Welsh metal outfit Bullet For My Valentine have attained that status whereby whatever they put out will be largely accepted by their devoted legion of fans.
While many band’s in the same position tend to gradually become less inspired and experimental as their career progresses, comfortable in the fact they have reached that summit, Bullet For My Valentine seem to be taking a firmer approach, ducking when they should be weaving and shaping a musical destiny that should see them go down as one of the leading purveyors of metal this century.
After the brutal heavy rock lashings of debut album The Poison, Bullet For My Valentine have released a succession of critically acclaimed albums, including Scream Aim Fire (2008), Fever (2010) and Gravity (2018), but it seemed as though the band were gradually leaning towards the friendlier side of metal with each passing album.
As if to dispel that notion and silence any inner rumblings, Bullet For My Valentine are set to unleash their latest self titled album, a slab of music crushingly heavy and a complete hark back to their early music as far back as from when they were called Jeff Killed John.
Fans have already had a taste with the brutal singles Knives, Parasite and Shatter, and as good and as heavy as those tracks are they are merely a sample of the delights on offer on the full album.
Vocalist/guitarist Matt Tuck joined HEAVY to chat about the new album and it’s heavier nature.
"Musically what people have heard so far that sums up the tone of the entire record,” he said. “It's a far more technical, angry, heavy record compared to the last few we've done, and it's good man. We feel like we've hit a sweet spot in our writing as a band and, yeah, it's all good man. Firing on all cylinders and we can't wait for people to hear the rest of it."
Rather than being a planned heavier direction, Tuck argues the tone of the album pretty much directed itself once the initial step was taken.
"It just panned out that way,” he shrugged. “We approached it as we had any other record. You just get in a room together, bash some demos out and some songs and ideas. You put riffs down, you put grooves down, and you just experiment and have with it and try and find a direction. It took about 6 to 8 weeks of writing on and off to finally find where the album was heading. As soon as we found the direction it was easy, and all systems go. The hardest part about writing a record is starting the process. Where are we going here? How are we sounding? What's the vibe? As soon as we found that we scrapped everything for that 6 to 8 weeks and then continued on with the song that started it all which was Knives and continued on that path."
In the full interview Matt talks in greater detail about the album, why he thinks this is just the start of things to come for Bullet, his singing of more harsh vocals, the awesome cover image and what it represents, the album intro and what it actually is, future touring plans and more.