ACCEPT Guitarist: 'I'm Honestly Surprised How Quickly The New Songs Are Catching On'

Mark Kadzielawa of 69 Faces Of Rock recently conducted an interview with guitarist Wolf Hoffmann and vocalist Mark Tornillo of reformed heavy metal legends ACCEPT. A couple of excerpts from the chat follow below.

69 Faces Of Rock: The original ACCEPT did bunch of festival appearances back in 2005. How did it things go from there?

Wolf: We got to do these shows, but only for a limited amount of time. We all felt it was a pity because we could've continued for quite some time. There was a big demand for the band then as there is now. We could've gone to South America, and continue touring for many more weeks, months, and what-not. Udo said he didn't want to do it, and that was it.

69 Faces Of Rock: Was the 2005 experience enjoyable? Was the chemistry good?

Wolf: Absolutely. It wasn't as good as it is now, but it was OK. I think we got along pretty good. I strongly felt it could've kept it going. We should've done this regularly for the next few years, again and again. Udo [Dirkschneider] always felt like he didn't want to because he felt it was a direct competition to his band. And we always felt like why you couldn't do both? You could've easily do U.D.O. and ACCEPT. I had no problem with that, but he did. He didn't want to. He said, "Nobody will want to see U.D.O. when I do ACCEPT," and he left it at that. But in any case, he wasn't interested in continuing, and that's why he never came back.

69 Faces Of Rock: Since 2005 very little was heard from the other ACCEPT members. What was going on throughout this time?

Wolf: We didn't do anything because we didn't have a singer, and we never thought there was ever gonna be anymore activities under the name ACCEPT. And then the big miracle happened that one day we walked into Mark Tornillo, met him. And we were like, "Where did this guy come from?" We've never heard of him, and we never auditioned people. We weren't even looking for anyone. I mean the band was pretty much done at that point. But, since we've met him, it was almost too good to be true. So, we were like why not try it with him? If Udo doesn't want to do it, why not try it with Mark Tornillo. He's got as good of a voice, maybe even better, and he is a great guy, so what do we have to lose? Otherwise we have nothing.

69 Faces Of Rock: Were there any worries going into this? After all, the previous experience with David Reece back in 1989 was not a good one.

Wolf: Right, we did. No, we weren't because it was a completely different starting point this time. Everybody else was skeptic, that's for sure. The whole world was skeptic. Everybody said: "They've tried it before and it can't be done, no Udo, no ACCEPT," and all this kind of stuff. And now all of those people are quiet because it's such a big success, and people are really seeing how good this is, and they love the new record. There are a lot of people coming back to us saying they were wrong. People say to us now: "I should've at least listen to it." And really in retrospect, that's all I ask for everybody in the future to do. Just give stuff a chance, wait until you hear something. You can't just judge something by the idea.

69 Faces Of Rock: Mark, you've certainly had big shoes to fill, and met with a lot of that opposition we just spoke of. How did you deal with that?

Mark: We just needed to write a good record, that's the only fight we've had. We needed to go out and prove them wrong. That's all you can do. After it was all done, we've converted a lot of the naysayers, let's put it this way. I think so, I really didn't know what I was getting myself into when we went to Europe. I wasn't sure if I should be wearing some protective outfit, but it was not like that at all. The people were just so happy to see the band, and I don't think they cared who was singing at that point.

69 Faces Of Rock: And how are you doing vocally with the ACCEPT classics?

Mark: I'm putting my own little spin on them. We try to make them sound as close to the records as possible. I mean that's what I want to hear when I go and see bands. I wanna a hear the classic sound the way it was supposed to be.

69 Faces Of Rock: The new songs certainly have a lot of great hooks, and will be considered classics years from now.

Wolf: Well, that's what I hope for. That's always been our goal, and I'm honestly surprised how quickly the new songs are catching on. Usually it took a while for any new songs to catch on, an slowly but surely the good ones will filter themselves out. In the past tours you could definitely tell a difference from a song from "Breaker" or a newer tracks, but in case of this tour it's almost the same. It's bizarre. There is little bit of a difference because not everybody who comes to the shows knows the new record, but the majority of the people we have coming to the shows enjoy the new material very much. It's crazy!

69 Faces Of Rock: I felt your latter output toward the end of the '90s ("Death Row", "Predator") was losing the focus, and started to sound a little bit disjointed. By the time you've released "Predator", the identity of the band was in serious question.

Wolf: Yes, we were losing that focus. Absolutely, we felt that too. I wouldn't go that far, but I know what you mean. But those were different times, and we weren't just trying to do just the same traditional stuff people were used to. We've tried to go with the times, and we tried to find a new identity in a way. We were sort of lost there for a while. Heavy metal as it was in the '90s was dead, and nobody showed much interest in it. It was a weird time, and everybody was fishing. The '80s were just behind us, and nobody wanted to acknowledge that decade anymore. People were moving on to something new, there was a new direction in music. You had all these grunge bands, and we were just trying to find our way in this world back then, and didn't quite get there.

Metal Fanzine's Ken Kitt has uploaded multi-camera video footage (see below) of ACCEPT performing the song "Metal Heart" on October 8, 2010 at the Agora in Cleveland, Ohio. The show, which also included performances by KING'S X and Cleveland's own SHOK PARIS, was professionally filmed and recorded for possible future release.