out from the beginning to do an epic like that or did it just kind of come out?

Yeah. [Vocalist/guitarist] Matt [Heafy] really brought a lot of that stuff to the table. I think he wanted to make a song that was like that, very epic, a lot of changing parts. The whole middle part, we’d never done anything like that before. It was definitely something new for us. At first, I wasn’t 100 percent sold on having a song that long because I’m really ADD with things. I like stuff to get to the point. But we did a lot of work on that song and the middle part ended up coming out amazing. I’m really stoked that we did the song the way it is because I think without it Shogun wouldn’t’ve been as good a CD as I think it is. We worked really hard on it. I think that was a great ending to the CD. The whole album overall was—we tried to make an epic vibe, a lot of longer songs and a little bit more progressive stuff here and there, so I that song kind of rounds out the CD pretty well.

Jeff: I don’t want to go in a negative direction, but on the Internet especially, there’s a lot of just people in general, metal fans that seem to kinda put you guys down for whatever reason. I don’t know if you’ve heard the term “mallcore” and all these kinds of things like that—which I don’t agree with at all. Do you think you’re winning over these fans?

Jeff: Or is their mindset is that they will never accept your band either way?

Those people can go fuck themselves for all I care, dude. Anyone that wouldn’t want to have their band’s shirts in a mall or anyone that wouldn’t want to be on the radio—we’re not a radio band, but I’m just saying hypothetically—be on the radio, be a bigger band, do tours like this, get to see incredible bands that have influenced us, influenced all these bands, share a great summer with all our fans—if you want to hate on that, you go right ahead. But it’s like, we’re doing this and we love it and you can never take that from us. So like I said, they can go fuck themselves.

Jeff: I never understood it. It’s not just you guys, it’s other bands, as well.

It is what it is, man. It comes with anything. Compared to someone that runs for politics, the kind of negative shit we get is not even close. It’s not like we’re on TV, in the tabloids or anything. It’s just dudes on Internet sites that more than 99 percent of the world has never heard, saying that I suck because I have a shaved head or something stupid like that. Maybe if I started dating a pop star, then something’ll happen.

Actually, that would be kind of funny. I’d like to see what the tabloid life is like for a little bit. Just 15 minutes. I just need 15 minutes of that and that’s it.

Jeff: You’re well into the touring cycle for Shogun now, but have you guys been writing any new material?

Yes. We have tons. We have a lot of new material. Me, Matt and Corey have been just recording it all on our computers, programming some pretty basic beats just to kind of get a vibe. We’ve never really done that before and I think it’s kind of helping us see, does this feel right, does this work. We’re all kind of exchanging ideas and asking for input, and I think it’s definitely helping us revise the songs and make them flow a lot better so that when we do get into the studio and start rehearsing with each other, there’s gonna be a lot more complete thoughts there. I’m pretty excited to start this next one. I think we might actually do a new song in December or January, ‘cause I heard I we might have a chance to do one for a game. So there might be a new song out earlier than we’re gonna do the CD. I really don’t think we’re gonna do the CD til—record it—til next fall ‘cause we’ve still got a lot of touring left to do on this.

Greg: Yeah, you’ve got a U.S. headliner coming up. It’s been a while since you had one of those.

It’s been since 2006 when you did the interview, I believe, and really stoked. Sixty-three dates. It’s split in two. The first half is Whitechapel, Darkest Hour, Dirge Within. The second half is Chimaira, Whitechapel and I think Dirge Within, as well, on that. We’re hitting everywhere. We covering all the places we hit on the co-headlining tour with All That Remains, the support run we did with Slipknot and this tour, as well. So we’re trying to cover all the bases that we’ve hit so far and hopefully get a lot of the people that saw us and were into our band at the show, get ‘em to come back out and check us out again.

Hmmm … Just keep checking the Trivium sites for all the dates that are gonna be announced. By the end of this month, most of them will be announced. The reason we couldn’t announce it all right away was because we’re playing some of the cities and it would kind of interfere with that. That’s why there’s only 25 dates up out of 63.