Since their inception in 2005 Five Finger Death Punch are a band who has constantly galvanized opinions.
Consider too heavy for the mainstream by most, and too mellow in parts for the metal community in others, the band had ridden their own musical merry-go-round of success, taking metal to places seldom envisaged in the past and to a wider audience than ever dreamed possible.
They have had number one hits, controversy, sold out tours and runaway success, yet still don’t receive the recognition they deserve in some quarters.
Their debut album Way Of The Fist divided the metal community but was a resounding success, paving the way for a multitude of bands to follow and finally providing that crossover style which bridged the divide between mainstream metal and purists.
Now, Five Finger Death Punch return with a new album, Afterlife, and new guitarist Andy James.
Ever moving forward and always quick to trample over the doubters, Five Finger Death Punch are nothing if not a force unto themselves, laying waste to the doubters and recruiting a new legion of fans with every release.
Put simply, they are a band who don’t give two shits whether you like them or not. They will continue making music that fills their own personal voids and for that they have to be respected.
James sat down with HEAVY earlier this week to talk about Afterlife and being the new kid on the block.
"Musically, it's definitely an evolution from the older stuff,” he began. “Trying to keep the sound of the band, obviously, I think we were maybe a bit conscious of that with changing our guitar player for this new record. I know personally for me, I was thinking how am I going to approach this? Because obviously I'm not gonna sit there and say I'm gonna sound like Jason Hook and do that whole thing. I wanted to bring my own flavour to the band and not be weird. Especially for someone like me who has been a fan of the band. I'm used to hearing the band not with me playing on it. So it's kind of like strange from that point of view hearing this stuff now (laughs). Musically, it's a pretty diverse record. There's some heavy parts, there's some slow, melodic parts; there's actually some cool chill vibe stuff on there. There's one song on there that's really industrial which is very different from anything I've heard the band do before so there's a good eclectic mix of different stuff on there, but it still sounds like Five Finger Death Punch to me."
Despite being new to the band, James said his own personal involvement with the album writing and recording process was better than even he could have expected.
"There is a process,” he nodded. “They've been working with Kevin Churko for a long time and he has a sound as a producer and he has pretty much come up with Five Finger Death Punch as well. The band and producer have grown together, so there's definitely a working process there, understanding how each member of the band contributes stuff and how they work and when they wanna work and what it is they wanna do. Coming into this creative process I was hoping that I might be able to contribute somewhat to the stuff, but I never really had any overbearing expectation that I would even be included at all. When I was asked if I had any cool ideas and stuff like that I would play some stuff and start the creative process for some of the songs that you hear on the record and some ideas died in the water, but it was pretty cool. I wasn't expecting as much input as I was given to produce stuff. It's interesting to see how it all works. It's not that dissimilar to other situations I've been in where I have been in the studio. You come up with an idea, record it, and then you back and forth with the producer about what we can do to improve it, or whether it's a good idea or not. Some ideas you spend plenty of time on and they don't get used at all, so it really does depend on how these things take a life of their own all by themselves."
In the full interview, Andy runs us through Afterlife and what to expect, how it is an improvement on previous releases, if there is a cover song on the album, recording music and acting in the new movie The Retaliators, settling in to an established band, finding that balance between mainstream and heavy music, touring plans and more.