Alter Bridge Mark Tremonti Interview: My Champion, Kirk Hammett Hardwired Solos & More

1. Writing Instrumentals & Doing More In The Future, Metallica-Style

S.T. You guys once did an instrumental, Ahavo Rabo Taco Salad, for Total Guitar magazine. Would you ever do more instrumentals on Tremonti or AB, or perhaps a whole album like that?

M.T: That was such a huge, huge effort. I've gotta give it up to guys like John Petrucci or whatnot that come up with side projects that are all instrumental, that are just loaded with solos. Because that song took me forever (laughs), it really did, and I don't know if I could do an entire album full of guitar solos.

It was a tough project. I'd like to tackle one, just like how Metallica used to, y'know? Orion, Call of Ktulu, To Live is To Die, those are three of my favourite Metallica songs, maybe do one a record.

S.T: That would be so great! A lot of people don't realise just how much effort goes into writing an instrumental track.

M.T: Yeah man, the toughest thing about it is, it wasn't a proper 'band track', so I was writing it at home, and then when we were doing rehearsals, we had to ask our engineer if he could get out his Pro Tool rig and record it in a rehearsal space. We were never in the studio doing it, so it was kinda like, "Okay, today can we knock out a couple drum takes? Today can we knock out some bass?"

It was kinda just jammin' it in there, and every day I would go home and write another part. Total Guitar had said they wanted to do a feature, like "We'll give you the cover of our magazine if you give us a feature and break it down", and I wanted to come up with something cool.

S.T: Well, I'm gonna put a request in - an instrumental track on the next Tremonti album would be insanely cool, and I guarantee a bunch of the fans would agree.

M.T. Yeah man absolutely, I'll keep that in mind, I'd love to do that.

S.T: Thank you very much for your time, all the best at Download and I'll no doubt speak to you again soon.

M.T: See you there, thanks!

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There you have it! One of the coolest dudes in music - what would you have asked him if given the chance? Let me know in the comments below!