DRAGONFORCE Guitarist: The Magazines That Gave Us S**t Are Finally Starting To Accept Us

October 7, 2008

Rushonrock.com recently conducted an interview with guitarist Herman Li of the British extreme epic power metallers DRAGONFORCE. An excerpt from the chat follows below.

Rushonrock.com: In the past you've claimed everyone thought DRAGONFORCE was a joke. Why?

Herman: I think that when we started out there was a perception, from people who don't know about music, that everything under the banner of metal had to include shouting, screaming and growling at some point. We spent 10 years trying to persuade people different and to join that scene would have been the easy way out. It was like if you play guitar solos and your singer's good then you're gay or pussy or something. The people who said that just had the wrong idea about what metal always was and always will be. There was a time when IRON MAIDEN weren't popular but they always stuck to their guns and we did the same.

Rushonrock.com: Why have opinions changed?

Herman: I don't really know. The great classic bands are back and I think people have a better understanding of what heavy metal is all about. People do get influenced by the printed press and that's a fact. The same magazines that gave us so much shit for so many years are finally starting to accept us and that's played a part. Everyone always said I was rubbish as a guitarist anyway, even when I was a kid. So the criticism's never bothered me. The other kids said I played widdly diddly wanking music but you just have to do what you want to do. I'm mates with Adam Jones from TOOL and one day I told him that when their band came out I couldn't even play the guitar. He asked me if I liked the music and I said, "No, it's shit." But for a while that was what metal was all about.

Rushonrock.com: Where are your metal roots?

Herman: As a kid I liked the usual stuff — MAIDEN, DREAM THEATER and SLAYER — so you can see where I've always been coming from. I got my first DREAM THEATER T-shirt when they played the Marquee in London but the last time I saw them they were at Wembley Arena earlier this year. They've come a long way and we're following hot on their heels.

Read the entire interview from Rushonrock.com.

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