Bullet for my Valentine - Entering the sandman
"Its 10 am over here, first thing, pretty sunny."
So goes the weather report from Wales, on the appropriate date for those in the know, of Friday the 13th of April, 2006.
I'm talking to Matthew Tuck frontman for the mega-metal-beasts, Bullets For My Valentine.
Tuck is taking a well earned break from his usual breakneck pace of international tour dates, releases, studio recording, and general rock 'n' roll lifestyle.
With growing popularity the band will soon be embarking on a schedule not dissimilar to their heroes, Metallica, a band they will soon be sharing a bill with.
"Because of Metallica I picked up a guitar - I wouldn't have started playing if it wasn't for them."
The band were honoured to do a cover of "Welcome Home (Sanitarium)" on the remastered CD, a tribute
commemorating the 20th anniversary of the release Metallica's of Master of Puppets, available as a bonus with Kerang.
"When we got offered the Kerang thing it was just a no-brainer, of course we said yes straight away...
We've heard that Lars is talking about it and likes it."
With the recent UK release of their latest album The Poison, following supports for US metal giants Chimaira on the UK leg of their tour, along with a fistful of great new clips, including the powerful "All these things I Hate" the Bullets can only gain velocity from here.
There's certainly no rest for the wicked, beginning with a hectic schedule in the US in May with Walls of Jericho and Roses are Red then through Europe and the US with Guns n Roses, followed by Japan/Australia later in the year, but not too late.
As for the band's music, which has been described "Darkly Romantic", Turk has this to say.
"I have strong political views on things, but I don't see fit to inflict them on kids, and the bands following, I try to keep that separate. I just tend to focus on things I know, relationships, and
emotional feelings within them."
For a band this fast on the rise it's easy to let things get out of your control, but for Turk, remaining true to their sound is something they wont relinquish the reigns on.
"We don't let producers change our sound. We don't like being told what to do by producers. We do our
own thing. We're very strong about that. Working with Colin Richardson was just great, he became a good
friend in the end... He is just the sweetest greatest guy. Sometimes he would make suggestions when he had an idea of how things should sound but he's just such a great guy he didn't mind when we said no."
"In the upcoming DVD we're working on at the moment, they'll be lots of uncut footage, backstage stuff
stuff like that. It also contains lots of live concert footage like from the gig at Brixton bout five
thousand there, like we had about 18 different cameras taking different angles. But no, there should be
some pretty good juicy uncut stuff...The earlier clips like for "Hand"(of Blood) and 'Words to Choke
Upon", like we just put them together, they were just done on home DVD's. Now things are different of
course."
Bullets for My Valentine, with The Poison at any good record store near you.
