Metal Hammer: M Shadows Wants The New Avenged Sevenfold Album To Be A Metal/Rock Classic.

M Shadows appeared on Metal Hammer’s February 13th issue cover and he spoke to them briefly about what fans can expect from the new Avenged Sevenfold album, his hopes for the album and Arin Ilejay. I’ve written up the small piece featured in the issue and you can read that below:

Nearly three years have passed since Avenged Sevenfold’s last record, “Nightmare.” 2013 promises to herald the Californian crew’s return with their sixth studio album. The band released one-off single “Carry On” in conjunction with video game “Call of Duty: Black Ops II” in September 2012, but according to frontman M Shadows, fans shouldn’t take it as any indication of the new record’s direction.

“The new album has a lot more of a Sabbath and Zeppelin feel to it, ” he states. “There’s definitely more Sabbath in what we’re writing, and we’re proud of ‘Carry On,’ but this album is going to be on a whole new level. We’re shooting for late January, early February [to enter the studio] and to have the album out in the summer. I’m pretty sure that we’re looking to go overseas first, so you guys will be seeing it before everyone else!”

Shadows has also made it plain that Avenged will not be jumping on the metal-meets-electronica bandwagon, stating: “It’s the exact opposite. We’re going back to Sabbath stuff. We’re looking at blues chords they’re playing most of their stuff in. We’re listening to Zeppelin. We’re going backwards with what we want this record to feel like. I wanna write a classic metal record, a classic rock record in 2013.”

This as-yet-untitled album will be the first to feature 24-year-old drummer Arin Ilejay, who began working with the band early in 2011. Following in the footsteps of the late Jimmy “The Rev” Sullivan and Mike Portnoy (who guested with Avenged on “Nightmare” and it’s subsequent touring cycle) will be no easy task, but M Shadows is confident that his band have found the right man for the job.

“He’s been doing really well. We’re trying to get him on the plane of, ‘We’re not trying to impress people with our playing abilities. We’re trying to write the best songs possible!’ That takes a lot of maturity. When we were his age we just wanted to shred. He’s doing well. He’s growing up fast.”