FIVE FINGER DEATH PUNCH Drummer Doesn't Take Band's Success For Granted

Recoil magazine recently conducted an interview with drummer Jeremy Spencer of Las Vegas metallers FIVE FINGER DEATH PUNCH. A couple of excerpts from the chat follow below.

Recoil: You've announced that you'll be releasing your new album, "The Wrong Side Of Heaven And The Righteous Side Of Hell Volume 2" on November 19. How much do you plan to premiere from that disc on this current tour? How much will you balance material from both of your new discs this year with all the material you have to pull from now?

Jeremy: Yeah, like you said, "Volume 2" comes out November 19, and we are playing a song, which is the first song and single off the record, a song called "Battle Born", and we are playing some songs off "Volume 1" as well as some of the older hits. We just try to keep it well balanced. We don't want to bombard people with too much new stuff. They're there because of the songs that they've already grown to like, from the past or whatever. So we try to balance it. We definitely get some stuff off the new record, but you don't want to focus solely on the new record because people will be disappointed that they didn't get to hear songs that they came to hear, you know.

Recoil: When you first started writing for these albums, I've read that you guys wrote more on the road leading into this album than you had before. How do you think writing on the road led you to coming up with so many songs and give them the kind of energy they have?

Jeremy: Well, I don't know if they're more energetic or whatever. We wanted to keep our creative muscle going, because when you stop using that, it's tough to rev it up again. And then when you have album deadlines… we always want to be prepared. And then there's a lot of down time on the road, when you're not doing press and stuff, or playing the shows, you've got hours to sit around, so we figured we might as well put it to good use, because we always like to be working. So if we'd ever got inspired, we'd get in the portable studio and lay down ideas, and when we came off the road we had a handful of good ones. And then we went into the studio really focused and hungry to record, and then we got up to twenty four, twenty five songs. So then it was tough deciding which ones were going to make the record. We didn't want to take any of them off because we felt they fit so well together, and they're so well-rounded as a body of work that we decided, "Hey, you know what, let's make it two albums." So that's what we did.

Recoil: What did it mean to you as a band to have "Volume 1" debut at No. 2 [on the Billboard 200] when it came out in July?

Jeremy: Oh, it was awesome. Any time heavy music gets recognized on that kind of a scale, it helps to open the door for all kinds of other bands that are heavier and stuff like that. For people to buy our record in this day and age, when people really aren't buying records — they're either stealing them or downloading them for free or whatever — it's an honor, we're grateful, and we don't take it for granted. I'm just thrilled that people are into the band. It's given me a career. It's awesome.

Recoil: With all three of your previous records going gold and "Volume 1" doing sell, what do you say to all the people who say that nobody buys albums, especially metal albums, anymore? Clearly your fans have proved that wrong.

Jeremy: Well, I mean if they want to look on my wall there're a couple big plaques hanging, so somebody's buying our record. [laughs] Overall sales are down for everyone, without a doubt, and the Internet has done that to the industry. But you have to adapt, and it is what it is, and you just try to make the best record that you can, and the records that you make are honest, and hope that people buy them. Get out there, get in their faces, do shows, interact with them. Do whatever you can to sell your record. It's tough, but you've got to do it.

Read the entire interview at Recoil magazine.