YNGWIE MALMSTEEN Talks About Making Of 'Perpetual Flame'

Jeb Wright of Classic Rock Revisited recently conducted an interview with legendary Swedish guitarist Yngwie Malmsteen. An excerpt from the chat follows below.

Classic Rock Revisited: The first thing we need to talk about is "Perpetual Flame". This album sounds more live than you have for a long time.

Yngwie: All the stars aligned for this album. We made this record completely different than any record I have ever made. I have my own studio, so I have the luxury of doing it whenever I want. In the old days, you would spend five grand a day in the studio and it was serious pressure. Normally, I just write the songs while I am noodling on my guitar when I am upstairs watching television. I would then get Patrick [Johansson] to do the live drums and I would write the bass and the guitar and whatever. On this particular instance, the songs were taking shape, so I went in the studio with Patrick and we did thirty songs, and I went on the road and forgot about it. I came back from tour, listened to it and picked out the songs that were really good. I put on some guitar and bass and then I went on tour again. I was in Istanbul and I was hanging out with some guys who were playing these strings and I had them add a string section. I have my laptop with me on tour with the backing tracks and ProTools on it. Normally, I start and finish an album right away, but this one took a long time, and that is a big difference. When I came back from Russia, I was listening to the songs "Death Dealer" and "Four Horseman" and I knew that the singer I had was not going to cut it for what I was hearing in my head. So I brought in Ripper [Tim "Ripper" Owens]. He was in another band and he was leaving that band. He came down to Miami and he sang a couple of songs to just feel it out, and it was a no-brainer because it sounded so fucking good. I went back on tour to Germany and then came back and he sang some more. Being the songwriter, the producer, and the arranger, it is actually hard to keep a distance and a good perspective on things. So it was actually really good for me to go away from it for a while and come back. It was also a great thing to bring in Roy Z to mix it. He came in like an outsider and he was very cool. I produced and engineered the whole thing. I miked up the drums and the whole nine yards. It was cool; I liked it. I have always been involved in that, but I have also always had an engineer there. I am getting better at it so I was confident enough that I could do it.

Classic Rock Revisited: How did you get Roy Z involved?

Yngwie: I needed someone to mix. I know K.K. Downing from PRIEST and he told me to check this guy out, so I did. He came in and goes, "Hey let's try this" and he throws an eight thousand dollar compressor on a snare drum. I go, "What the fuck are you doing that for?" Then I hear it and I go, "Fuck, that really sounds good." I have all this shit lying around and half the time I don't even know where it is. I learned a lot from Roy.

Classic Rock Revisited: Roy has made the last two PRIEST records sound awesome. Roy has an ear for heavy metal.

Yngwie: He really makes everything stand out. He was like, "We should do it with ProTools." I told him, "Oh no, brother, this is old school. This is live guitar and live drums. This is like ZEPPELIN and PURPLE recorded." I didn't use any samples or triggers — nothing. This is all the real deal.

Classic Rock Revisited: This album will be successful because it feels good. How do you know when you are just sitting around playing and when you are really being creative?

Yngwie: That is a very good question because I don't really know, but I kind of sense it. The way I play is so spontaneous. I have to be clever about it. If I don't like it, and I don't feel that it is the one, then I just do will do it tomorrow — that is the beauty of having your own studio. I bought this house about fifteen years ago. It is a colonial old mansion sort of thing. It had servants quarters. I completely gutted one of the servants quarters and filled it up with Marshall stacks and hardwired it up to the control room where the heads are. It is a permanent guitar setup. I don't have to worry about miking shit up or anything. I push a button and there it is. It is such a sweet deal because I don't have to worry about anything. There is a track on the new album called "Caprici Di Diablo" and that was taking the bull by the horns, brother. I said to myself that I was just going to push it all the way out. The whole idea behind this record is my motto: More is more. Some people say less is more, but I say more is more. Like I said, as this album was coming along, I knew I needed someone like Tim. The first song we did was "Live to Fight Another Day". After doing the vocals, I went back to do the guitars again, because everything was up another notch higher. It has taken a year and a half to do this fucking album. It really turned out to be a good thing. A lot of things fell into place making this record. I think this record captures my passion more than any of my other records. When I play live is when it really comes out. On my records I like to have a couple of clams on there, that really makes the ones that have the fire stand out. I wouldn't say clams — I really threw myself over the cliff on that one [laughter]. The chance-taking is going to be more rewarding when you play it live, but there is also the chance you will fall on your ass.

Read the entire interview from Classic Rock Revisited.