ICED EARTH's JON SCHAFFER Is Open To His Bandmates' Input When It Comes To Songwriting

ICED EARTH guitarist Jon Schaffer was recently interviewed by veteran U.K. rock journalist Malcolm Dome about the band's new album, "Incorruptible". You can now watch the chat below.

Asked if he is the leader of ICED EARTH and everyone else in the band takes cues from him or if they make joint decisions as a group about how to approach things, Schaffer said: "I am the leader of the band and [I've been] the driving force of the band since the very beginning. [But] that does not mean that I don't take in the input of the guys on anything, you know what I mean? But as far as starting a cycle… I'm the chief songwriter, so… What I did, for instance, on ['Incorruptible'], I talked to Stu [Block, ICED EARTH singer], and said, 'Hey, you've gotta give me some lyrical themes of where you wanna go, titles, subject matter, whatever,' because it's my job to create the soundscape for that. And I knew where I was gonna go with the direction of the songs I was gonna write lyrically. And so he sent me some titles, and then whatever resonates with me, I've gotta be inspired by it in order to create that landscape that really is sort of like the soundtrack of a movie — it's very, very important. And then the other guys will send me riff ideas, and if it's fitting in and if it's a cool part… Luke [Appleton, bass] wrote the majority of a song called 'Defiance' on this record. So it depends on the song and what the parts are doing, if they're inspiring me and I run with it and go somewhere else or whatever — it can happen in all different ways — but definitely it starts here and I drive it the whole way through."

"Incorruptible" was released on June 16 via Century Media. The cover artwork for the disc (as well as additional illustrations to every song) was created by David Newman-Stump from Skeleton Crew Tattoo (pencil illustrations) and Roy Young (colors).

Regarding how "Incorruptible" compares to previous ICED EARTH albums, Schaffer told Metal Wani: "They're all kind of their own thing, but I have a very strong gut feeling about this, and so does everybody in the band, that this is one of the really special ones. So I put it up there with 'The Dark Saga' [1996], 'Something Wicked This Way Comes' [1998], 'Dystopia' [2011] — it's in that league of records — so it's really gonna be something special, man. I know musicians always say that, but there is something going on here, so it's cool. We're all very excited about it."

ICED EARTH took a break from touring in 2015, primarily due to Schaffer's second cervical fusion surgery.

Longtime ICED EARTH drummer Brent Smedley returned to the band for the current recording and touring cycle. Smedley had to step down due to personal family reasons in 2013 shortly before the recording of "Plagues Of Babylon".