A few hours before Fifth Angel took the stage we managed to squeeze Ed Archer and John Macko backstage at Kyttaro club. This was followed by an interesting interview with one of the favorite acts of the American scene. Interview: Michael Ntalakos, Camera: Yiannis Dolas, Editing/PostProduction: OneManArmy
Rockpages.gr. What do you expect from the Greek audience?
John Macko: We are excited! I’ve never been to Athens before, but I think I speak for the whole band. We arrived last night and I immediately loved the place! There’s a different energy here than in the rest of Europe. There’s a feeling about this city that I really already love. We’ve heard that the Greek audience is amazing. We’ve had amazing audiences in the Balkans so far and we were really surprised! People have been crazy (laughs).
Ed Archer: we’ve heard rumors about the Greek audience being very warm like in Serbia and Croatia, as John said. I personally am coming to Greece for the first time. As we were coming on the plane I started having these adrenaline rushes just at the thought of coming here. Marco who helps us with the drums on these shows has been here before and told us quite a few things about the people here.
Rockpages.gr: It’s been a year since the release of “Where Angels Kill”. How do you feel about this album now?
John Macko: We really like this album. I don’t really know how many copies we’ve sold, but we like playing songs from the album and so far people have been very positive about these new songs. We play three songs from this album at our shows. It’s a long album, but so far we’re really enjoying these songs. I think people are enjoying these songs as much as our classic songs.
Ed Archer: I really like the album. Especially “Resist The Tyrant” is one of my favorite tracks on this album. I really like the guitar part. It’s also a track with an interesting message since there are still tyrants everywhere in the world today. I think the world likes it very much too. This setlist is a mix of old and new songs. I know we came here for people to hear our classic songs as well. Even today I’m really impressed by how well people remember these songs and us. They travel from far and wide to see us. I hope next year we can do more concerts.
Rockpages.gr: How different is it to work on a concept album from a “typical” one?
Ed Archer. This album is Ken Mary’s baby. He came to us with the whole concept. He had all these crazy ideas in his head, you know. The dialogue, the plot and even the different judged secrets (easter eggs) you know all these little bits and pieces from the past of the band. Names of our old songs that now can be found as lyrics on the new album.
John Macko: Obviously it’s a departure from our past since this was the first album that had that theme. You know we tried to recreate our past sonically, but that’s impossible. We’re not twenty years old anymore. It was also a different environment. The compositions were more organic, since we didn’t have the technology back then that we have today. Back then the band would all sit together and throw ideas around, it was a different process. Now we can’t work like that, we’re spread out all over America. So obviously we had to make use of technology.
Ed Archer: The use of technology did play a key role in this album, as it did in our previous album. We all have our personal studios in our homes now. All you need is a computer and the right software. In the end you will get recordings of the same quality that in the past i.e. in the 80s and 90s you had to go to a very expensive studio to achieve that. Now, you can exchange files with great sound quality easily. So that’s where Ken as a genius could put it all together.
He’s got a great studio in Arizona, with a great analog console. So he would take all these digital files and run them through there. He did a lot of things for this album.
Rockpages.gr: How Fifth Angel came to be?
Ed Archer: I knew Ted (Pilot, vocals) from school and we also knew Ken from back then. We had a cover band. We played all over Washington State. That lasted a long time but we didn’t write our own material then. We did some stuff but it wasn’t in the Fifth Angel style, since we hadn’t developed as musicians.
When that was over Ted and I started another band with another guitarist Mark Von Βeck. There we wrote original material, but it wasn’t that heavy. It was guitar driven but more pop. This project we were working on with Floyd Rose, but we didn’t get anywhere. All the while me and Ted had a lot of heavier ideas that we couldn’t use there so we put them aside. When that project ended James Byrd approached Ted to sing on a demo. The music was quite heavy and very close to what we were writing.
Then Ted called me and said I should listen to that demo. That was the beginning of the band. The three of us sat in a room and shared our ideas. Which is pretty much what John said used to happen back in the day. We exchanged opinions; a very organic way of working. It started as a three-person project and stayed that way until just before recording our first album.
Rockpages.gr: Was the arrival of grunge such an abrupt end for heavy metal in America?
John Macko: Absolutely. It practically killed our career. You know we had just released “Time Will Tell” and things were going really well. We had several songs on the charts and then “Smells Like Teen Spirits” came along and all of a sudden everybody forgot about the classic metal sound. The record companies turned their attention to this new sound. Of course, this didn’t happen only to us. A lot of the bands in the 90s, even bands much bigger than us really struggled to survive.
Ad Archer: You know it’s also important to remember what the music industry meant back then. Today it may not play as big a role. Their job was to sell records, and when they saw something new that was they chose to go with the ones that were selling the most. It was easier for them. I’m not saying they didn’t invest money in these new bands. Things were changing, heavy metal had been around for a long time and unfortunately things can’t stay the same forever. Today the music industry is very different.
We as a band are a very old band. We’re going back to what we did in the past and people are very interested in that. It’s just that the world is very different now than it was back then. Nowadays, to survive you have to play live and sell merchandise. Recording records is more about marketing and keeping people interested in your sound.
Rockpages.gr: In your opinion, what are the ingredients for a good guitar solo?
Ed Archer: You know, I’m not the lead guitarist for Fifth Angel although I have written some of our solos. To me a good solo is like a stand-alone section within the song. It makes some sense if you listen to it. Not just unarranged notes. There are so many great technical guitarists in the world but for me that’s not enough. Just the notes aren’t enough and of course it has to fit with the whole piece.
John Macko: For me the most important part of the solo is the melody. Being a string of notes means absolutely nothing to me. To me a good solo is one that has a melody that you remember afterwards. All the great guitarists from the past Jimmy Page, Jeff Beck wrote solos like they wrote their songs.
Rockpages.gr: What are the next steps of Fifth Angel?
Ed Archer: This tour was an experiment for us. We’ll see how it goes and what kind of response we get. To see if we survive (laughs).
John Macko: Yeah we didn’t know if 50 or 500 people were coming.
Ed Archer: I have to say the tour was successful. Both for us as musicians and we could see that people enjoyed it. I can say I’m sad to see it come to an end. We only have these two shows (Athens and Thessaloniki) and I can say that I could go on. Now we have to sit down and see the future of the band. Surely, we can organize the next tour a bit better in terms of flights for example. We could play more like that.
Rockpages.gr: Iron Maiden or Black Sabbath?
Ed Archer: Oh! I can’t really choose. I listened to Black Sabbath when I was a teenager and fell in love with them. When I was a teenager and I fell in love with Black Sabbath when I was a teenager and I fell in love with them. The tone of the guitar, Ozzy’s voice, that darkness they brought out was fantastic. I heard Iron Maiden a few years later and immediately fell in love with them. So they’re both favorite bands, they’re both my influences.
John Macko: I grew up with Black Sabbath. They were the first heavy metal band I listened to besides Led Zeppelin. Iron Maiden I listened to years later. So I’m going to say Black Sabbath. We also had met Ozzy in Los Angeles. I cornered Ozzy and we talked for 5-10 minutes. That’s when he had hired Zakk on guitars and back then Zakk was a skinny teenager (laughs). It was an epic party back then.
Ed Archer: As far as Iron Maiden I can say that when I heard “The Number Of The Beast” I was really surprised. It had everything in it. The choruses, the solos, the vocals. It was very different from Black Sabbath. I can’t really pick and choose.
