By Tim Henderson
"Of course I wanted to," he adds with a fire in his eyes. "I mean it's a great opportunity. Great musicians, a pro organization and I had met a few of the guys before and hit it off. First of all, my #1 concern, 'Can I remember 20 - 30 songs this quick?' I was sitting here the next day waiting for FedEx because Chris (Caffery) said, 'Yeah, I couriered you out some CDs and we'll pick the songs later,' which was freaking me out because I needed to know exactly what songs to do. The courier never came. So I finally got the stuff about five days after that and within a week I was on a plane to New York and did four or five rehearsals (their rehearsals would have totaled up to 1.2 Annihilator rehearsals!). After the first rehearsal, they were like, 'Ah, no problem, this is great.' I was actually very nervous about it until the first show at the Rock Machina in Spain was over with and then after that it was like, 'Whew, OK, I did it.' It doesn't matter if people are telling you, 'Yeah, you can do it' or 'It should be a piece of cake.' I am pretty damn thorough with Annihilator and I wanted to bring in the same work ethic to this gig."
"Wacken was sort of like a building block on this Savatage trip," Waters continues. "That was being billed and built as the most important show on the tour for them. A lot of people were there and it was sort of like a make or break for them, as far as setting up the anticipation for their next CD. Of course that put a little pressure on me because, well I know I'm not a front man in this band but I still didn't want to be the guy that people looked at and went, 'Hmmm, does he fit? Can he play as well as some of the guys whose position he is in?' Pitrelli, Caffery and Skolnick are great players but I definitely discovered one of metal's most under-rated guitarists: Criss Oliva."
ANNIHILATOR'S JEFF WATERS - "Musical Slut!" Page 3