The hardest thing in the world for a band to do is recapture the passion and the thrill of their past glories, or as Ken Mary sees it ‘win the fight against nostalgia’. Only a handful of bands have pulled it off, and as they years intervene it gets still harder. Back in 1987 Fifth Angels’ debut was one of the records I couldn’t stop playing and whilst I loved the follow up ‘Time Will Tell’, and 2018’s ‘The Third Secret’ it’s the album that I’ve been playing all week that somehow miraculously is giving me the same feelings I had when I played that first record all those years ago. Fifth Angel’s fourth release ‘When Angel’s Kill’ is my album of the year so far and one that transported me right back to where it all began.
Ken: Good morning how are you doing Mark?
Mark: Very good thank you Ken, and a good afternoon to you. It’s been five years since we last spoke.
Ken: Just a blink of an eye right?! (laughs)
Mark: (laughs) Well it is really I guess, if we take out a couple of years for Covid
Ken: Yeah we lost a couple of years for sure, the whole Covid thing wrecked us in a lot of ways. And it really slowed down the recording – this album ended up being a two year process (laughs)
Mark: It sounds great, I was always a huge fan of the Fifth Angel debut and so when you came up with the third album I was incredibly impressed but this one, I think, is even better. Real old school headbanging music!
Ken: Thank you so much. The one thing we tried to stay true to was that those big pay-off choruses were there and I think we accomplished that. Thats been kind of the Fifth Angel trademark and we really noticed that. We just played the KIT (Keep It True) Festival in Germany and, you know, you have thousands of people singing along to every song, every single song! We even played two new songs – ‘When Angels Kill’ and ‘Immortal’, and ‘Immortal wasn’t even out on video yet and so we showed them how to sing it and everyone sang along the entire song. So one of the things we’ve really tried to do is make sure those hooks are in there, and I think that’s something that all our albums have in common, but there’s also been a growth in the band in terms of the technical ability and the musicianship. And I think we’ve just made a piece of art that we are all extremely happy with right now.
Mark: It’s great and I love the cover too, wonderful artwork, I’d love to see the vinyl.
Ken: (Ken reaches behind him) Well It just so happens… This is the vinyl here, its a gatefold and this is the sky blue vinyl. There’s a bunch of photos when you open it up, and another page that has lyrics on there. They did a beautiful job on the packaging in my opinion.
Mark: That’s so cool. I donlt think my love of vinyl ever went away. It’s such a great way to experience music.
Ken: It’s exciting for us to put out vinyl, we had it on the last album too, but these days vinyl is making a really big impact for people and we’re so happy it’s back – it’s such a cool medium. I love the big artwork and you can do so much more with it, and I still love the way vinyl sounds, it sounds better to my ear. I guess because it’s a flawed process, whereas CDs are digital and perfect, I mean we hear in analogue, so I definitely prefer the vinyl.
Mark: It’s a warmer sound I think, that’s what always appealed to me.
Ken: Me too.
Mark: It’s a great record right from the off with tracks like ‘When Angels Kill’ and ‘Resist the Tyrant’ that open – there’s some great songs on there and it ever lets go of you! Do you have any particular favourites? You mentioned the two that you played live the other day.
Ken: It’s hard to talk about favourites and it’s kind of weird because it changes, you know I’ve lived with these songs for years now, and it’s amazing that I can even listen to them at all! (laughs) Usually if I finish a record and there’s been that much energy and effort put into it personally, I can never listen to it again, But with this one I can still enjoy it, My favourites are ‘When Angel’s Kill’, ‘We Are Immortal’ and I love hat middle part with ‘Run to the Black’, ‘Seven Angels’ and ‘Blinded and Bleeding’. I think that ‘The End of Everything’ is a cool song too, that one moves me a lot, there’s a lot of orchestration, and when I was doing just the orchestration and listening without any of the other music just that was very moving to me. And that’s difficult to say. I think sometimes when you’re that close and involved in something that intricate it’s easy to just not be moved by it, it can become a bit clinical and you’re just trying to get it done. But a lot of these songs actually move me and that’s unusual because I’ve taken part in the writing, and like I said a lot of the time I’ll finish a record I’ve been involved in and never want to ear it again. (laughs) This one I think is a little special and the first time I was able to hear it complete and in order I was like “Wow”. Sometimes you make pieces of art that that connect and this is one of those times – I really feel strongly about this ‘piece of art’.
Mark: Two years is a long time to invest and I think that what I suppose was an initial hindrance has paid off. Over the years you’ve been involved in so many great records in my opinion, but it must be great to be able to drum like you do on this record! There’s so much going on!
Ken: well you know it’s so funny because one guy who commented on one of my posts on YouTube I think said “Man what is it like to get up in the morning and just play like that!?” And I thought “You know what I don’t know” I don’t really think of it that much because there are so many amazing musicians out there, you know what I mean? There’s so many incredible drummers that I look at and think “What? What are they doing? This is insane!” So I don’t know, I don’t tend to look at myself that way.
Mark: There’s so much energy though in the performance on this album, right from the off with ‘When Angels Kill’ there’ no holding back!
Ken: (laughs) Yeah, we’re not messing around! We’re trying to make a statement right out of the box. So I know what you’re saying! (laughs) I guess I just don’t take compliments well! (laughs)
Mark: (laughs)
Ken: I always feel self-conscious when someone comes up to me and says “Wow dude, you’re amazing” I just feel a little uncomfortable and thank them for their kind words. I don’t know it’s hard to look at yourself objectively, as there are so many incredible musicians out there. But yeah there’s a boat load of energy that went into these songs, Someone said to me “Imagine playing this whole 70 minute piece live!” and I thought, yeah, that would be quite a work out!
Mark: (laughs) Absolutely!
Mark: It’s hard to believe the debut album is now 37 years old and I guess the band, if we ca rely on the internet, is 40 this year.
Ken: Yeah, I didn’t realise that until I looked it up on Wikipedia. But I really think of it as ’84 as when we really started doing things, getting the recordings together and sending them to Michael Varney, and got or first record deal. Then everything really started happening more in ’85, ’86, I don’t know but I always think the band is more from that time period. But things definitely started in that time period. I think the first four songs we gave to Mike Varney were ‘Wings of Destiny’, ‘Fifth Angel’, ‘Shout It Out’ and I think one more song. But at any rate that album and just the fact that we’re still taking about it, what 37 years later, is astounding to me, it’s astounding to us! When we were making it we were trying to create something special and we’ve always done that as a band – we always try to do everything with excellence from the artwork to the recording or a photo – you know whatever we are trying to do. We’re always trying to do it with excellence. SO just that fact that album has stood the test of time and you ca still go back and listen to it and enjoy the songs and be moved by them: to me that is quite an accomplishment.
Mark: It’s one of those things I always think if there was an alternate history the record label would have had their shit together and we would have had an extra 20 odd years of Fifth Angel!
Ken: I agree with you. I think it’s an unfortunate story, but really I think the Grunge thing really put the nail in the coffin. Not just for us, for a lot of Metal bands. There were a lot of bands, even big bands that really struggled in the 90’s – bands like Megadeth and even Metallica were struggling to a large degree. People don’t remember how weird that whole thing was. There’s only one of two times in music history where this happened – where there was a backlash on other styles of music. That happened in the 70’s with Disco, when people were burning Disco records and saying ‘Dosco Sucks’ and radio stations were having ‘Bee Gee free weekends’ and things. And then in the Grunge era when they hated Metal bands, they were making fun of Aerosmith and Kiss and Ozzy. They wouldn’t allow Ozzy to be on the alternative Rock tour so he created Ozzfest and said “F You I’ll do my own thing,” But f you look at the attitude of what was going on that was not cool, that was not a cool era, and look at how much of that survived ? I mean Foo Fighters came out of that, but everyone is gone except Pearl Jam, some bands have new people like Alice in Chains, but Soundgarden is gone, Nirvana is gone. The whole thing lasted like two years and it was just very unfortunate that the attitude of the fans was ‘if you’re not this the get out of here!’ I thought it was totally uncalled for.
Mark: Not everywhere though Ken.
Ken: That’s right. Europe by comparison didn’t really do that. We didn’t realise that back when we lost our record deal. There was no YouTube, there was no Internet, just the birth of it around ’92. And so without a deal there was no way to keep in touch with your fans. Nowadays if that happened you could still put out videos on YouTube, you could still service music on Spotify and you could continue. But back the you lost your record deal and it was pretty much over.
Mark: It is amazing to think that. At the time of Grunge I’d just moved to Australia and really here we never had that backlash. I think I’m allowed to say it being here so long but in some ways Australia is refreshingly behind the rest of the world so we never really had that backlash against Hard Rock. In Europe too Metal held strong and I think always will. But you’re right in teh US where the labels and the money was , it was a very strange time and everyone went chasing Grunge, which lasted a remarkably short period of time.
Ken: I think so. I do harbor a bit of, I don’t want to say ‘resentment’ about it: but it was not appropriate what happened. Obviously styles come and go but they don’t just wipe out the bands that were before them. It was really a Corporately inspired attitude. Inspired by the big companies, but anyways… just not a fan of that whole deal.
Mark: That was always the strange bit for me, the labels dumped the bands so the product wasn’t there but really we fans never went away it’s was just that in the U.S. especially labels controlled what you could buy. Becoming a Metal and Hard Rock fan got harder and a little less exciting.
Ken: And now we’re back!
Mark: And I think now we’ve learned that none of us need that kind of Corporate Machine any longer there are plenty of great focused labels out there now. Last time we spoke we talked about some of the great albums you’d played on over the years, for example Bonfire’s best album ‘Fireworks’ which was huge in Europe.
Ken: Yeah, I think that went Gold in Germany, so a big record.
Mark: Were there any projects that you turned down or were unable to do that you wish you maybe had?
Ken: Well there’s tons of records, but I’m glad I chose what I did, and some had success in other areas ‘Chastain’ had a lot of success in Europe but not so much in teh United States, ‘Impellitteri’ had a lot of success in Japan and had some initial success in the United States but it didn’t last, he was more or less a Japanese artist. I mean there were a lot of records I played on I’m so glad I did ‘Don Dokken – Up From the Ashes’ that was an amazing record to play on, I even look back with fondness playing on some of Kip Winger’s solo albums, and playing with Jordan Rudess from Dream Theater on his first solo record. So it’s been a great experience – I feel like I’ve had the opportunity to play with some of the greatest musicians in the world, which really is a stunning thing. So I feel very blessed and fortunate to look back on my discography. Sometimes when I’m touring Europe there’s usually somebody there, maybe one or two at every show who will bring a stack of records for me!
Mark: (laughs)
Ken: And I’m signing stuff I’ve forgotten I played on! And that’s really cool that some people have followed my career to that degree where they have almost everything I’ve played on. It’s a great honor and it’s very humbling, and I will sit there and sign every one of those because someone invested their time and their money in buying all of those records and I’ll stay there and sign ever one of them.
Mark: You’re the only signature I’m missing on a certain Alice Cooper album, years ago Alice signed me a stack of records and over the years I’ve managed to track everyone down but you! (laughs)
Ken: Well you mail it to me with a return envelope and I’ll sign it for you and send it back! Or I’ll sign something for you and you can forge my signature! I give you authorization to forge my signature on Alice’s records! (laughs)
Mark: (laughs) You see Ken I could never bring myself to do that, the fun is in tracking everyone down and we will meet one day! When I tell everyone who I’m talking to each week I ask for questions from people and the really cool thing is I got in over 250 questions for you! Obviously we don’t have time to get through all of those now, but one of the recurring themes in there was if you were starting out paying drums today who would you suggest that people listen to?
Ken: Wow, that’s a big question. For me I had my three, and I’m actually doing a series called ‘Three Drummers’ that’s coming up, so for me, I was taught formally, my teachers was a guys named Dick Stensland out of Seattle. He was a fabulous guy, and was teaching me Progressive Music and things like ‘Yes’ and ‘Return to Forever’ and Latin beats, and Rhumba beats and all these different types of things. So I think it really depends what your taste is, but for me the three I really focused in on were Buddy Rich, Neil Peart and John Bonham. And they are completely different drummers, they are like diametrically opposed. But I felt like there was something special, for me, in each one of them. Buddy, I think if he was born in this era, he would be a Metal drummer, because he’s all about speed and precision. He was way faster than anyone back in his day. You can still go back and see, I think he died in ’87, so here we are 36 years after his death, and you go watch some of his drums solos and you think “This guy was dropped in from another planet!” He was born in 1917, there was no YouTube, there were no other drummers to draw from. He had to write the book! I think he was the greatest drummer of all time. I would definitely suggest him I would suggest Neil Peart for his composition. He was the first to show that the drums really had a musicality that had not been tapped into, and he really made orchestration with drum parts that were really phenomenal. And then John Bonham for the feel and the groove – such an advanced groove on songs like ‘Fool in the Rain.’ He was 30 years old when he recorded that and it’s just beautiful. If you listen to the isolated drum tracks, all the grace notes and all the feel that went into that, it’s just incredible. So they would be three that I would definitely take a look at, then there’s plenty of other guys. There’s a drummer called Eric Moore who is really incredible. there’s just so many. You could just go on Instagram ad find all kinds of really amazing drummers.
Mark: And I guess that’s the great thing now if you are picking up an instrument, there’s so much out there that’s readily available to watch.
Ken: Absolutely.
Mark: If you could direct someone to a record in your back catalogue to give a spin this week what would it be?
Ken: Well that’s a tough one, if someone is going to listen to something I obviously have new art in the market place so I’d love people to give the new Firth Angel a listen. But I like you, love that first record and songs like ‘In the Fallout’ and ‘Cry Out the Fools’ – some of those songs that we still play and people sing along to. That record holds a special place in my heart as well.
Mark: I should have pulled out my copy, I still have the original that I still play.
Ken: And Metal Blade reissued those first two albums too, so I think hey are available again.
Mark: I love the second record too.
Ken: So do I but there’s just something special for me about that first one, you know, when you’re young and full of energy. I think that might be the first album that I ever played on, and it holds a special place because it taught me so much and we learned so much as a band. And just the fact that we can still talk about it 37 years later is a testament to the fact that we did it right even though we were very young. You know you always look back on those days with great nostalgia, so I think that’s part of it too.
Mark: I think so. One of my favourites and I have to say that ‘Firth Angel – When Angels Kill’ is my album of the year so far.
Ken: I love to hear that! And love to hear that for a number of reasons because honestly this one was really special for me too, it was a labour of love because these days you really don’t make money on these things. So it really was pouring out our hearts into trying to make something great and I feel really proud of it. I feel that we did create something kind of special. I thought that right in the middle of making it, but when you get to hear it all done and in lace I really do have an affinity for this record.
Mark: I think it stands out for me because it takes you back to a place that you’ve been before, and though the landscape has changed over time, you still get that same feeling you did the first time you heard that first record.
Ken: Wel that means a lot, it’s always hard to fight against nostalgia. I mean I love my favourite Iron Maiden albums – they’re the ones that I heard when I was young and that’s just the way it is. My favourite Rush albums are ‘Permanant Waves’ and ‘Moving Pictures’ because those are the albums that introduced me to those bands. And so when somebody says something like that I’m astounded because we’re fighting against nostalgia to a large degree, and it’s hard to win against nostalgia. So thank you for the kind words.
Mark: It hardly ever happens for me, sometimes you get echoes, but rarely do you get that feeling of almost ‘deja-vu’.
Ken: I have a family member – my wife’s brother who was a big Fifth Angel fan back in the day and he’s been listening to this album non stop because he’s family so he obviously got an advanced copy and he thinks it’s by far his favourite and i’s just so cool that someone who loved the early stuff appreciates the new art. It’s a very cool thing. There’s nothing that feels better in the world.
Mark: Thank you so much Ken. It’s bee great to talk, let’s not leave it so long next time!
Ken: (laughs) Thank you so much Mark, and you have a great morning! Take care my friend!
