LIPS: The Interest In ANVIL 'Has Not Changed' Eight Years After Documentary Release

Canada's The Metal Voice recently conducted an interview with guitarist/vocalist Steve "Lips" Kudlow of legendary Canadian metallers ANVIL. You can now listen to the chat in the YouTube clip below.

Asked if there was been a drop in the level of interest in ANVIL since the acclaimed documentary "Anvil! The Story Of Anvil" first came out in 2008, Lips said: "The interest has not changed; I really don't think so. And in fact, actually, more people have seen the movie since. Plus the fact, it's moved, particularly in some countries, on to regular TV programming. I would say even more so now than ever, and I don't think that that's gonna dissipate anytime soon. Certainly, there are millions of people that have never seen the band that have seen the movie. So therefore we have an endless amount of work out there, theoretically. We're gonna be playing for the next fuckin'… until I die. And what does that mean? That means that I can make a living from being in ANVIL for the rest of my life."

Lips also refuted the suggestion that "Anvil! The Story Of Anvil" singlehandedly gave ANVIL a career. He said: "If the band was a lousy band and they just made a movie, it would have dissipated in a few weeks. And you can watch the dozens and dozens of… And even some of the big bands have tried to do documentaries and it's made no difference for their careers. And in fact, it's been detrimental."

He continued: "There's a number of reasons [that 'Anvil! The Story Of Anvil' connected with so many people] … First of all, you need to have been relevant enough. ANVILwere an inspiration to ANTHRAX, MEGADETH and METALLICA. We were one of their favorite bands. We still are one of their favorite bands. You can't hire Lars [Ulrich, METALLICA drummer] to sit in on your documentary and get him to say those things. He did that for free. In fact, all the members of all those bands did that for free. These are unique situations. Nobody can recreate that and think that they're gonna get the same results. Never mind the fact of how the documentary came to be to begin with."

Lips added: "If you take into consideration this was a fan [director Sacha Gervasi] that we let into our change room in 1982, grew up to be Steven Spielberg's screenwriter, came looking for his old friends that let him into that change room in '82, meets up with us and goes, 'I'm gonna make a movie about you.' That in itself is a story within itself that you can't recreate. You get what you put in in life. If we had closed the door on that 15-year-old kid in 1982, there would have been no ANVIL movie. I wouldn't have the success I do today. This has been sustained by good recordings and the band being a good band beyond just a movie."

ANVIL will release its new album, "Anvil Is Anvil", on February 26 worldwide (excluding Japan) via SPV/Steamhammer. The album will be available on digipak CD (incuding one bonus track and a poster),2LP gatefold clear version and as a digital download.

"Anvil Is Anvil" was recorded in October 2015 at Redhead 4 Studios in Pulheim, near Cologne, Germany, with producer Martin "Mattes" Pfeiffer. According to a press release, the CD is "an unambiguous, uncompromising recording, typical of this band. At the same time it's fresh, occasionally surprising and generally exciting through and through. A stalwart metal manifesto by a band who stand for authenticity and credibility like few others in this fast-lived business."