If you like metal, there’s no way you won’t have heard of Asking Alexandria. Lead guitarist Ben Bruce spoke to us ahead of their massive UK headline tour, which brings the band to the Southampton Guildhall on November 5th.
Are you excited for the tour?
Yeah, we’ve just been in Europe for the last 3 or 4 weeks so we’ve been counting down the days to get back to the UK, so we’re all very very excited. We actually got back today, we haven’t had any sleep, we left a venue last night at 1am and got to the border crossing at 5:30/6 and had to get on the ferry, and then off the ferry and when we finally got a chance to go to bed, we got to the hotels and the bus driver went away and the rooms weren’t ready so we had to stay up in the lobby, it was a nightmare!
I’ve had about 2 hours sleep, and an English breakfast so it’s alright!
How have the rehearsals been?
In Europe, we’ve just been doing the same show, as we always like to hit Europe before we hit the UK because that is our rehearsal, warms us up a bit.
Do you have two distinct fan bases then, European and English?
Our fans all over the world are different everywhere but our European fan base seems to be really really REALLY excited when we go over there which is awesome.
I don’t know if they’re making up for the fact there’s a language barrier and they don’t want us to feel awkward or they genuinely like us as much as they make out that they do but yeah, I like it over there, it’s cool.
What was your favourite place to play in Europe?
Probably either one of the three German shows or Austria.
Where are you looking forward to playing in the UK?
I love the UK in general, we all live in the states now and we tour the states so often that it’s nice to come back to the UK and think ‘ah I’m home!’.
If I had to pick one place, I’d have to go for London just because that’s where I’m from. The rest of the lads in the band are from up north in York and I’m the only southerner so I get a lot of sh*t anyway so it’s nice to go back to London.
Are there any surprises planned for the tour?
We’re playing a bunch of new songs that we’ve not played in the UK, we’re playing ‘Moving On’ and ‘Breaking Down The Walls’ and a bunch of singles that we’ve never played in the UK because we’ve not really had the chance.
The last time we were in the UK, I think it was the Bullet For My Valentine tour, we only had a 30 minute set so this time we’ll be playing for an hour and 15 minutes at least.
If you could tour with anyone, dead or alive, who would it be?
Led Zeppelin, that doesn’t even need a reason.
Any plans for another album?
We’ve got one more tour this year, which is a US and Canada tour and then we enter the studio to record our new album. Musically, its far more advanced than any other album we’ve done. It’s like I’ve learnt to play guitar or something! There are more soft songs, there’s like 3/4 soft songs but the rest of the songs are heavier than those from ‘From Death To Destiny’ so it kind of makes up for it.
Tickets are still available for their tour at the See Tickets website.
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