Live-Metal.net recently caught up with SEPULTURA guitarist Andreas Kisser to discuss the band's new album, Kairos. An excerpt is available below:

Q: So the new album, Kairos, has been out for a little while now and I think most of the feedback has been pretty positive. There have maybe been a few mixed reviews, but are you satisfied overall by the feedback of the album and its success so far?

Kisser: "Very much, man. It’s been overwhelming. There’s been a very good response all over the place. We’ve been touring since April, and the album came out in July, and we’ve been playing Europe and playing new songs for awhile and they’re working great live. And we have a great label, as well, with Nuclear Blast, a great partnership that is working fantastic. The chemistry is really great. Since last year, we have been putting this together and everything is flowing according to. It’s great that the album is really causing an impact, and it’s just a privilege to be on the road and enjoy. It was great timing."

Q: We’ve seen a lot of comparisons of this album to Chaos A.D. and Arise, as well. Were you trying to make an album in that vein because that’s what you felt the fans wanted, or were you just kind of following your own path?

Kisser: "It’s natural for us to try and find something new all the time, even though we are inspired on this album by ourselves. So a connection to any old album of Sepultura makes sense. Not that we are trying to do a specific album again, which I think is kind of stupid—it’s impossible. But Sepultura celebrated 25 years of a career last year, so that kind of vibe just took me around, to still touring the world and making albums. We look back and see the beautiful history we have behind us, and we respect so much of our past, but we’re not trapped there. We needed a little bit of the memories and all the influences that we had; the bands that we used to listen to and all the limitations that technology had during those days. On vinyl, you could only put a certain amount of songs, and we used to work in the studio and record on tape and everything. That kind of stuff brings back a lot of memories, and it kind of worked to provoke those feelings—to our families, to our relationship to the press, record labels, managers, the whole experience of touring the world and being onstage. So it’s a very intimate and very personal album, and I think the connection is obvious. Not that we were trying to do our A, B or C album, but I think everything is there. From Bestial Devastation (1985)to A-Lex (2009), every album is very important."

Q: I know you get the “reunion” questions all the time, so I won’t go all the way there, but let’s just say you were approached to play one show or one festival with Max and Igor. What would be the one most important thing that would prevent that?

Kisser: "I don’t know. I don’t like to think about that. I think that’s kind of ridiculous (laughs). We can portray any kind of situation and give an opinion. It just makes no sense to me to try and picture something like that. It is what it is, and I’ve always enjoyed being in music. I don’t want to be a slave of something that’s not there anymore. I’m not a slave of my past. I respect my past, but I’m here now. Much (more) than anything else, I think that is what Kairos is all about—it’s in this moment, it’s a concept of time. Not the past, but this is a vision and concept of the future. Our fans try to create expectations, but that it’s totally empty.

And it has to be right, it has to be honest and it has to be Sepultura; otherwise, it’s not. And that’s why we’re still here as Sepultura, because the spirit is still well in our lives, very positive and very happy. And we’re growing, going to different directions, going to different places in the world still. We make sure everything happens in the best manner possible. We show respect to our fans, and we’re not trying to fool them. So I’d rather be myself than trying to fulfill expectations of people that they would normally expect for."

Click here for the complete interview.

Sepultura have been confirmed as the headliner for the Thrashfest Classics tour, featuring EXODUS, DESTRUCTION and HEATHEN.

The tour dates are as follows:

November

25 - Munich, Germany - Backstage
26 - Leeuwarden, Netherlands - Zaal Schaaf
27 - Paris, France - Bataclan
28 - Braunschweig, Germany - Meier Music Hall
29 - Würzburg, Germany - Posthalle
30 - Saarbrücken, Germany - Garage

December

1 - Prague, Czech Republic - Kd Vltavska
2 - Oberhausen, Germany - Turbinenhalle
3 - Giessen, Germany - Hessenhallen
4 - Antwerpen, Belgium - Trix
5 - Hamburg, Germany - Markthalle
6 - Gothenburg, Sweden - Trädgarn
7 - Aarhus, Denmark - Voxhall
8 - Berlin, Germany - C-Club
9 - Katowice, Poland - Mega Club
10 - Leipzig, Germany - Hellraiser
11 - Bratislava, Slovakia - Majestic Music Club
12 - Zagreb, Hungary - Boogaloo
13 - Ljubljana, Slovenia - Kino Siska
14 - Bologna, Italy - Estragon
15 - Pratteln, Switzerland - Z-7
16 - Eindhoven, Netherlands - Effenaar
17 - Stuttgart, Germany - LKA Longhorn
18 - Wien, Austria - Arena

As previously reported, Sepultura's hour-long set from the Wacken Open Air 2011, which ran from August 4th - 6th in Wacken, Germany, is available for streaming below. The band's complete setlist was as follows:

'Intro/Arise'

'Refuse/Resist'

'Kairos'

'Just One Fix' (MINISTRY cover)

'Convicted in Life'

'Choke'

'What I Do!'

'Relentless'

'Troops of Doom'

'Territory'

'Inner Self'

'Ratamahatta'

'Roots Bloody Roots'

.