TRIVIUM's PAOLO GREGOLETTO Says New Drummer ALEX BENT Is 'A Monster'

TRIVIUM bassist Paolo Gregoletto was interviewed by Midwest Beatdown prior to his band's November 14 concert at the Skyway Theater in Minneapolis, Minneapolis. You can now listen to the chat in three parts below.

Speaking about TRIVIUM's new drummer, Alex Bent, Paolo said: "[He] is a monster. If you've seen us live, you know what I'm talking about, but if you haven't yet, you're gonna be in for a surprise. Not only just playing stuff, but just so in control of it. There's that X factor of just being able to be completely playing the wildest stuff, but then looking back, he's not breaking a sweat and it's just looking so effortless. It's a sight to behold. It's fun for us, 'cause I turn around and [go], 'Woah! The dude's really good.'"

According to Gregoletto, Bent's addition to TRIVIUM has served as a boost for the band's live performances. "I think our energy on this tour has been unlike anything probably since the beginning," he said. "'Cause when you first start out, you're just kind of going out and just giving it your all, and it's back before you have really good monitors and stuff, so maybe things don't even sound that good but you're just going for it. And now we have the best of both worlds — having the energy of feeling like we're a new band but [with] great sound and can actually play the instruments proficiently. And having a guy like that that's so solid, for us, it's just about, 'Okay, we can perform. We don't have to worry about him back there. We can do our thing.' And it's been great."

Paolo also talked about the writing and recording process for TRIVIUM's latest album, 2017's "The Sin And The Sentence", which was released this past October via Roadrunner. "It was like a year and a half of sort of… off tour, everyone kind of collects their ideas, their riffs. We all listen to everything, we figure out what's gonna probably be the right way to go, what's not, and then we get together in the rehearsal room. And we did that in two separate sessions, I guess. We did one in December [2016], which was bringing Alex into the band for the first time. He also had to learn an entire headlining set, because we were going to Europe in a few months after that. So we pretty much did most of December — like two, three weeks — made Josh Wilbur come down and produce the record. We worked on it, and we were, like, 'All right. We've got a good start here — six songs.' And then we did the tour in Europe, we kind of started getting ready for the next six [songs]. And we did the same thing — we did two weeks in April and then we went right into the studio in May [and] June, and we put the record together. And it was, like, record time for us in terms of how quickly we recorded it. But it was so well prepared in the rehearsal; that's where the majority of the work gets done. The studio's like the recital — you're on performance mode at that point; you know what you're gonna play."

"The Sin And The Sentence" was recorded at Santa Ana, California's Hybrid Studios.