“YOU'RE NOT WRITING FOR OTHER PEOPLE. IT SHOULD BE WHAT YOU BELIEVE IN”

How to write the heaviest metal songs without reverting to formula, by Bullet For My Valentine guitarists Matt Tuck and Padge

- Amit Sharma

Bullet For My Valentine guitarists Matt Tuck and Michael ‘Padge’ Paget are no strangers to reinvention. Throughout the course of a 23 year-career, the band have continually searched for new ways to equate anthemic melody against metallic heaviness.

In 2018, their sixth album Gravity saw them experiment further away from their thrash metal roots, embracing more radio-friendly structures and flirting with electronica while still remaining very much a guitar band. But now the pendulum has swung again with a new, self-titled album that could be their heaviest yet. “We wanted this to be an extreme version of our band,” Matt says, as he and Padge describe how the new songs were created - from the first bunch of riffs to the shredding solos they call ‘widdly bits’...

When did the songwriting process begin for the new album?

Matt: I think we started in the studio back in Spring 2019, a long time ago now! We did some block writing sessions at a place called Vada, which is this really cool residential studio in Alcester. We just started putting ideas down. They weren’t songs as such, just riffs or sections to catalogue as many as we could while we were there. Working there, we could double up the workload when preparing for a tour, there was a big live room. So we’d either be in there or in the studio. It was a productive working environment. We wanted to show people what we’ve got. We’re more than capable of it.

Padge: [The new album] reminds me of the ferocious metal we grew up listening to – stuff like Pantera, Machine Head, Metallica, Slayer and Slipknot.

In some ways, it feels like that heaviness is connected to Gravity being less abrasive.