TMC: Tim, es un placer conocerte y quiero agradecerte que te tomes el tiempo de hablar conmigo para The Metal Circus.
Tim Owens: “Genial”.
TMC: Es muy bueno verte en New York de nuevo. ¿Cómo te sientes de nuevo en la Gran Manzana?
TO: “Es genial. Ya sabes, estuve aquí hace no mucho haciendo promoción, estuve con MTV y Sirius Music pero está bien tocar aquí. Deberíamos tocar en un recinto mas grande de todas maneras, pienso.”
TMC: Has de admitir que un lugar intimo es bueno en ciertas ocasiones.
TO: “Definitivamente, está bien tener un recinto de este tamaño, y las entradas se han agotado, pero si hubiéramos podido cambiar a un recinto mas grande habría sido mucho mejor, pero es un buen sitio.”
TMC: Es alucinante ver lo bien que te has adaptado al puesto en ICED EARTH, y creo que este disco es muy grande. No puedo dejar de escucharlo. También te he de admitir que soy un fan novato de la banda.
TO: “Oh, está bien”.
TMC: También me gustaba lo que hiciste en JUDAS PRIEST, así que es obligatorio preguntarte si estás contento con la respuesta que estas recibiendo hasta el momento.
TO: “Si, está siendo casi todo positivo, pero el único problema que tenemos es la gente que interpreta éste disco como algo político y no podemos hacer nada contra ello. Canada ha sido muy mala en ese sentido, ya que una revista se ha ocupado de ello, pero no estamos preocupados ya que es una revista de bajo presupuesto, una revista de mierda.
TMC: No diremos el nombre.
TO: “Simplemente se cargaron el disco diciendo que era un trabajo político y no podemos imaginarnos porqué la gente dice eso.”
TMC: La gente está muy excitada con el nuevo Cd, así que la pregunta es ¿vais a ir a España pronto?
TO: “No hemos ido todavía, aunque lo teníamos planeado, pero a principios de año, Jon tuvo problemas en su espalda.
TMC: Pero ahora está mejor.
TO: “Está mejor de eso, pero actualmente esta enfermo, y tiene un virus estomacal o algo por el estilo.”
TMC: ¿Hasta cuando va a durar la gira para vosotros?
TO: “Uhm…iremos a Los Angeles el 20 de mayo, luego iremos a Japón para tres fechas y volveremos para mas fechas americanas, para luego acabar en Europa el 26 de junio. Tenemos dos festivales en Europa, el Grasspop, del cual somos cabezas de cartel el viernes, y también tenemos el Bang Your Head Festival.
TMC: Así que ¿qué es lo próximo? ¿vas a hacer un nuevo disco con ICED EARTH?
TO: “Definitivamente”.
TMC: He escuchado algunos rumores acerca de un disco en solitario por tu parte…
TO: “Voy a hacer algo de material en solitario, aun tengo que conseguir un contrato pero lo voy a hacer. Será un disco en solitario, algo así como un proyecto paralelo, y definitivamente lo voy a hacer.”
TMC: Sera ortodoxamente metálico ¿no?
TO: “Será metal, si, pero mi banda principal sigue siendo ICED EARTH.”
TMC: Me alegra verte en esta banda. Incluso le dije a tu amigo Chris Caffery que me gustaba lo que hacías en PRIEST pero amo lo que estas haciendo en ICED EARTH. Fui uno de esos que recibió bien el hecho de que entraras en JUDAS PRIEST porque dije “bueno, Halford se ha ido, que le vamos a hacer?”.
TO: “Creo que en líneas generales fui bien recibido en PRIEST. Creo que la mayoría de los fans me aceptaron, y quizá algunos antiguos fans nunca lo hicieron pero…”
TMC: Bueno, peor para ellos. Tengo los CDs y el DVD y es muy buen material.
TO: “Bueno, en general la respuesta muy positiva y cuando la gente nos veía en directo siempre estaba todo bien. Me lo pasé bien y creo que salí airoso de mi estancia en PRIEST. Quizá no tuvimos demasiado éxito pero nos mantuvimos tocando Metal y continuamos tocando en directo y agotando entradas en muchos lugares, y bueno…aunque los discos no vendieron bien, tampoco vendieron los de HALFORD ni los de otra gente. Las cosas son como son. Pero fue una buena época y creó que conseguí mi meta”.
TMC: Mi pregunta es si estás cómodo con este gran resurgimiento del metal.
TO: “Creo que está bien, he visto una gran diferencia en los últimos años, desde que entré en PRIEST, porque cuando entré en PRIEST no había nada. Ahora la gente puede decir que porqué de golpe y porrazo ahora el metal funciona de nuevo. Bueno, las bandas están tocando más y mas bandas de metal van apareciendo. Quiero decir…quizá no es el metal que las viejas generaciones quieren escuchar, pero bandas como DISTURBED, GODSMACK y gente así comenzaron a emerger poco después de que yo entrara en PRIEST y creo que el mercado está volviendo a admitir el Metal. Los chicos lo llaman New Metal pero simplemente creo que es Metal. Por supuesto, no quiero ser clasificado como metal “antiguo”. Pero creo que cuando todas esas bandas de metal comenzaron a aparecer provocaron que los fans volvieran a prestar atención. Además, el Ozzfest no hace daño incluyendo a bandas nuevas en show de metal. Ayudó y la música siempre ha estado ahí. El Metal nunca ha muerto.”
TMC: ¿Podríais ser una adición de última hora al Ozzfest?
TO: “No. Habría sido un buen año para hacerlo, por el cartel que ahí. No estoy seguro de que pudiéramos hacerlo. Si los números son los adecuados y el dinero está ahí y no nos supone perdidas, podemos hacerlo. Lo que…pienso que el Ozzfest no es fácil para acceder a él. No entras en el Ozzfest porque sí, has de ir trabajándote tu camino en el festival, y no vamos a hacer eso. Nos gustaría entrar en otra gira, quizá teloneando a una banda mas grande, pero de momento hemos agotado entradas en unos cuantos lugares por nuestra cuenta y las cosas marchan bien.”
TMC: ¿Hay algunas sorpresas en el show? ¿Está basado en “Glorious Burden” o quizá incluso escuchemos el disco entero?
TO: “No, hay cosas nuevas y cosas viejas. Por supuesto tenemos un montón de temas de ‘Glorious Burden’ en el set porque tocamos ‘Declaration Day’, ‘Greenface’, ‘Red Baron’, ‘When Eagle Cries’ y por supuesto ‘Gettysburg” la cual creo que es el punto álgido de la noche.”
TMC: También me gusta “Don’t Tread On Me”.
TO: “Esa también es buena, e intentamos meterla pero no había manera de introducirla en el set-list. Intentaremos tocarla la próxima vez. Quiero decir…la ensayamos, pero se nos hacía difícil y queríamos cambiarla un poco.”
TMC: ¿Crees que habrá algun DVD de ésta corta gira?
TO: “Podría ser, pero vamos a editar un DVD de ‘Gettysburg’. Tratará todo sobre ‘Gettysburg’ y creo que quedará bien. Con suerte, editaremos un disco en directo.”
“Me gustaría hacer un disco en directo eventualmente”.
Ken Pierce([email protected])
Trad.:Sergi Ramos
As I mentioned in my review, I was fortunate enough to be one of the only members of the Press with talent interaction as well as photography opportunity at this show. The venue BB Kings is pretty tight, and thanks to the Record Company SPV, I was able to get this stuff for you all to enjoy. Read on.
TMC: Tim it’s indeed a great pleasure to meet you face to face and let me first thank you for taking the time to sit and talk with me on behalf of the Metal Circus
Tim – Good Man
TMC: So it’s awesome to see you in New York again, so how does it feel to be back in the Big Apple
Tim – It’s great you know I was just doing some promotion here not too long ago did MTV and Sirius Music and a bunch of stuff but its nice to play here. We should be playing someplace a little bit bigger though I think.
TMC: Well you gotta admit an intimate room is good sometimes.
Tim – Definately, it is nice to have a room this size and it was sold out but if there was some way we could have moved up that would have been great, but it’s a pretty cool place.
TMC: It’s nice to see how well you have stepped into the role of singer for Iced Earth and I think this album is fucking killer man, I love it and cant stop listening to it. Also I am a new fan of the band to be honest
Tim – Cool thanks
TMC: I also liked you in Priest, so I have to ask are you happy with the response you’ve been getting so far?
Tim – Yeah its been all positive but obviously the only downfall we ever get is people who say that its a political record and we cant figure it out. Canada was pretty bad on that, a magazine was on that but we are not worried since it’s really just a small low budget magazine anyways, a crap magazine.
TMC: I’ll leave the name out.
Tim – Yeah they really hammered it saying it was a political album and we cant quite figure out how people would say that.
TMC: so the site I write for is in Spain, so I am their New York guy and they love this record and their big fans and this site is 100% behind it
Tim – Well the fans have been really behind it.
TMC: So we have site visitors raving about the review we did of the CD and there are rave reports coming in on shows they have heard about so their question is are you going to Spain with this soon?
Tim – We havent yet and we were supposed to but earlier this year Jon’s back was bad.
TMC: Yet he is doing good now.
Tim – He is feeling better on that, but he is actually sick today and he has a stomach virus or something.
TMC: So how long is this tour going to go on for you guys?
Tim – Uhm, well we go to LA on the 20th May, Go to Japan for three dates, and come back for more American dates and then we pretty much end on June 26th in Europe. We have two Festivals in Europe, Grasspop which we are headlining on the Friday and German Bang Your Head Festival.
TMC: Those sound like two good festivals to be part of.
Tim – Oh yeah.
TMC: So whats next for you are you going to do another Iced Earth record?
Tim – Oh definately.
TMC: Now I heard some rumbling about some solo stuff from you…
Tim – I am going to do some solo stuff – I gotta get it signed but I am gonna do it. It’ll be a solo record and more of a side project type of record I am definately going to do that.
TMC: Definately going to be metal though right?
Tim – Its gonna be metal yeah but my main band is Iced Earth.
TMC: I am really happy to see you in this band cuz I even said to your friend Chris when I talked to him that I liked you in Priest but I love the work you do in Iced Earth. Now I was one of those fans that embraced it when you were in Priest because I said, well Halford left .
Tim – I think overall I was embraced in Priest , I mean most of the fans embraced me, and there are some old school fans that might not have but ..
TMC: Well that was their loss I mean I got the records and the DVD’s and its great stuff.
Tim – Well overall it was a positive response and when people saw us live it was always a good thing. It was always a good time I think I succeeded in Priest. We might not have succeeded but we still kept going in metal and we still kept playing and we sold a lot of places out, and well while the albums didnt sell but neither did Halfords neither did some other people I mean its just the way it is. But it was a good time and it made my mark.
TMC: So I have to ask you are you happy to see this resurgence of big metal, I always seem to ask everyone this.
Tim – Well yeah, I’ve seen a big difference over the past years since I joined Priest, because when I joined Priest there was nothing going on. Now people might say why is it all of a sudden doing it now well bands are starting to play more like that and more metal bands came out . I mean it might not be the metal that old school metal fans like but bands like Disturbed and Godsmack and stuff but it did start emerging at that time since I joined Priest and fans seem to start embracing the whole metal market again. Folks call it New Metal but I think myself its just metal of some sort. Of course I dont wanna be classified as old metal because then I am classic rock . Yet I think that when a lot of all these other different metal bands started coming out It just put kids awareness back to that. Plus Ozzfest didnt hurt either with doing a metal show and mostly featuring new bands at the time. Still it helped and Its music has always been there. Metal never really died.
TMC: So any last minute addition to this years Ozzfest?
Tim – No. It would have been a good year to do it this year, because of the lineup. I am not sure we are going to do it, if the numbers are ever there and the money is there and its not a loss and we can do it sure. Which I think in Ozzfest might be kind of hard since you dont just jump on Ozzfest, you sort of have to pay your way on it and we’re not going to do that. We like to get on another tour maybe supporting a bigger act but right now we’ve been selling out all of our shows right now and its been good.
TMC: Well, its a great response that I’ve seen and that I have been reading about and for me every time I recommend a new record I have been saying to people that I have been listening to this new Iced Earth and I say grab it. It was among the things when I spoke to Chris (Caffery) that I said what is in your CD Changer and he was like I have been listening to it a lot, I cant turn it off.
Tim – Yeah its a good album and it has a lot of good songs I mean Iced Earth is about mixing it up and having a lot of melody.
TMC: What are some surprises we are in store for tonight? Will it be most of the Glorious Burden or maybe even hear the whole album tonight?
Tim – no its old and new of course we do have a lot of Glorious Burden in the set, because we have Declaration Day and Greenface and Red Baron, When Eagle Cries and of course Gettysburg I think is the highlight of the evening.
TMC: I also like Dont Tread On Me.
Tim – Yeah thats a good one, we tried to fit that in but we just could not fit it into the setlist. We’re going to try and get it for the next time. I mean we rehearsed it but it was so hard and we wanted to put a different mix on it.
TMC: You think that there will be a live DVD released of this short tour.
Tim – We might, but we are releasing a Gettysburg DVD. It’s going to be all about Gettysburg and it will have the music and song in it so I think it will be pretty awesome. Hopefully we will release a live one .
TMC: Yeah that will be good because you are coming in at a perfect time for it since you have this killer record and there is a back catalog for Iced Earth and it’s high time for a great double live album from them
Tim – Yeah I would really like to do a live one eventually.
TMC: Well let me let you get something to eat and to meet your next interview. Kick ass tonight and Keep rocking. Thanks very much for your time.
Tim – You’re welcome, thanks for the support.
Ken Pierce([email protected])
Galería 8 fotos
