After paying close attention to the orchestral side of music over their last few releases, Blind Guardian have decided the boundaries can be pushed no more, electing instead to return more to their roots on their new album The God Machine.
Thirty years after their groundbreaking release Somewhere Far Beyond, Blind Guardian prove that there’s still life left in the metal genre by infusing elements of their earlier work with a modern sensibility that promises to appeal to fans both old and new.
HEAVY caught up with drummer Frederik Ehmke still a few weeks out from release to discuss The God Machine.
"This time we had a long anticipation phase,” he nodded, “since the actual album was finished last year in July or so. We had to wait until then due to some production problems with vinyl pressing that they were waiting for materials and there was no room when they went to press the vinyl. Then there was the problem with the touring being postponed and that also is not a smart move to release an album when you can't tour for it. So that's why we were waiting, or were kind of forced to wait for another year. We tried to stretch that with some extra outputs, releasing some video clips and teasing with some material so people get an impression already beforehand. Finally, second of September is the day but we are now touring with festivals and still dealing with Corona problems somehow, so there's no real time to be nervous about the album release and we, pf course, cross our fingers that everything works out perfectly. We set the tracks and it's the best prepared that we could so we would assume and stay positive - not in a COVID way, we'll stay positive that everything will work out in the end."
Much has been made of the sonic delivery on The God Machine, with Ehmke admitting he is relieved the band’s flirtation with orchestral arrangements has been shelved for now at least.
"The God Machine is kind of a seizure in the band’s latest discography,” he offered. “We came from a longer path working with orchestral sounds and evolving that to a certain eclipse which culminated in the Legacy of the Dark Lands album, which is only orchestral and Hanzie's voice singing along to that. So then we felt, where shall we go from there? What shall we build up from there? We wanna evolve somehow, and we were missing a little bit the band focus lately. The orchestra needed a lot of room production wise and also composition wise. It was clear for everybody pretty much that we don't want to work with the orchestra for the next time and we wanna go straight forward with focusing on the band which was clear during the songwriting phase. We had some experiments as always, and then all of a sudden we all know that it was going more in the straightforward direction. What people can expect from the album is a kind of straight, speed metal ish, powerful, energetic album that has not too many outside of the box extra sounds. I think we're... we're not having that much of a folkoristic elements any more. It's more of a modern sound. It's kind of darker, it's very, very intense sound. We changed a lot of the production ways to achieve a new sound and also in the compositions it's more modern. more like a cyborg, scientific approach more than Classic Fantasy or The Medieval World or something like that."
In the full interview, Frederik talks about the album process, how it reflects back to the band’s earlier material, the longevity of the band, experimenting with orchestra sounds and the impact it had on the rest of the band, the title and what it refers to, the striking cover art and more.