We love the MACHINE HEAD guys, so when they were here on the Black Procession tour, we sat down with them and had a bit of a chat.

Keep on reading to hear about how the tour went for the guys and what they are going to be getting up to in the coming months.

Roadrunner UK – Last time I saw you was Sonisphere- how did that go for you guys? It was all a bit stressful before hand with the will they won’t they play shenanigans but then you got onto the stage and it was just fucking insane…
Dave McLain – It was a rock star Machine Head moment. The whole day leading up to that at Sonisphere. Having our own chartered private plane to take us and our equipment and just the excitement of doing it as kind of a surprise show, ya know, like being back on the bill. We didn’t really wanna make it public because we wanted to come back… and just… and just make this impact of like people seeing us. The fans out there weren’t sure and watching the backdrop come down and hearing the Machine fucking Head chants starting… It was definitely… there was adrenaline time! It was awesome!

RRUK – So what do you go on to do after Sonisphere?
Phil Demmel – What did we do? We had 3 months off and then we were supposed to do a Canadian carnage dates with Slayer and Megadeth and then Tom’s back went out and so that go cancelled and we just and went to the world series and various other sporting events! After that we started to tour with Megadeth.

RRUK – How did that go?
PD – Really good, yeah! Playing in front of people that wouldn’t normally come to see us, so we definitely accomplished that and then ended up with some west coast dates with Metallica and we got to play at home with them, and it was like the best way to end it ya know; to end our States Blackening run with our hometown heroes in front of our home crowd.

RRUK – That must’ve been one hell of a show!
PD – It was a hell of a guest list *laughs* and out dressing room was retarded, I didn’t even want to go in there! [laughs]

DM – Those hometown shows are so draining because you just have to like turn it on and you feel like you kinda have to entertain everybody in for them. They have family members there and I know how, when I go through Texas or whatever like you have family come out, how it’s always like… It’s really like herding cattle coz you try and keep everybody kinda entertained and ya know.. You want them.. oh yeah come over here to this spot.. And you like herd them for a little while ya know..

RRUK – And how was the crowd at the show? Insane? I just get this feeling it would’ve been an absolutely insane show…
PD- It was, it was good I mean it wasn’t like, it wasn’t one of the better Metallica shows that we had, but it was awesome Metallica crowd. There was a lot of people that knew us, and we had a lot of friends there- especially for me I had a lot of people from high school that came out.It wasn’t like an insane headlining show for us, it was more of a benchmark we’d achieved.

RRUK – Talking about mad crowds for you guys, this tour’s been pretty insane, right?
DM – Totally been insane. In the UK there’s kinda like their own brand of craziness. Like here in Manchester’s always insane. London this time was really amazing.. Like ya never know really what to expect with London because it’s London and it’s kind of like in LA or New York- sometimes you get a crowd out there that will maybe subdue coz they get shows the whole time or whatever, but this time around it was killer. Glasgow was just insane just craziness but I think tonight’s [Manchester Apollo] gonna be the best show

PD – That is the reason why we come here; why we did like the Burn My Eyes thing here- just the crazy circle pits we get here. Manchester’s always a special show. We’re looking forward to it, it was actually gonna be the last night of the tour. But we had a couple of shows in Ireland.

RRUK – So, a lot of people have asked me this question so I’m gonna put it to you- this is really the proper first headline tour of this album for the UK, why so long?
PD – For anywhere in the world, it’s been the first proper headline ever. I mean we’ve done co-headlines but the longest we’ve been playing is like an hour, until this tour. We wanted to do a States tour, proper headline, but then how do you turn down Slayer and Megadeth? And then ending with Metallica and we opted for right out of the gate we had all these support slots, It’s Lamb Of God, Heaven and Hell ya know? We did festivals over here but then it was Slipknot for 8 months, Metallica for a year or whatever- the biggest bands in metal, you can’t turn that down. ever since I joined the band we were, if we wanted to go out it had to be ok well who are we gonna get to headline and take our own package out, so now we finally get to go out on support and we set ourselves up really well for the next record.

RRUK – This record’s just been crazy for you guys – album of the decade, Amazing reviews, you got your silver plaques last week for over 60 thousand copies sold- how’s it feel?
DM – It’s fucking awesome, like it’s really the best stuff that’s ever happened to the band. Ever!. Ya know? And it’s just to have it happen now and at this point in our career? From going though like, just like all kinds of stuff ya know? Like good, bad, whatever, real bad, real good, and having it happen now, when we have this line up that we have, that is like, it feels… Its Machine Head ya know? Like to me THIS is Machine Head. And to have all this stuff happening to us now is like…I don’t know…not that I wouldn’t have appreciated it before, but now more than ever. You just don’t expect things like this to happen and its kick ass! [laughs]

RRUK – So after you’ve finished this headline run, you gonna go back and start work on a new record?
DM – Yeah, I mean we are, me Robb and Phil are *laughs*

PD – We’re probably gonna take a couple weeks like after we get home around the 1st of April, ya know settle in and then me and Dave are probably gonna go down to the studio and trick it out and get it work comfortable for us. Our last place, it was just gear everywhere, and I’m pretty much freaked out just sitting between the two of you right now cus I’m really claustrophobic so we need to have a good working environment, because that’s where we do all our writing. We come up with riffs here and there… but probably by mid April we’ll be in there starting to rock out.

RRUK – And do you feel any nervousness or apprehension given how well The Blackening has done; are you thinking holy shit how do we follow this up?
DM – No because all the stuff that’s happened has really just like, it was never on our minds while we were writing in the first place, and it was kind of just like the icing on the cake, like we know now that you take that when it comes your way, and The Blackening has been this amazing special moment in our career and I think more than anything we’re just more excited, like it’s not being nervous it’s not like oh god how are we gonna follow The Blackening? Like we’re just gonna go in and do our thing and just write, it just seems to happen ya know?

PD – Yeah, we’re not gunning for album of the next decade or ya know. Those accolades were great and everything.. But that isn’t why we wrote The Blackening in the first place- we wrote it coz we enjoyed it and people just happened to like it, so.. Hopefully it happens again. If not whatever… so long as we’re happy with it.

Machine Head are now on their way home to take that downtime before starting the writing process. We’ll bring you updates as and when we have them. The Blackening is available online HERE.