During a recent interview in the latest issue of Metal Hammer magazine, FIVE FINGER DEATH PUNCH guitarist Zoltan Bathory has revealed one of the bands he looks to the most for inspiration when it comes to framing FFDP‘s current career path.
When speaking on FFDP‘s upcoming album Afterlife, Zoltan said: “This is the ninth record, and at this point everyone knows who we are and the sound. It’s very difficult to achieve a signature sound, but when you have that, you have nothing to prove and it allows you to venture farther away. Take QUEEN: you can’t categorise QUEEN, and that’s the place you want to be, because you can do anything.”
“For us, I think this is the record where that’s really starting,” he explained. “For an artist, as much as you want to be free, there’s all this expectation, and you set yourself up, like, ‘I have all these hit songs so I have to keep repeating that.’ That’s why I mentioned QUEEN, because those guys didn’t give a sh*t, they wrote whatever the hell they felt like writing. That’s as honest as music can be.”
Afterlife will be released on August 19 via Better Noise. It is the first album since 2007’s The Way of the Fist not to feature longtime lead guitarist Jason Hook, who was replaced by Andy James in 2020.
