Trivium
"Härtere Gefilde sind ganz natürlich für uns"

He is quite a bit younger than the rest of you guys (24 editor’s note). Did that affect the chemistry of the band in any way?

Surprisingly not. He is young but he is into pretty much everything that we are into musically. And that is a rare thing. I think we were a rare band to begin with because when we started touring we were like 18. And all of our influences were bands that had come much earlier. Melodic Death Metal bands like IN FLAMES or SOILWORK. And so it is hard to find people who are into the same things in the same way. And Alex is just one of these rare cases. You know, his favourite drummers are Gene Hoglan (DEATH, TESTAMENT, FEAR FACTORY and many more editor’s note) and Nicholas Barker (CRADLE OF FILTH, DIMMU BORGIR and more editor’s note). A guy too young to see PANTERA live but knows Vinnie Paul’s drumming inside and out. What a great opportunity for us to find a guy like that! Looking back at it the way we were putting the record together was crazy. It could have been a disaster if it hadn’t worked. But it worked so well and I am excited about the things we could do next, when we have even more time.

Can you tell me something about where you are going lyrically and which topics you were concerned with this time?

Especially the last few years the world felt very tumultuous. I kind of felt sad looking at things, how people disconnect and how all of a sudden there is a real inability for people to solve differences. And they start exploit people and exploit feat. And so a lot of the lyrics evolve around that.

There are also lyrics which are definitely more from a personal perspective. Songs like „Betrayer“ and „The Wretchedness Inside“ deal more with people’s relationships and problems and internal problems.

I think when you take the album as a whole we made sure that songs that aren’t technically songs that fit together lyrically really felt like they are in the same vibe. When it comes to the way in which they are performed, the music, the melody. We wanted to make the record sound like a whole. And it felt like even though it’s not a concept record it could be. And that was sort of the goal.

What’s with the title? Is it like some kind of overall topic you could adapt to all of the songs?

That wasn’t the intention but I’ve actually heard some people say that. Maybe we in a way made something without really connecting the dots ourselves. The song title is really just within the song. I guess, to put it shortly: The idea I had was that people daily online pile onto people they don’t know. They say something terrible. Maybe they are joking or whatever. But often the situations spiral out of control and it’s thousands or millions versus one. And just the concept of what someone does and the punishment of either being shamed or losing a job anything that comes with that. What you don’t realize every day is that those things occur so often and the question is: How are we weighing the justice? It’s the sin versus the sentence. And that was the goal behind it. And I felt like it was such a great title to sum up that concept. Because it is a really old problem. It hasn’t always been social media. It was witch hunts and superstition and blaming people for someone’s problems. You know, I kind of used the metaphorical witch hunt terminology and applied the idea to new circumstances.

Because you were mentioning a lot of times the things you were thinking and you were writing I was wondering about your role in the songwriting in general?

For the lyrics on this record Matt and I did pretty much everything. Musically Matt, Corey and I all write riffs. We write full skeletons of the songs and then we come together and edit them, play them, make them better. Or we come up with riffs on the spot in the rehearsal. So it’s really like there is no definitive way a song starts. We just let them happen naturally. We bring them in and refine them together. It seems it just works best for us that way. Because we are always getting the best out of everyone. And we know that if two guys in the band are not feeling something it is probably not the right idea.

Artwork of „The Sin And The Sentence“

Of course, it’s just that you often hear of bands where it’s one or two main songwriters and the rest is just following along.

I mean, there is ups and downs to that. I feel like it’s probably easier to keep a consistent vision with only one guy writing. The downside is that at some point maybe that guy isn’t going to have the right inspiration. I think it’s natural. Every writer has a blockade sometimes where you just don’t have good stuff coming out. It takes some time to find some inspiration. I’ve always felt very comfortable knowing that as long as I can bring in the best material it doesn’t matter if it’s one song or six songs. That’s all that matters because everyone else is going to bring in their best and we can make something out of that.

Do you have personal favourites on the record?

I’ve been bouncing back and forth a bit because I’ll listen to the whole record and it feels like I need to listen to everything to really enjoy the record. When I listen to one or two songs I also want to listen to the rest of it. Lately though, I’ve definitely really been into „Betrayer“. We are going to play it live on the next tour and I am listening to it a lot. When I started writing this song at the same time I wrote the music for „The Sin And The Sentence“. And I feel like „Betrayer“ is a bit like a companion song to it. There are similarities in some parts. Once we started rehearsing we made sure that we changed some of these so that they didn’t feel too similar. But I still feel that these songs are like brother and sister. And I really like them both.

I’m afraid we’re running out of time. Thank you very much for taking the time!

I appreciate it, thank you!

Galerie mit 22 Bildern: Trivium - Summer Breeze Open Air 2023