UK / Swedish Metal outfit Nerve Star is set to release White Hot. An album that brings to the fore a selection of cover songs from long-forgotten and bands and albums from the annals of Heavy Metal.
Masterminded by manager / producer, Mike Dixon, bassist, Joss Thorley, guitarist Chris Billinghurst and singer Matt Oakman along with Swedish guitarist Janne Stark (who had done it all as both a producer and guitarist in Metal, Prog and NWOBHM bands since the 1980’s and recorded and produced his own albums) and drummer Peter Svensson come together as Nerve Star. The album is a wonderful tribute to music of the Heavy Metal kind, given a new and vibrant lease of life. We corner Matt, Joss and Chris who fill in some blanks as we fire some questions their way.
old school Metal – backgrounds and influences
Joss: I could write an essay on this honestly, The thing that really got me wanting to learn was actually classical. I’d only ever dipped my toes into heavy metal here and there; Slipknot and Avenged Sevenfold being two bands that really stood out but I never really dived deeper. In high school I discovered Thrash and I finally had the money and freedom to head into town to take advantage of HMV’s 3 for £5 deal. Bands like Slayer, Anthrax and Overkill; something about the intensity and energy, I just got completely hooked! I picked up bass around that time as well, it was an easier move from piano compared to guitar, and I’ve just kinda been going at it ever since!
I carry a lot from those thrash metal bands that got me into metal in the first place. Learning to keep up pace and using your instrument to bring energy even when the song isn’t a million miles an hour is really important to me and Thrash has some great examples through players like D.D Verni and Frank Bello. I still dip my toes into classical; I try to bring a little bit of that to Nerve Star too; it’s nice to add texture and work to push the melody forward rather than just sit on the root note all the time. The band has been happy to indulge me and it’s been a lot of fun to write and play for!
Matt: Thank you – glad you enjoyed the music. I think like your own musical upbringing, this band has a wide range of influences from the Rock/Metal genre. My influences vocally include many great singers like Rob Halford, Miljenko Matijevic, Michael Vescera, and many more.
Chris: In my mid teens I really started getting into Rock and Metal, and within about a year I’d ended up buying all of Maiden’s studio albums, and around that time I’d started getting more serious about playing guitar too. Learning their songs was so much fun and massively shaped how I approached the instrument. From there my tastes kept growing, but those classic bands were definitely the starting point and still influence how I play today.
THE focus on cover versions
Joss: Absolutely! ’d have never have heard these tracks if it wasn’t for Mike, bringing these forward. It’s been great to be a part of something that’s taken these absolutely killer tracks, bring them back out into the light and share them with everyone else too!
Chris: We ended up digging up around 25 songs in total, and demoed probably five really strong tracks that didn’t even make the album in the end. More than anything, it’s broadened my musical horizons and been a really fun challenge to bring these songs back to life.
the recording process
Joss: We start out by putting a demo together which acts as our guide. We all have access to the means to record our parts somehow; whether that’s in a basic studio set up or, in my case during the early days, a laptop and interface on my living room table! We learn the source material and our parts then record them individually. Together these then get mixed into a single demo track which we can use as a guide for studio time. From there, the process is split into two parts. Peter and Janne would lay down their parts over in Sweden and then they’d get sent over to Ras Bom Andersen here in the UK. Me, Chris and Matt would then drive out to Ras and use his studio space to record our parts for the final version of the track.
The two guitar instrumentals – Janne Stark’s Cool, Calm, Connected which aside from doing what it says on the tin is an unusual departure as is Chris’ Lone Orbit. seem the chance to showcase the their skills and originality. And interesting how they vary from Van Halen styled Eruption to an acoustic/electric combo of Bluesy emotion. Should that tell us a bit about the musician’s different characters!?
Joss: I never thought of it like that admittedly however, maybe there is more to that! Janne is a chilled and laid back personality for sure but then again so is Chris, it just so happens he really likes Eddie Van Halen! I’m sure he’d be happy to hear the comparison!
Chris: Janne’s an amazing guitarist, and his experience and musicianship had a huge impact on the band as a whole. I love where his instrumental sits on the album too – after a run of really powerful, full-on tracks it acts as a bit of a breather and sets the mood for what follows, showing there’s more to us than just straight in-your-face metal. With Lone Orbit, we knew from the start that we wanted it to serve as the intro to Precious Rock. Since that’s one of the most intense songs on the album, I wanted the intro to build atmosphere and give a hint of what was about to hit. And on an album that’s all about bringing older rock tracks back to life, it felt right to tip the hat to one of the most influential rock guitarists of all time: EVH.
THE swagger in The Harder The Better and the funky chops on Black Jack – providing a musical service and an education to show us where the roots of some of these major bands lie!
Joss: I think it’s probably because we share a lot of the same influences it makes the vibe easy to capture. The majority of the tracks on the album were written back in the 80’s and a lot of the music that influenced the musicians writing those songs is just as influential today. Aerosmith and Led Zepplin was a big part of my musical upbringing and played a huge part in how my music taste developed for example!
Matt: A lot of these bands that were re-recorded probably influenced by the classic rock groups, so it’s only natural that the music will touch on many rock styles, but it’s purely by chance how the songs have ended up on the album. But if it’s a rock education, then it shows the diversity of the band and music.
Richard III – HOW MANY will have heard of the band Tredegar who did the track originally? (although the connection with Budgie might ring a few bells).
Matt: I loved recording this track with it’s melodic and emotive intro to the heavy galloping verses, it really thunders along. The involvement of Tony Bourge from Budgie and Tredegar came about through Mike Dixon, who saw Budgie back in the day and was a fan of their work and Tony’s guitars. Mike went for a more obscure project of Tony’s called Tredegar and chose Richard III as the song to do. He then contacted Tony and he was more than happy to re-record his guitar parts on the song for us.
HAVE THE lines between Metal and Punk have blurred or softened a little? No longer two warring factions…
Joss: I’m not sure there ever really was a super clear line to begin with; and if there is there’s a lot of things in common between the two genres and it’s easy to borrow ideas from one to add to another. Motorhead and Hawkwind were massively influential to punk musicians, on the flipside you have Slayer going on to credit bands like T.S.O.L and Minor Threat as influences. It’s all one big circle, but think of all the music we never would have had if bands didn’t draw influence from outside their genre? It’s pretty cool to think about really!
Matt: I would say the two genres have benefited from each other, especially the rock/metal bands. When I think of bands like Motorhead, Metallica, Guns n Roses, there was always that Punk edge to the music but done faster and more technical creating the metal sound.
whittlING down 13 TRACKS to 8
Joss: This is a question for Mike really, but I’d imagine so given there were even more tracks that we were considering putting on the CD, never mind the LP! Mike said he shortlisted 25 tracks total, I can think of at least three we demo’d but never took to the studio. Might make for a good single at a later date maybe.
Matt: It was always gonna be tricky to figure the best choice of tracks to put on the vinyl release, but I think we managed to get a nice mix of songs that people will really enjoy in that classic format.
Chris: As alluded to earlier, we actually started out with around 25 songs in consideration, so getting that down to 13 was hard enough – let alone cutting it further to 8 for the vinyl! The main issue is the physical limitation of vinyl. You can only fit so much music on each side while still keeping good sound quality, so we had to think carefully about both song selection and the running order to make sure it flowed well as an album.
It was definitely tough leaving some tracks off, but we wanted the vinyl version to feel like a strong, well-paced listen from start to finish. The final vinyl running order ended up as:
Side 1: Hell On Wheels, Black Ice, Say It To My Face, Winner Takes All. Side 2: Space Ritual, Precious Rock, Feel Like King, Richard III
Finally, Where does your drummer – Peter ‘Trumpeter’ Svensson – get the nickname!?
Joss: I actually don’t know! I could tell you a crazy rock and roll story but I genuinely have no idea. BUT – I messaged him on WhatsApp – it’s a word play. Trum is the Swedish word for drum.
Here’s Black Ice from the album, originally a NWOBHM single released in 1981 by Aragorn, who folded and disappeared out of sight:
Nerve Star: Website