JEFF SCOTT SOTO On YNGWIE MALMSTEEN: 'Hopefully Some Day We Will Patch Things Up'

SONS OF APOLLO vocalist Jeff Scott Soto spoke with Eric Blair of "The Blairing Out With Eric Blair Show" at the fourth annual "Bowl For Ronnie" celebrity bowling party on October 25 in Studio City, California. The full interview can be seen below. A few excerpts follow (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET).

On how fronting SONS OF APOLLO has affected his career:

Jeff: "It showed me, at the age of 52, it's actually possible to reinvent yourself. The tour was amazing, and it did give me hope that a band like this could actually make waves and actually do something in this day and age. Rock n' roll, you've got to carve your own path. You can't just rely on the fact of where you came from, what you did before. The fact that we were able to do that with this band means a lot."

On the band's future plans:

Jeff: "We are going in for album number two in January, and I don't think the album's going to see the light of day until early 2020, because we can't tour next year. We want to save it for when we can tour. It doesn't make sense to put the album out and not support it, so I think 2020 is when the new album and the next tour's going to be. Everybody in this band has a bunch of different other outlets and different things they do, so everybody's going back to their usual routines and rituals, because without doing that, they won't be able to commit another year to SONS OF APOLLO like we were able to do this year."

On whether he was "surprised" by the reception to the group:

Jeff: "You can't say 'surprised,' because in general, you kind of expect it based on the pedigree that's in this band, but it doesn't mean that it's going to happen. A lot of 'supergroups' out there — a lot of these pairings and matchings — it's not an automatic thing. You still have to find your way and you still have to carve your way. Luckily, I think we got past that point. I think the next time we come out, people are going to see us as the entity that it actually deserves to be... I think the consensus in the beginning was, 'I don't think this is real. I don't think it's going to last. I don' know if this is going to be a real band.' I think people were expecting it to kind of dissipate, and the fact that we just came off a very successful 2018 tour, I think the next time around, they're going to see that we actually did grow. [Now,] they're going to expect the next level of where we're going to take it to. In the beginning stage, it was more of like, 'Let's go check this out, because I don't know if this is real.' When they walked out of there, believe me, they knew it was real."

On the group's chemistry:

Jeff: "That comes by the trials and tribulations of playing together, learning each other's chemistry on stage, the show kind of becoming and forming... all those things have to happen with the amount of time that you put onto a tour. You can't build that by just going on the road in two or three weeks and say, 'Okay, now we have the nucleus of the band.' It took us months to finally reach that position where we actually feel like we could go out there blind right now and be able to kill it. The pedigree in this band is so rich. Everybody's at the top of their game, but it doesn't necessarily mean that it's going to work. On paper, it's unbelievable, but in reality, it doesn't mean it's going to happen, and we made it happen."

On what to expect musically from the band in the future:

Jeff: "We proved that we can pretty much do anything, so I would like to see us do a little more of anything, as opposed to just what's expected of us. I think we're going to be able to pull that off on the next record... I don't think we need to be [more progressive]. What I love about this band is where it came from, [and that] we went out and proved that we could play virtually anything. Now I think it's time for us to kind of prove like what QUEEN and VAN HALEN did when they proved that they were the baddest in the land. They could tap into other things that you wouldn't expect them to do, and I think that's the next step for SONS OF APOLLO."

On his plans for 2019:

Jeff: "Because I have pretty much 2019 off after we've recorded the new album, I've got a new SOTO album we're working on that's coming out around springtime. I'm just going to follow up with SOTO. That was a dream of mine that I've been pushing since 2015. We did two records; we, unfortunately, lost our bass player, David Z, last year; but now we're back. We've got a new bass player, Tony Dickinson, in the band. I want to prove, the same as SONS OF APOLLO, that it wasn't just, 'Let's see if it happens. If it doesn't happen, we'll walk away [and] try something new.' I'm going to keep chiseling at this because I know we've got something here."

On the recent comments by onetime bandmate Yngwie Malmsteen about not needing a lead singer:

Jeff: "I think he's right. He doesn't need a lead singer. He doesn't even need a band. He can do everything himself, and God bless him for it. I'm not going to fall into the whole fodder of anti-Yngwie and putting him down the way he seems to be putting everybody else down. If that's what he wants, God bless him. Follow that path. I'm doing my own thing. I can't read into his head, and there really is no relationship left between us, unfortunately. I would like there to be — I don't like enemies in the world; I don't like unrest. I want peace and love. We're a brotherhood. Especially in the music business, it's supposed to be a brotherhood. I want everybody to get along, and hopefully some day, we will patch things up. For now, it's broken, and God bless him — just do what he's doing."

Soto sang on Yngwie's first two albums, 1984's "Rising Force" and 1985's "Marching Out".

SONS OF APOLLO recently completed the final leg of their tour in support of their debut album, "Psychotic Symphony", which was released in October 2017 via InsideOut.