DIVINE HERESY - Drink The Fifth! Page 3
by Martin Popoff

"One of the hardest parts I did was on 'Rise Of The Scorned'. It wasn't that difficult to play, but what made it difficult is that I used a ten-string acoustic guitar, a ten-string classical acoustic guitar. It was a challenge to play, because my thumb couldn't fit on the back of the neck. Because the neck was so huge. That I had to just do it with my hand on the front, on the top of the neck, which was kind of hard to do. Also one of the biggest challenges was because it was a low tuning. That song is tuned down to A, so that's the reason why I had to use the ten-string acoustic, just to get the tuning right. The other biggest challenge was finding the time to create this band. I had so many obstacles that I had to go through, just to put this band together. At the time, I had Brujeria and Asesino that I was working on, and that took a lot of my time. And Roadrunner All-Stars came out, and that took about a year of my time. So the greatest challenge was finding the time to create this record."

And then there was gallivanting through the southern hemisphere... "Yes, all through Argentina, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, all through Mexico. Those are great territories that I haven't really been able to go to with my previous bands. And just seeing the success out there was amazing. And you know, just being where they speak Spanish, basically, and... the food is different (laughs). What I notice is that out there, sometimes the fans are a little more passionate about the music. Sometimes in America, we're very spoiled because we get to see a lot of shows, especially in Los Angeles. People don't react. A lot of people may come, but it's not as crazy. You go to Mexico and people cry and try to grab you. It's like the Beatles, know what I mean? They're just a lot more passionate about it. It's crazy. What it is, is probably they don't get it as often. And I've seen dudes literally get the daylights beaten out of them, bleeding everywhere. And no one even cares to help them. They just leave them there. I've seen shit like that. Just crazy, man. You know, out there in Mexico, anything goes (laughs)."

Did you notice any strange trends in what kinds of metal they are into down there?

"You know how here in the United States and certain parts of the world, where, music comes in cycles? Maybe punk was big in the '70s, '80s, and then it became big again in the '90s, and so on. Same thing with thrash metal; it's getting popular now again. The grinding death metal is getting popular and so on. But in parts of Latin America, those things never died. That's what the main difference is."

DIVINE HERESY - Drink The Fifth! Page 4