FORBIDDEN Guitarist Interviewed by METAL ASSAULT (Audio)

On October 6, Aniruddh "Andrew" Bansal of Metal Assault conducted an interview with guitarist Craig Locicero of reactivated San Francisco Bay Area thrashers FORBIDDEN. You can now listen to the chat in three parts below.

"Forsaken At The Gates" a brand new song from FORBIDDEN, is available for streaming at the band's MySpace page. The track comes off the group's new album, "Omega Wave", which will be released in Europe on October 22 and in North America on October 26 via Nuclear Blast Records. It was recorded at Sonic Room/Audio Voyage Studios in Livermore, California, produced by FORBIDDEN guitarist/songwriter Craig Locicero with Tim Narducci, and mixed by Sean Beavan (SLAYER, MARILYN MANSON, NINE INCH NAILS).

FORBIDDEN's current lineup consists of Russ Anderson on vocals, Craig Locicero on guitar, Steve Smyth on guitar, Matt Camacho on bass and Mark Hernandez on drums.

"'Forsaken At The Gates' is FORBIDDEN's new thrash anthem for the 2010s and beyond," commented guitarist Craig Locicero.

"If we could go back in a time machine to when we called it a day in 1997, there still would have been no way that we could have written 'Forsaken…' back then. We needed the distance and hindsight to write this record and had to get a grip on what the hell FORBIDDEN was all about when we started.

"Our vision is clear. We are a thrash metal band! 'Forsaken At The Gates' says it all.

"If I were to compare 'Forsaken At The Gates' to any of our old songs, it would be 'March Into Fire', which was one of the first songs that I'd ever written in my life. Ironically, 'Forsaken…' was the last song we'd written for 'Omega Wave'. Funny how things work.

"As far as the song itself, Mark was a fucking beast when we tracked it!

"I knew we had a monster on the first take; [there was] great energy and sense of urgency in his performance. It made one hell of a spine to connect all of the other moving parts to. Everyone blasted through their tracks with the same sense of urgency, too.

"Playing those riffs, my blood pumps harder then in any other song I've played on.

"It was an intense session to track and Matt cruises through the entire thing like a bulldozer! The solo section brings me back to the good 'ol days when trade-offs were all over the classic metal records we all love.

"I really love playing and writing with Steve; he makes me so much better and I think we make a great team.

"After that, it's Russ that's next fucking level! Tim and I got him fired up and locked him behind the glass until he sounded as crazed as they lyrics are intended to convey.

"The song itself is about turning away the masses from the numerous underground shelters around the planet that will try to seek protection from any natural or unnatural disaster that would effect all of us on the surface.

"The main line of the song says, 'Corpses laid out for the Rapture, New World Order buried in it's tomb.' In other words, if the surface isn't worth living on and the powers that be decide who lives in a canned air bunker for future generations to come... let them rot down there, that's not a world worth living in!"

Vocalist Russ Anderson added: "Looking back on recording our first album, 'Forbidden Evil', and recording, 'Omega Wave', there really is no comparison. During the recording of 'Forbidden Evil', we were in a time crunch and I sang the whole album in about one and a half days. Impossible some could say, but true. I was happy with the results because that gave the album its rawness that, in my opinion, goes down in history as true as a thrash album gets.

"'Omega Wave' was a slower recording process. I worked with Craig and Tim as my right-hand men and they know me. At times I think they were trying to 'slap me around' a little before the heavy songs like 'Forsaken At The Gates' to get me to approach the song with true aggression.

"You really should not be feeling love and flowers approaching a song like this. Not to say that was what I was thinking, but it helps to bring out the aggression of the song through the vocals.

"'Forsaken At The Gates' was easier for me than some of the others, only because it was the last song I recorded and was done in one session.

"By the time I was on the last of the songs, I had a lot of fire to breathe and did not want to stop.

"As far as my voice being deeper or better, I don't know, I tried to complement each song and be one with it, and to do that, you must be one with your voice. That is something I have strived for over the years and hope it comes across.

"I think that vocals can change or get better over time, like a fine wine. For instance, if you listen back to James Hetfield when he did 'Kill 'Em All', he most definitely has a more adolescent voice than on, say, '...And Justice For All'.

"Vocals are touchy things and definitely unpredictable from day to day. The only way I have found to have any control over it is to approach every song with its intended emotion, which is also the key to a good performance no matter how your voice is holding up that day. Point being, it's a human instrument that mirrors the soul.

"I truly gave it my all on 'Omega Wave' and I hope everyone will enjoy it as much as I enjoyed recording it.

"Hope to see you all on our United States tour that kicks off on the East Coast November 4th, ending on the West Coast on December 11th, 2010.

"Thank you in advance to those that support FORBIDDEN and buy the album.”

The cover artwork for "Omega Wave" by Kent Mathieu can be viewed below.

Songtitles set to appear on the new FORBIDDEN album are as follows:

* Alpha Century
* Forsaken At The Gates
* Swine
* Immortal Wounds
* Hopenosis
* Adapt Or Die
* Inhuman Race
* Behind The Mask
* Dragging My Casket
* Overthrow
* Omega Wave

Interview Part 1:

Interview Part 2:

Interview Part 3: