Canada's The Metal Voice spoke with Anthrax drummer Charlie Benante about his upcoming covers album Silver Lining (via Megaforce Records) featuring an all-star cast of artist as well as upcoming new music from Anthrax.

The Metal Voice: Why the title Silver Linings?

Benante: “I tried to see out of the darkness (pandemic), the depression that there was a Silver Lining. We are all going through this and some of us are have it a lot harder than a lot of other people are and they are silver linings. I would see people complaining about their kids, man enjoy it, you are getting to have all this time off to spend with your kids that you would never have. Just enjoy it, embrace it"

The Metal Voice: Tell us about your covers album and the songs: 

Benante: “I wasn't even going to put them out and I kept getting asked to do it more and more then I said alright I will do it. It was just hard to choose which ones to put on there. If I put the Rush songs on it, it would take up a lot of space. I had the idea of putting a Rush EP out for Record Store Day next November that is going to be fun that is going to be all the Rush Songs by themselves (done in quarantine). A lot of these songs on the record have always been in the back of my mind, songs that I loved. I just had to find the right people to make them happen and once I did it just snowballed." 

The Metal Voice: Tell us about covering Iron Maiden's Transylvania?

Benante: “First Time I saw Iron Maiden was with Paul Di'Anno it was at the Palladium in New York. They opened up for Judas Priest and I went both nights. When Iron Maiden came on, the excitement and that feeling  that I was witnessing something for the first time that I don't know if I will ever see again, it was so amazing. That band for me since day one was the reason that I think we started a band to model our band like Iron Maiden. I think they single handedly created the form of music that became thrash metal."

The Metal Voice: What about the two KISS songs on the album?

Benante: “Those two KISS songs have always been my favorite KISS songs and I treat those songs like they were ‘Rock And Roll All Night’ or ‘Detroit Rock City’. I always wish that 'All The Way' (off Hotter than Hell Album) was on the Kiss Alive album just to have that sound and treatment. And ‘Mr. Speed’ is just a classic Paul Stanley song."

The Metal Voice: Would you ever put another form of rap on an upcoming Anthrax album  like you did in the past, maybe have Chuck D from Public Enemy on?

Benante: “Absolutely as a matter of fact I'm working with D (Chuck D) right now on a song that is coming out pretty awesome but I won't discuss it now (laughs). We have always been open to something else but we always said if we couldn't top the ‘Bring the Noise’ thing then we didn't want to do it. "

The Metal Voice: Where are you at in regards to a new Anthrax studio Album?

Benante: “We are going to start working on it again. Before Covid hit we had about seven-eight songs that were killer and we are going to continue to work on those and more. We didn't want to put a record out at this time cause we thought it would get stuck in that Covid vacuum. So we wanted to wait and so at least we could go out and play these songs."

Watch the entire chat below: