{"id":18264,"date":"2013-09-23T07:30:33","date_gmt":"2013-09-22T21:30:33","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/maytherockbewithyou.com\/mtrbwy\/?p=18264"},"modified":"2013-09-24T23:19:22","modified_gmt":"2013-09-24T13:19:22","slug":"brian-marshall-of-alter-bridge-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/maytherockbewithyou.com\/mtrbwy\/2013\/09\/brian-marshall-of-alter-bridge-2\/","title":{"rendered":"Brian Marshall of Alter Bridge"},"content":{"rendered":"

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\n<\/a>\u201cI\u2019m just really excited to play these new songs and really digging into them and just now in the last week or so getting into the new material and we haven\u2019t played together in over a year in front of an audience, so we\u2019re just ready to just get this ball rolling man\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

Alter Bridge are back with a new album \u2018Fortress\u2019, and in the three years since ABIII they have all been busy, writing, playing, releasing, and that\u2019s just their other projects! Now finding the time to reconvene, they have now put together this new album and it\u2019s their heaviest and I feel best yet. They\u2019ve come a long way since their debut in 2004, so now get ready as Alter Bridge circa 2013 will \u2018Open Your Eyes\u2019 and show you they\u2019re a force.<\/p>\n

We chatted to Alter Bridge bass player, Brian Marshall ahead of the release of their new album \u2018Fortress\u2019 about its creation, as well as their upcoming return to Australia for Soundwave in 2014 and the evolution of the band\u2026<\/p>\n

You’re heading back to Australia on the massive Soundwave bill, what can people expect should they come and watch your set?<\/strong>
\nWell, we have a new record \u2018Fortress\u2019 coming out October 8th<\/sup>, I think that we\u2019re going to be pretty heavily into playing a good bit from that album. The songs are just fresh to us, they\u2019re new, they\u2019re fun, they\u2019re up tempo, we\u2019re going to try to keep the set moving and it\u2019s probably going to be a pretty rockin\u2019 set actually. I\u2019m not sure where our timeslot is, if it\u2019ll be night or day and I\u2019m not sure if we\u2019re going to have any light show or any of that, but I can imagine that we\u2019re just going to be heavily invested in our new record and we\u2019ll play songs that are important to our fans as well. Hopefully we\u2019ll get all of it in with the time permitted.<\/p>\n

The bill as I just mentioned is huge, is there anyone you’re excited to be sharing the tour with?<\/strong>
\nYeah I\u2019m excited to see Whitechapel, I\u2019m excited to see Ill Nino and I\u2019d like to see Korn, I\u2019m happy that Korn is back with their original guitar player Brian \u2018Head\u2019 Welch, so I\u2019m really excited to see him share a stage with his former band and it\u2019s just going to be a great time. We had such a blast on the last Soundwave and we\u2019ve been anxious to get back and finally we got the new material and some steam behind us, so we\u2019re excited to play these songs and get back in front of our fan base there in Australia.<\/p>\n

The last time you were here was for Soundwave in 2012, do you have a great memory of that tour run you can share?<\/strong>
\nYeah there was a few moments, I think Slash getting up with us was a pretty epic moment for us, and every time he\u2019s out and he shows up at a show he tends to get up on stage and play \u2018Rise Today\u2019 with us, so that\u2019s a cool moment in 2012, and there\u2019s another few moments, Slipknot was headlining that show and Corey Taylor was doing some video footage and he came by and interviewed the band, and just getting to know a lot of your peers and a lot of the bands you\u2019ve come across in listening to or growing up over the years and really getting to hang out and know these guys and they\u2019re not just machines *laughs* You know what, the Soundwave tour is really unique, it\u2019s like no other touring, you fly everywhere, you\u2019re not on a bus, and when you\u2019re on a festival f that capacity you\u2019re always shoulder to shoulder with some of like I was saying, these guys you listen to and guys you\u2019re a fan of and being on the same aeroplane and same dressing room areas, it\u2019s a neat experience for fans and bands a like.<\/p>\n

Flip side, is there anything you\u2019d do differently this time around?<\/strong>
\nI don\u2019t know man, that\u2019s a really good question, I can\u2019t really think of anything too exciting to elaborate on about that, I guess we\u2019ll just let it happen. I\u2019m just really excited to play these new songs and really digging into them and just now in the last week or so getting into the new material and we haven\u2019t played together in over a year in front of an audience, so we\u2019re just ready to just get this ball rolling man, it\u2019s just been too long and we have a great fan base over there, I just want to share the stage with these bands and my band mates and get up there and do it.<\/p>\n

The new album is due at the end of this month and it\u2019s killer! When putting it together did you set out to do anything differently compared to your other releases?<\/strong>
\nNo\u2026 I get asked that quite a bit, we didn\u2019t really have any pretence going into this, I think it was just a natural evolution of Alter Bridge, we kind of have our sound, Mark was doing his solo project and that was more geared to the metal side, so he had some material over there that he was writing for his solo project that probably filtered into Alter Bridge when we started writing, so like I said it was more up tempo and it kind of lended its hand to this one, to Fortress, and when we got together it was three different writing sessions, each was about a week\u00a0 and just getting Myles off the road with Slash and getting him down to Orlando was tricky but when we all got in a room we all bunkered down and explored every avenue really, just opened the door and didn\u2019t stick to any arrangement or thought pattern as far as what sound or what we wanted to accomplish. It was just new sounds and try this here and there and we\u2019d try things and some things would work and some wouldn\u2019t, it was just trial and error, we\u2019re all pretty much a good filter for an Alter Bridge song, if it feels good to us and it\u2019s fun to play and it sounds it, then let\u2019s just stick with it and keep going as something magical has happened and the more that you play it the more that it evolves and the better it sounds and we would just, even there were some vocal melodies that were there but we really concentrated as a band before I even heard any lyrical content or melody, we were all kind of in the dark there, I know Mark had some ideas and Myles was just humming along there but there was no lyrics, we were really concentrating on making a work of art musically.<\/p>\n

Well I feel that you have done that, and to me it seems there is a heavier element to the record, was that intentional or did it come from a lot of what you mentioned when Mark brought in these riffs?<\/strong>
\nWell yeah as I was saying, that\u2019s just kind of the way it happened, he had these ideas on his computer and we\u2019d just bounce off different ideas and we\u2019d say let\u2019s try that one, pick it up, learn the part and piece things together. There was a lot of harder stuff there apart from \u2018Lover\u2019 and \u2018All Ends Well\u2019, those were the two kind of slower songs on the record and they\u2019re still mid tempo. It\u2019s cookin\u2019<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>I like that it\u2019s called \u2018Fortress\u2019 fourth album 4-tress\u2026 was that intentional or did I just make that up?<\/strong>
\n*laughs* That\u2019s awesome that you said that because everyone laughed at me *laughs*\u2026 Fortress came about later when the lyrics started to come into play, and the name of that song before \u2018Fortress\u2019 was \u2018Ritual\u2019 and Mark just texted me and said what do you think of the name \u2018Fortress\u2019 and I actually wrote back \u2018Yeah, four, that\u2019s cool, can spell it maybe fourtress?\u2019 and he was like \u2018No\u2019 and basically I kind of got the feeling that he thought that was funny and cheesy *laughs* so I don\u2019t think it had anything to do with that, but between me and you that cool little play on words adding the U in there would be cool, but I got shot down *laughs* we\u2019re on the same page, man.<\/p>\n

So what does the title actually represent?<\/strong>
\nA fortress is basically something that you would see as invincible and steadfast, something that you feel safe at crumbling around you, lyrically I think that it captures in loyalty and betrayal, greed, institutions, relationships, a lot of human emotions, but fortress in the sense and then the album cover, basically that place, that old beat up shed at some point in time was somebody\u2019s home, it was their safe haven and for it to be all old and decrepit now is symbolic as its crumbling around you. We wanted to stay away from a \u2018Lord of the Rings\u2019 I guess you think of fortress and that\u2019s what you think about so we wanted to stay as far away as that as possible.<\/p>\n

Working with \u2018Elvis\u2019 as the producer once again, what was he able to bring out of the band and the material this time that may have not been there before?<\/strong>
\nWhen we went into pre-production, we do writing sessions and we go in with Elvis and that\u2019s where we\u2019ll sit down with him in a sound room with all the instruments miked and go over them with his fresh ears and he listens to songs and has some input. Some things that don\u2019t move him he\u2019ll mention, some things that do move him he\u2019ll say \u2018hey man that\u2019s killer, stick with that\u2019 he\u2019s just a great sounding board and filter after we\u2019ve beaten up the songs so many times, we have what we call demo-it is, where we don\u2019t know it any other way you know what I mean? So when you throw out ideas and you throw out the songs that we\u2019ve arranged and we\u2019ve wrote over the last few weeks we throw ot to him and it\u2019s fresh ears and he has the ideas and he has a great ear and a great sense of melody and a great sense of tone and he\u2019s on the same page as the band and he has been for the last three records. It\u2019s just a really good relationship, he\u2019s here in town, he lives in Orlando too and he was just real excited about doing this and was a vital part of the whole process, he\u2019s got a great sense about himself and he knows what the band\u2019s about. I can\u2019t say enough about Elvis, something you don\u2019t think sounds that good initially and you hear it recorded and tonally with his ears, he brings it to life using his production side of it.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve seen you live now a few times and I think especially with Soundwave in 2012 many walked away surprised, and I don\u2019t mean that in a bad way, but do you feel you in some way struggle to get people familiar with Alter Bridge but once they\u2019re in, they\u2019re in?<\/strong>
\nYeah you know what? That\u2019s a really good question, it\u2019s a lot to grasp, especially the up tempo stuff, it\u2019s very cerebral, there\u2019s a lot going on, but once you really sit down and really digest the entire work of art and the entire music as a body of work, once you hear that over and over you tend to really understand it and appreciate it more and I think once that happens with a fan, or anyone, even myself you know, I listen to a song that we are writing or whatever and listen to it recorded and I have a new appreciation for it, so I think they\u2019re lifers once they latch onto something it seems like they want more.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s been almost ten years since \u2018One Day Remains\u2019 when you look back at that album and the band back then, what do you see as the biggest change that has taken place?<\/strong>
\nWell the evolution of Alter Bridge and our sound, that\u2019s the biggest thing, it\u2019s so drastically different, Myles didn\u2019t play guitar on \u2018One Day Remains\u2019 at all, on Blackbird, that\u2019s when the co-writing with Mark really came into play. The songs from \u2018One Day Remains\u2019 was Mark and maybe left over Creed material I think even though we were onto something it really hadn\u2019t developed into what it is now. So it\u2019s just a different sound and the evolution of the sound kind of had to find ourselves and time and playing together and just the aggression of our instruments and of our influences and influencing our entire music, it was key and I think that we\u2019ve done a good job finding a home for our sound. It\u2019s one of those things that fell into place, I don\u2019t know, it is much different though, there are still some moments on that when I was reviewing and listening back and the recording is so much different than what we\u2019re doing now, and I\u2019ll hear things and think \u2018why did I play that there? I would never do that again.\u2019<\/p>\n

Do you mind quickly if I ask what\u2019s the status of Creed?<\/strong>
\nSure.<\/p>\n

What\u2019s the status of Creed?<\/strong>
\n*laughs* That\u2019s funny. Well, there is nothing going on right now, I know Scott was doing a solo record, there really hasn\u2019t been any talk, we got together once and had some material going but other things kind of got in the way, solo projects and whatnot, so it just never came into fruition, but who knows what the future holds?<\/p>\n

Lastly do you have a message for your Australian fans down here?<\/strong>
\nWe just released a new video \u2018Addicted To Pain\u2019 off our new record \u2018Fortress\u2019 and really just can\u2019t wait to get over there, it\u2019s been too long, and we\u2019re excited to play this new material and see your beautiful country.<\/p>\n

Thanks for your time Brian; we\u2019ll see you in February\u2026<\/strong>
\nAlright, see you soon.<\/p>\n

Essential information<\/strong><\/h2>\n

From: <\/strong>Orlando, Florida, USA<\/p>\n

Band members:<\/strong>\u00a0 Myles Kennedy \u2013 Vocals, Guitar, Mark Tremonti \u2013 Guitar, Vocals, Brian Marshall \u2013 Bass, Scott Phillips \u2013 Drums<\/p>\n

Forthcoming Release:<\/strong> Fortress (Roadrunner Records Australia) September 27th<\/p>\n

Website:<\/strong> \u00a0http:\/\/www.alterbridge.com
\n<\/a><\/p>\n\n

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