MARK TORNILLO Is 'Grateful' For His ACCEPT Gig: 'It's A Gift From God'

ACCEPT singer Mark Tornillo has confirmed to The Aquarian Weekly that he and his bandmates are "already writing a new album. [We're] working on it as we speak," he said.

"Writing is one of those things I like being under pressure to do it. Right now we're going at it slowly, going back and forth. We're working on a few new songs. Once we come off the road here in November, we'll start hitting it hard. Then we'll go back out in January."

Tornillo, who joined ACCEPT in 2009 as the replacement for the band's original lead singer, Udo Dirkscheider, added: "Just the opportunity to do this again is amazing. Before ACCEPT I was, for all intents and purposes, retired as a musician. I played with the EDGAR CAYSE BAND for a while. T.T. QUICK would do a reunion show once in a while, but that was it. I'm just grateful to be able to do this on this level at this age.

"God, I'm 68 years old. It's insane. It's a gift from God."

Tornillo can be heard on ACCEPT's last five studio albums: "Blood Of The Nations" (2010),"Stalingrad" (2012),"Blind Rage" (2014),"The Rise Of Chaos" (2017) and "Too Mean To Die" (2021).

In a 2018 interview with Metal Shock Finland, Tornillo stated about what it was like to first join ACCEPT: "It was frightening. When we first announced what was going to happen, there was really not many people on board with it. Online, there was a lot of naysayers, a lot of badmouthing. It was very disheartening. We all sat down and said, 'Look, we have to make an amazing record, or else we're gonna die here. This is going to be a swansong. We have to make an amazing record.' And that's what we did. We spent a lot of time writing 'Blood Of The Nations' and a lot of time recording it, and I think in retrospect, it paid off. If that album wasn't what it was, we wouldn't be here."

Asked about fans who have yet to "accept" him, Mark said: "Everybody is entitled to their opinion. I'm a purist too with certain things. I get it. But I think we've moved on. We're almost a different band at this point. We really are a different band at this point. We still pay tribute to the old ACCEPT by playing the old songs — I mean, we have the two people that wrote most of the songs, [so] we have to. That's always going to be part of ACCEPT's history. You can't change it. All we can change is the future. But everyone's entitled to their opinion, and I get it. I wish them all well, and I wish Udo well, and his band, you know. No hard feelings on my part, that's for sure."