"I work best under pressure - that's my fuel."

In the wake of the birth of German thrash metal veterans Destruction’s tenth full-length studio album, "D.E.V.O.L.U.T.I.O.N.", the trio’s frontman and mastermind Marcel "Schmier" Schirmer revealed everything we need to know about this special project…

Vassil Varbanov: Hey, Schmier, hello! How are you, my friend?

Schmier: I'm doing great! Actually we'll have a weekend before Wacken where I'll be doing a show with my project Headhunter.

V. V.: However, the idea to have you with us is Destruction. Please tell us everything about "D.E.V.O.L.U.T.I.O.N."!

Sch.: It's an anniversary album, so it had to be a special one. That's why we invited some friends to play with us, so we have some guests like Jeff Waters from Annihilator, Vinnie Moore from UFO, and Gary Holt from Exodus. We also wanted to have a really good sound, so we chose Jacob Hansen for the second time to do production, which I think was a great idea - we never sounded any better than on this album! Regarding the songs, I think we made a nice mix of old and new stuff, so we have a lot of variety on this album. We had a lot of pressure, but the reactions so far are really, really awesome, so we're definitely happy.

V. V.: You said pressure - coming from where?

Sch.: Well, pressure is something you always have when doing a new album. It's an important part of the process. I work best under pressure - that's my fuel. The certain amount of positive pressure is important when making an album.

V. V.: Having Headhunter being active again, does it give you something more than just pressure? Is scientific books they call this schizophrenia...

Sch.: Ha-ha, no, Headhunter is more kind of my hobby. I don't have any pressure with Headhunter, because we just do what we like and it's nice to play some straightforward heavy metal. Therefore it was fun to do the Headhunter album - we had a lot of fun in the studio, which reminded me a lot of the old times. I could also open my horizon, which really helped me to do the new Destruction album. I'd say Headhunter is more my soft side, while Destruction is my angry side.

V. V.: "D.E.V.O.L.U.T.I.O.N." shall be released in about a month, on August 29. What's going to happen to Destruction until then?

Sch.: We're giving many interviews and we're gonna play some festivals in England, Germany, Spain... We'll be busy until the release, and then we're planning the world tour to start in November.

V. V.: I read somewhere that you upcoming show at the Bloodstock Open Air in the UK shall be your first-ever appearance in England, is that right?

Sch.: No, no, no, no, no, no, no... First festival appearance in England maybe... We just did an England tour some months ago. We've been a couple of times there. It's a difficult market, so usually when you go to the UK you play one show in London, one in Ireland, and one in Scotland. There's not much in between, because the American scene is dominating the English one basically - U.S. bands are very trendy there.

V. V.: Why have you never played on a festival in the UK before?

Sch.: Because they didn't have a festival like Bloodstock. They had Download, which is very commercialized and they don't take underground bands like us to play. Bloodstock is basically the first real underground metal fest they have in years.

V. V.: A year ago, when we did our latest interview, you promised Destruction will be coming back to Bulgaria, but it didn't happen...

Sch.: We played in Kavarna again, didn't we?

V. V.: The conversation in question was straight after Kavarna...

Sch.: Was it? Yeah... and then we did a new album. You know, people always think that I can go out there and play. People need to know that we get invited by concert promoters, so if there's no offer from Bulgaria, we cannot come. We really want to play in Sofia again, and we have a tour coming in the autumn and in winter, so I really hope to play in Sofia once more - we had a fantastic show there, and the two shows we did in Kavarna were also great. I hope we can come back, but it's really not up to us - you have to make the concert bookers wake up and invite us again.

V. V.: Ok, back to your new album now. How did you record "D.E.V.O.L.U.T.I.O.N."?

Sch.: We usually play together with the drums, then we record the drums, and the rest comes afterwards. It's very good to play together in this kind of live feeling, but in order to make the album tighter it's always better to record the guitars and the bass again. It was important to us that the album sounder warm, not clinical. However, we use our live gear and basic equipment on stage, so there are no effects - we just let everything the way it's supposed to work live.

V. V.: Since you first and last show in Sofia some 4-5 years ago, to what extent do you see yourself different compared to back then?

Sch.: You know, the fact that the world is developing so fast doesn't mean it's getting any better... For me everything is getting worse at the moment. Look at the world! I just see the rich getting richer, the poor getting poorer, and the middle class is dying everywhere. Even in rich countries like Germany we have big problems, like workers with families and stuff can't survive on their money anymore... It's a fucked up situation, because with all the fast-moving world and technologies we're destroying the old planet. That's basically the idea behind "D.E.V.O.L.U.T.I.O.N." and its entire lyrical concept - we're looking forward to getting more and more of everything, but basically from the behaviour we're moving back to the cave. I see a lot of greed and anger in this world.

V. V.: Last question: Why have you written your new album's title like an abbreviation?

Sch.: We wanted the whole album to be special, so it's a kind of concept - that all the lyrics and song titles create the album title. I mean that every song title adds a little more to the "D.E.V.O.L.U.T.I.O.N." concept. I thought this was sort of special, and it's also pretty complicated to make the final result perfect, because you have a lot of restrictions this way, especially when setting up the running order of the album - you've got to have only ten songs, and the first one has to start with a D, the second with an E, etc. We call this acrostic.

The "D.E.V.O.L.U.T.I.O.N." Tracklist:

01. "D.E.V.O.L.U.T.I.O.N."
02. "Elevator to Hell"
03. "Vicious Circle - The Seven Deadly Sins"
04. "Offenders of the Throne"
05. "Last Desperate Scream"
06. "Urge (The Greed of Gain)"
07. "The Violation of Morality"
08. "Inner Indulgence"
09. "Odyssey of Frustration"
10. "No One Shall Survive"

Copyright: Tangra Mega Rock