Savatage
Formed: 1981
From:
Tampa,
FL,
United States
Last Known Status: Active
Savatage Interviews and Features
Below are our features and interviews with Savatage.
Interview
Chris Caffery Discusses New Spirits Of Fire Album
The term "supergroup" can be a bit of a poison chalice at times. They always look like they'll be great on paper but when it comes to the finished product, it can at times be a little lacking. However, that doesn't mean they're always set up to fail. Just take Cream, Emerson, Lake & Palmer, Down, Brujeria or Avantasia for some highly successful examples. As you may have guessed, one rising group which certainly belongs in the latter category would be Spirits Of Fire.
Formed by Chris Caffery, guitarist of Trans-Siberian Orchestra & Savatage, bass extraordinaire Steve DiGiorgio (of Testament, Death, Iced Earth among many others) and drummer Mark Zonder (Fates Warning and Warlord,) alongside former Judas Priest and Iced Earth singer Tim "Ripper" Owens, the band unleashed their eponymous debut album in early 2020 and now, two years later and Rhapsody's Fabio Lione behind the mic stand, the quartet have let loose their fearsome sophomore effort, "Embrace The Unknown."
To find out more about this record, its history, circumstances which created it and much more, we caught up with Chris Caffery, who explained everything a fan of this emerging powerhouse could want to know, including why Lione sounds different on this album than he ever has before, the origin of their mascot and even an update on new material from Savatage. You can watch it in full below, while an excerpt reads as follows:
Diamond Oz: The album, "Embrace The Unknown" is out now...
Chris Caffery: Yeah, I'm really excited for people to hear this whole record. Not that I have a particular favourite song, I think the record as a whole is just something that I'm really happy about. Sometimes when you release the first couples of singles, that could be a lot of the highlights and people might not get more, but I think when people hear the rest of this album, they're going to be even more excited, which is what I'm really happy about. Especially the metal fans around the world, I think they're going to be happy when they hear this as a piece.
Oz: Absolutely. The first album was magnificent. Where does the title, "Embrace The Unknown" come from?
Chris: Actually that came from the song title. Fabio had written the lyrics for this record, which is something I wanted to happen because the first four songs on the first album, I'd written them pretty much myself. When we were coming to this and we found out that Ripper was not going to be doing this record, I'd asked that whoever was going to be doing the vocals, I wanted them to write the lyrics and the melodies because if I'm writing this kind of music and then I have to finish everything, to me it starts to feel too much like I'm making a solo record.More...So I was happy to have them do this and as far as the meaning behind this record or the lyrics, it's funny because I'll read the title or the lyrics and be able to get my own idea, the same way that you will, but the only person who's really able to answer exactly what these are is Fabio. Which is kind of cool because when I look at these titles I find meanings in them, like "A Second Chance" is kind of like our second chance and "Embrace The Unknown," people who had no idea who was singing on this record were embracing an unknown when it came out.
When I got Fabio's first finalised versions of this record and had some finished mixes, I sent it to friends, some of whom have listened to thousands of singers, nobody could guess it was him when they heard this and that's the thing that I think was really awesome because you know, as far as I'm concerned, this style and what he's doing on this record is really not something that people have heard him do before and he did it so well. He got into the character of being the singer for Spirits Of Fire and the voice of this band in such a cool way. I'm so happy with his performance and overall this record, to me, is just a really fun listen, front to back. I'll listen to this a lot more than I'll listen to other records that I've been on. A lot of times I'll finish an album and I might listen to it once or twice, or there might be a song I like but this one I listen to start to finish and it's always a really fun listen for me, especially when I'm driving. It's a good driving album!
Interview
Audio Interview Available With Jon Oliva
Jon Oliva sat down to speak with me today to discuss his new solo record "Raise the Curtain." The audio portion of the interview can be heard below (transcribed version pending). In the interview, Oliva touched on a myriad of topics, including the upcoming Jon Oliva's Pain record, which will be "the heaviest record" he has ever done, which Oliva describes as "dark, twisted, but very musical." Tran-Siberian Orchestra is recording three albums simultaneously, including Romanov, based on a novel by producer/writer Paul O'Neill, which was at first intended to be a Savatage album after "Edge of Thorns," and then intended to be the first T.S.O. album. Of course, Savatage was touched on along with his appearance at the songwriting clinic at ProgPower USA in 2012.
With the transcription version pending, I present the audio portion here: More...
Interview
A Chat With Vocalist Jon Oliva
Jon Oliva’s Pain is the solo project of former Savatage vocalist Jon Oliva. While his former endeavors have stuck with the vocalist to this day, Oliva has shown over the years that Jon Oliva’s Pain isn’t just some random band that he plays with on the side. Oliva has released three albums so far with the band since its formation in 2003 and the band recently released their fourth album, “Festival,” featuring a return to more fantasy-based themes. I recently had the chance to speak to Oliva over the phone about the personal lyrical touch of “Festival,” his interesting habits at live shows and the filming of a live DVD in October. More...