Wild Souls has just released their third album called “Queen of my Heart” and we grab the chance to talk with the band’s guitarist Kostis Tsiligiris for an in depth interview. Needless to say that they guys have once again delivered the goods and every hard rock fan out there should really take a good notice at them. Interview: Sakis Nikas
Rockpages.gr: 4 years have passed since the release of your album “Game of Love”. What you have been doing in these time frame?
Kostis Tsiligiris: It has been a rough 4-year period for the band. Come to think about it, the most active year was the last one somewhere in 2019-2020. That was the time when some new members came into the band and started writing and recording the new material.
Rockpages.gr: We had the chance, back in 2016, to talk about “Game of Love” which I thought it was one of the biggest hard rock surprises of the year. How do you feel about that album, after all this time…would you change anything?
Kostis Tsiligiris: “Game of Love” is an album that I still enjoy and listen to from time to time. I wouldn’t change anything…not really. I am totally satisfied of how things turned out and all the people who bought the album share the same feeling with me. So, I guess it’s a really good record.
Rockpages.gr: Let’s talk about the new album “Queen Of My Heart”. How long did it take to prepare the whole album from start to finish?
Kostis Tsiligiris: The album was written and recorded in a breakneck speed. We had already signed a deal with the label and we had a schedule to meet. So time was not really on our side; also, we had a new line-up and we had to meet the time schedule. I’d say that we had the whole thing arranged in the last three months. It was fast but I think that it all turned out positively for us all.
Rockpages.gr: Personally, I believe that this is the best album out of the three that you have offered so far. Once again the pure hard rock element is wonderfully blended with the AOR/melodic rock genre. What’s your opinion and would you like to share with us how Wild Sould work on a tune?
Kostis Tsiligiris: This marriage of Hard Rock and AOR sound is really a mystery to us as it came out quite unexpectedly right from the first record. This is a sound that we really love and I couldn’t imagine focusing on just one aspect of this style thus we stand behind those two elements of our sound. As for the songwriting process itself…I must say that this time around it was a more collaborative effort as we all worked together in the studio with a riff or a melody. In the two previous albums all the songs were written either by me or George.
Rockpages.gr: It is plain obvious that Whitesnake is the main influence of Wild Souls. In our last interview, you said that your favorite period is definitely 1987-1989. But I wonder what’s your favorite Whitesnake guitarist of them all…?
Kostis Tsiligiris: (laughs)…I must admit that this is the toughest question I’ve ever been asked…you got me there! From a compositional standpoint, I have to say that John Sykes is absolutely untouchable. Maybe it was a perfect fit for Coverdale, too. Now, performance wise and from a technical ability, Doug Aldrich is the one…after all, he is my favorite guitarist.
Rockpages.gr: Speaking of Doug Aldrich, there are only few out there who know that he played guitar as a guest on your debut record…
Kostis Tsiligiris: Yes, that’s right. We were young and inexperienced; we didn’t promote it as much as we should. There are people who discover those old Wild Souls tunes and they are completely surprised when they see that Doug was a guest on that first album.
Rockpages.gr: The whole Covid-19 pandemic has changed things dramatically in the music business. How much did this affect Wild Souls as a band and the new album in particular?
Kostis Tsiligiris: Every single band on the planet is affected by this terrible pandemic. The negative fact of this is the fact that the overall promotion of the album is happening amidst the lockdown and our choices are limited. Nevertheless we are trying our best to work around this whole thing. We only played a show in our hometown but we still managed to shoot and release two video-clips. That was something really important to us.
Rockpages.gr: The video-clip for the song “I remember you” is absolutely inspired and well-crafted. For one reason or another, it kinda reminded me of “Don’t Go Away Mad” by Motley Crue. Tell us a few things about it…
Kostis Tsiligiris: The whole idea for this different clip came from our guitarist Thanos. It was like a short movie and it was well-received by the fans as it already has 1000 real views in the first three days of its release. The songwriting credit belongs to our singer but we all loved the song as it represents the AOR side of Wild Souls.
Rockpages.gr: Name three of your favorite albums of all time…Whitesnake excluded!
Kostis Tsiligiris: “Whitesnake excluded”…(laughs) There are quite a few, I must say…let’s see…we all like “Hold Your Fire” (Firehouse), “Vault” (Def Leppard), Gotthard’s self-titled album etc.
Rockpages.gr: How hard it is to stick to your guns and follow a career in Greece, taken into consideration the fact that hard rock music was never so popular in this country?
Kostis Tsiligiris: As time passes by, the feedback is better and stronger. But this difficult situation remains…as you said; Greece is not the ideal country for hard rock as the fans of the genre are not that many. That makes our job even more difficult. Having said that, Wild Souls will keep on going strong by focusing on our music and expressing our feelings through the songs. Hopefully, our dreams will come true…stay rock, stay wild!
