ACCEPT's WOLF HOFFMANN On AXL ROSE Fronting AC/DC: 'What I Heard Sounded Pretty Damn Good'

Australia's Sticks For Stones recently conducted an interview with guitarist Wolf Hoffmann of German/American metallers ACCEPT. You can now listen to the chat in the YouTube clip below. A couple of excerpts follow (transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET).

On AC/DC's decision to hire Axl Rose to front the band after doctors told Brian Johnson he faced a total loss of hearing if he did not stop touring immediately:

Wolf: "It's not really up to me to have an opinion on that. I imagine that they had good reasons why they went with Axl. AC/DC is an amazing machinery that's been successful for so many years, so who am I to comment on their decision? I have no insights [and I don't] know [any] more [about it] than you do, and out of respect to other musicians, I wouldn't dare of having an opinion on it, or publicly voicing it anyhow. I'm sure they had good reasons why they went with Axl. Quite honestly, everybody said… I've heard a lot of people bitching about Axl and stuff, and I thought what I heard sounded pretty damn good to me. Everybody was saying, 'You can never…' But it kind of reminded me a lot of what people were saying when we started with [current ACCEPT singer] Mark Tornillo. At the end of the day, you always have to sort of wait and see and hear and listen and be objective about it, and then have an opinion, not beforehand."

On whether it was a dream come true opening for AC/DC back in 2010:

Wolf: "As you can imagine, man. I've been an AC/DC fan since the '70s. When I first heard about 'em, I got all their albums — still on vinyl back then, of course — and I've been hooked ever since. So to actually be on the same stage with them, and to be on their stage, it was amazing. It was really fantastic. It was two outdoor shows we did in Germany. I guess it was about eighty thousand people each, or sixty, but huge. It was amazing. [I] never met the guys, [I] never got to talk with them. We had to leave while they were playing, and they just came, and I guess they always do, just one minute before the show and they went straight on stage and had no time for anything. And an army of stage managers kept everybody away. Of course, I wanted to go and pay our tribute and shake hands and all that, but it never got that far."

Hoffmann has just released his second solo album, titled "Headbangers Symphony", via Nuclear Blast. The effort is a collection of rock-guitar-driven interpretations of some of classical music's most loved compositions. Wolf took the main pieces, and then wrote riffs that fit them. Lastly, in the grand hard rock tradition, he layered a guitar solo over it. He shaped the sound into a quite adventurous elegance, but the key themes of the originals remained.