Fleshgod Apocalypse mastermind Francesco Paoli recently sat down with Metal Wani’s Carl O’Rourke to talk about the band’s current tour, new album ‘Veleno’, the highs and lows of being a multi-instrumentalist and much more.
On their most recent U.S tour, Francesco said,
“The tour is probably the best tour we’ve done here in the United States. We are here with Hypocrisy, it’s a co-headlining tour, so we have plenty of time. We play over one hour every night and all the fans are going nuts for this. Sometimes we come here and we have to support bigger bands so we play like forty minutes and stuff like that. So you really focus on the singles we released and trying to get more audience. But this time we had a chance to play some old songs we didn’t play for years and we are playing a couple of songs from the new album ‘Veleno’, and the feedback is great. Everybody likes them!”
“You feel the support of the people for the band. The trust, they believe in the band, they believe in the new music, the new line up, which is great. We are really thankful for this.”
Talking on the band’s leading single ‘Sugar’, Francesco shared,
“We want to use the song as an anti-heroin, anti-drugs theme. It worked out because a lot of people were excited about this. They were like finally somebody who talks about daily problems, something which is not that far from us, you know? Sometimes we feel this thing belongs to the past or is not that close to us. Otherwise sometimes these kinds of problems or issues the problem have been very close. So I wanted to do it in some way to give a little bit of relief to my soul with this.”
“It’s a little bit complicated to talk about this. This song itself is an anthem against heavy drugs.”
Asked about the pros and cons of being a multi -instrumentalist,
“It’s both things. It’s way easier because when I write my parts, for example, when you can play more than one instrument, it’s very useful in the songwriting because you know how to arrange the stuff better in some way. So technical-wise it’s way better. It’s a little bit more of a pain in the a*s when we come to the studio [Laughs] and I have to record drums and then record the guitars and then do the vocals, and with each one of these aspects, we recorded with Marco Mastrobuono. He’s a very good friend of mine. But still, he’ll try to push me to my limit, and he’s pushing me to my limit in drums, and then push my limits in guitars and then it’s the same story with the vocals!”
Francesco concluded,
“So it’s a long process when it comes to recording the stuff. But, you know, I’ve always done it. It’s part of the deal. I love to write songs, I love to record the stuff, so it’s helpful when we are taking about songwriting, and then when you have to perform it’s a little bit more complicated, but still. I love doing this.”