Spoke to the guitar maestro, Gus G the other day. I love his solo-album (official release date March 17) and there was a lot that I wanted to know about the birth of I Am The Fire.

The actual interview will be published in a few weeks, but this was one of the best quotes from it. And believe me, he’s telling it like it is. :) He’s way out of his usual comfort zone in every aspect with this album- and it kicks ass. If you’re into traditional hard rock/metal with a modern sound, this is something for you.

Interview, review and all that will be up here in due time!

Gus: It was a fun record to do, in general. I composed 95 percent of the stuff when I was doing my demos. So basically, when I went into the studio  I just replayed everything through a proper amp.

But if we’re talking about CHALLENGING, I think the instrumentals were very challenging for me. I kinda outdid myself this time. I pushed myself to play harder, more difficult stuff. I even had to practice all this stuff when I went into the studio to be able to play it!

And when I had to learn these songs NOW I was fuckin scared shitless! How the fuck am I gonna do this live?!

Then I started practicing those songs standing still – just standing still. Cause it’s easy to play when you’re sitting down, but when I stood up and tried to play those songs, it sounded like a fuckin’ five-year old kid who had grabbed the guitar for the first time! Hahaha! Oh my god, I’m horrible! I gotta get it together!

Those are pretty technical, those two instrumentals. They have definitely pushed the boundries for me as a player. I mean, NOW I can play that stuff very easily, but that’s just because I practiced a lot. I liked that.

Are you gonna avoid playing those songs live?

Nooo! Hell no! We’re gonna be playing those! I look forward to playing it because now I can do it! I’m gonna start playing them even harder because now I’ve already mastered them, I’ve got it all down so now I can take it to the next level.

I mean, you know how Firewind sounds, those two songs are probably closer to Firewind and what Firewind sounds like. When I wrote those I thought, I’m probably gonna save those for the band later on. But then I thought… What the fuck, it’s a solo album and I should be allowed to have whatever the hell I want on it. If I want a fucking country song on it, I should be able to!
(to be continued….)

[First video, with Mats Leven]