Zorro: Hi Vassilis! First of all thank you for this big opportunity to be here with you on the pages of Heavy Paradise! My kindest regards from Italy!
heavy paradise : Let me start this interview with your superb last year's release Shining Line project. It is a superb melodic rock stuff which received some excellent reviews. How do you feel about that?
Zorro: Well, I can say that I'm absolutely amazed of the huge acclaim received by fans and critics for the debut album of my beloved Shining Line project! Me and Amos worked really hard together with Alessandro Del Vecchio to give to all the melodic fans a high quality product, and being me the first huge AOR supporter I hope we've been successful in our mission!
heavy paradise : With all these 'big' names did you had some problems as it concerns the recording of Shining Line album?
Zorro: Sincerely, I had some great times in recording this cd and all the guests have been really professional working with big devotion to leave their recognizable trademark on every song! We had only few moments of trouble, solved anyway with the close musicianship and professionalism of the entire Shining Line team!
heavy paradise : Except of the great guest list that you had, was there any one that you have invited and didn't accepted the invitation?
Zorro: Yes, it's usual that when you approach renowed artists you must expect that their schedule list can be full (due to live dates, other recording sessions, etc.) and it's easy it can be incompatible with the planning you've done on your project. As you can imagine I can't tell a list of all the names who didn't had the chance to take part to the debut cd, but I really hope I'll have the chance to work with them on a mighty second album. If this will happen, you'll be the first to know it! I would anyway like to send an heartfelt thought to Steve Lee, which is surely watching us all from heaven: he was one of the names we approached for the involvement into the line-up of the project, but the collaboration didn't go on port for the planned tour he had in promotion of the Gotthard's "Need To Believe" cd. We miss you so much Steve!
Zorro: Thanks again and again Vassilis for your so kind words! When I started to talk with Amos for the very first time about this project, I had a clear idea of how all things should have turned out, and what you can hear now on Shining Line is exactly what I wanted to do for this so ambitious project. It's really hard, for an artist, to try to picked out some favourites tunes in a personal tracklist, but I can say that I have a special connection with the song "Heat Of The Light", which I wrote for my beloved dog and friend Yuri, died the last year after 16 years passed happily together: I miss him in way so difficult to describe with simple words...
heavy paradise : Avenue Of Allies is a fast growing record company. Some great last year's releases and I'm sure that there are many to follow. How do you see the thing with record companies nowadays? Do you think that, for a new musician/band, it's hard to get a good enough record deal?
Zorro: Avenue Of Allies is without doubt the best choice we could make for our project! The president Gregor Klee is a skilled manager, a careful promoter and a very passionate fan of the entire AOR scene, and we're delighted for the work he's done (and he's continuing to do!) for the promotion of our self-titled debut!
I think that the today's situation of the music market is really hard to face, but at the same time musicians and artists can count on the great help offered by techonology, which allow them to build up good records with reasonable budgets. The chance to get a record deal today is proportional to the quality of the music offered: if you present a record with polished production, good songs and cured vocals parts, you surely have all the elements to try to get attention from a label. Otherwise, the melodic market is satured today, so it will be really hard to be noticed; this is what I've seen in my little experience.
Zorro: I can say, starting from the point of view of the fan and adding what I learnt in my little "career" as artist, that the melodic rock scene is living today a second youthness, maybe thanks to a revamped interest of people to this marvellous music style.
The real trouble is that sales today are strictly lower if compared to the pre-internet era, so the main problem for artists and musicians who makes album is always to be able to cover all the costs of makin' a record with the poor sells of these days. Take me for example: I invested a lot of money to do the Shining Line debut, and all the chances to make a second chapter are related to what we're be able to recover from the money side. It's sad to say, but me and Amos are two ordinary men with ordinary works, and we don't have the resources to make albums if sells don't help us in a some way.
heavy paradise : So, are we going to hear more from Shining Line or are you working on something totally new?
Zorro: Regarding Shining Line, even if I have at last 9 or 10 new songs already written, we're forced to wait again. Anyway, in this moment I've been envolved, by a close friend of mine, in a new astonishing project which few GREAT guests of the melodic rock/AOR scene: in this album I'll take care of all the drums parts and most of the lyrics.
The songwriting talent of my friend is absolutely incredible, and it reminds me a lot of the AOR style with westcoast elements of acts such as Toto, Work Of Art and Richard Marx... I'm absolutely sure that this album will be one of the real highlights of this 2011, so stay tuned!
heavy paradise : That's really great news!! So Zorro, which are your favourite top five albums ever?
Zorro: What a difficult question! I'm a huge fan (and collector) of the past and present melodic (hard)rock scene, and I have in my collection more than 3000 titles exclusively of this kind of music (but I wanted to have more!): so you can understand that pick out only five titles for me is simply impossible!
heavy paradise : Which are your influences?
Zorro: My influences as songwriter comes from the classic melodic rock scene, I especially love the late eighties bombastic melodic sound, and with Shining Line I tried to put this devotion into every single track of the album. Talking from the drumming side, I usually don't like too much virtuoso musicians, preferring a clean playing which is done in the service of the mosaic of the songs: for this reason my favorite musician (and idol!) is Bryan Adams' drummer Mickey Curry! What a GREAT drummer!
Zorro: I would like to thank all of them for the great acclaim received with the Shining Line debut, I really hope to have the chance to a second chapter with another astonishing list of guests, to give them some other great tunes of classic melodic rock music! For everyone who is interested to know something more about Shining Line, please visit and contact us at out official Myspace www.myspace.com/shiningline , or write to me at my personal e-mail address: veron_zorro11@yahoo.it
heavy paradise : I'd like to thank you once again for this interview and to wish you all the best for the future!
Zorro: Vassilis, I'm the one who MUST thank you for the great support and for this wonderful interview! I send my best regards to all the staff and readers of Heavy Paradise! And remember: stay tuned this year for a new astonishing melodic project! Rock on!
No comments:
Post a Comment