TRIVIUM's Corey Beaulieu Talks Silence In The Snow – “It Was Inspired By HEAVEN & HELL”

October 6, 2015, 8 years ago

Greg Prato

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TRIVIUM's Corey Beaulieu Talks Silence In The Snow – “It Was Inspired By HEAVEN & HELL”

While preparing for the writing of their seventh studio album, the Trivium lads began studying classic works by the likes of Maiden, Sabbath, Rainbow, Metallica, and Pantera, resulting in the recently-released Silence In The Snow. Only time will tell if the album is one day mentioned with the same reverence as Killers, Paranoid, Rainbow Rising, Master Of Puppets, and Vulgar Display Of Power, but Trivium's guitarist, Corey Beaulieu recently spoke with BraveWords correspondent Greg Prato about the album's inspiration, videos, and tour plans.

BraveWords: Let's start by discussing the new album, Silence In The Snow. 

Corey Beaulieu: "It's seven records in. The recording process hasn't really changed, but it was a lot of fun. The songs are a lot of fun to write, just the whole creative process behind making the record, the approach to what we were looking to achieve with the record was really challenging, with what the songs required to be good. It was a pretty fun process. And just working with Elvis Baskette was a lot of fun. His approach to songwriting really helped taking the songs to a new level. We spent a lot of time writing the songs over the course of about a year - fine-tuning the songs and everything. It was a pretty lengthy process with just getting everything together. But by the time we hit the studio, we had pretty much everything covered. So it was just jumping in the studio and knocking everything out. It was business as usual in the whole recording part of it - having a routine with how we approach getting everything down. Nothing too crazy different than how we've always made records."

BraveWords: I’ve read a quote from Matt Heafy, saying that playing shows with Heaven & Hell back in 2007 served as inspiration for this album.

Corey Beaulieu: "The title track was written back in 2007, and we had just come off tour playing a few shows in Japan with Heaven & Hell. And we got to meet all those guys. It was really cool - we got to see them live, and they just sounded so amazing and powerful, that it was kind of a special moment. After that quick little tour, we ended up writing the music which became the song 'Silence In The Snow.' At the time, we were writing for Shogun, and that song really didn't fit or just wasn't ready to be used at the time. So we always had it on the shelf, and over the years, management and record labels would always mention that song as something that was really cool and liked it, but the demo we had, we didn't really put so much time into the song, because we were working on so many songs at the time that we just never had the proper amount of time to put into it, to really make it a great song. But the idea for the song was always very strong. When we started talking about this new record and what we wanted to do with the new material, all the things we wanted to do, the song 'Silence in the Snow' really covered everything that we were thinking about doing with this record, and just made sense to bring it back. And that song became the starting point for the record. We kind of built the record off the vibe of that song. It was inspired by Heaven & Hell, so we definitely have that traditional metal blueprint as an inspirational background for what the record became."

BraveWords: Three singles were released before the album's release – “Silence In The Snow”, “Blind Leading the Blind”, and “Until The World Goes Cold”.

Corey Beaulieu: "Those three songs, for pre-release material, each song has its own vibe and brings a different element to the table for what the record is. So it was kind of nice to put out three songs that were very different from each other, to kind of show the diversity of the record. But they all fit together really well. When you listen to the record from start to finish, each song has its purpose and its place. No two songs really cover the same ground - as far as the overall vibe. But 'Silence In The Snow' was definitely the song we wanted to lead off with, because it was a very important song that as the leadoff track, really sets the tone. And 'Blind Leading the Blind,' it's up-tempo and has all the elements that I think Trivium fans would expect - from the old school Trivium riff to the guitar solos and melodies. It has a lot of the throwback Trivium vibe, but also, mixes with the new Trivium of what we're doing now. It's a blend of old and new. And 'Until The World Goes Cold', I think it's a new kind of song for us, that I don't think we've ever treaded on a song like this in the past. Just a really big song, but like the other songs, it has the things that people have come to know from us - the guitar melodies, the guitar solos, and just big vocals. It's always nice to be able to write a new song that really covers new ground for the band and sonically moves us into the future with something fresh and exciting."

BraveWords: The video for 'Until The World Goes Cold' is an interesting one, with the chap wearing the mask.

Corey Beaulieu: "All three videos, we have a good friend of ours, who did all the artwork and videos for all the songs. We wanted to make each video completely different from each other, and really do something different with being a metal band, we didn't want to fall upon the cliché metal videos, and do something that we've already done ourselves, or what metal bands typically do in general. But a good friend of ours - who we've worked on the In Waves record, he doesn't come from a metal background, so he brings a different perspective to the table. Him and Matt really work out a lot of the ideas, to bring a visual aspect to the band that makes it interesting and different. We kind of figured out, like in the past, when we go in a different direction and do something off the wall, it usually works out good for us to go the non-typical metal route. We just wanted to make each video kind of very artistic and visually exciting, but also, it makes the viewer/listener think of trying to decipher what the meaning of this video is. I think people when they watch all the different videos we've made; people make up their own interpretations of what they think the video means. It's really cool to do something that's creatively stimulating for our fan base."

BraveWords: Touring plans?

Corey Beaulieu: "We're in the middle of the Hard Drive Live Tour with Tremonti and Wilson right now, and then once we finish up the last show at Knotfest in California at the end of October, right now, the only thing we've got booked for the rest of the year is Knotfest in Mexico City. And the next year is going to pretty much be all year full-on touring. So we'll be hitting it hard next year."





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