SW: Your latest album, Poets & Madmen is now on Nuclear Blast Records...
JON: The reason for that is Savatage was just getting lost in the shuffle, especially with Trans-Siberian doing so well. I pretty much foreseen that Savatage wasn't gonna get that much attention here in America on Atlantic, because their whole focus is on T.S.O. and I can't blame them for that, after all, they are a business. Savatage has been so successful in other parts of the world and now it's time to focus back on America. And things are looking good...the first half of our tour in America we did 30 shows and they went very well. And I saw a lot of young faces out there, which is also very refreshing. I'm very optimistic about the future of hard rock here in America. It seems to be making a strong comeback. I was talking with friends of mine, like Ronnie Dio, and they all noticed this resurgence of people coming out to shows again. I think perhaps people are getting tired of people who can't play their instruments, and it's time to get back to seeing some guys who can work and who can play. You know, quality music will stand the test of time, and there's a lot of great bands out there but, frankly, the musicianship in my opinion has tragically taken a downfall in the last ten years.

SW: Obviously, in Europe Savatage still remains a huge metal powerhouse!
JON: Huge. We play football stadiums there, whereas we're playing clubs here in America.

SW: I've noticed in Europe, a lot of the young kids are really into traditional power metal, and there are more and more newer traditional metal bands popping up all over Europe.
JON: It's surging over there, getting bigger and bigger. It's really cool, they are really into their hard rock over there.

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