Jason Newsted whom you may know from his days in Metallica or as the Ambassador of Heavy Metal, is back and better than ever. He’s in a new band called Newsted and they have an EP that you can buy either on iTunes or over at http://newstedheavymetal.com/. There are two more EP’s (each will be sold exclusively on iTunes for 2 weeks before physical copies become available) to come this year followed by a full blown LP on Vinyl with art work and the whole deal. For release dates, tour dates and anything Jason Newsted related head over to the site listed above. If you want to interact with Jason hit him up on Facebook and Twitter.
Q: What made right now the time to do an old school metal album?
Jason Newsted (JN): I think the timing designated itself. I’ve been playing with these guys (Jessie Mendez & Jessie Farnsworth) that I made this music with for about five years in the Chophouse doing our improv metal that we do perpetually. The confidence that was built in those guys, the hunger that they brought and then the catalyst being the Metallica 30th Anniversary shows at The Fillmore. The feedback from the fans was just like it always was times 100. They were just looking me right in the eyes and that feeling hit me again like never before and I said I’m going to try this one more time. So that’s what I’m doing. I got these guys together in August of last year, wrote some songs, we recorded them all and I’m releasing them in batches. I’m doing it because I want to do it, that’s why.
Q: You named the band Newsted. It seemed like early on after leaving Metallica you were trying to blend in with whatever project you were working on, and not being the focal point. What changed that made you want to call it Newsted?
JN: It’s kind of what you said there, I’ve played all kinds of different styles with many different players through the last twelve years, Echobrain, Gov’t Mule, Sepultura and DJ Shadow’s all different styles. On this one I wanted to make sure there was as little confusion as possible with the name, my name and the word Metal. Those two things no matter what language that you speak as long as your in the metal circles, you know what those two words mean and that’s why I did it this way this time. It comes down to clarification, simplicity, feet planted on the ground, no questioning, just metal.
Q: What really blew me away were your vocals. I knew from your days in Metallica that you had a decent voice that was a nice compliment to Hetfields. I didn’t realize you had that front man strength and range in your voice. Is that something you just recently discovered or have you always known that you had that?
JN: I’ve done the Cookie Monster vocal and the (growling) Die Die for many many years and that’s kind of what I was known for as the support vocalist as you put it there. The last ten years as I’ve been exposed to people like Dylan (Donkin) from Echobrain, Snake from Voivod I started developing this other voice, this lead singing voice. It has been a long time coming. I work on it everyday. I exercise it like I do my pushups. I had to unlearn how to sing with just my throat and my head and relearn to sing with my gut and be able to project and hit pitches. I work on it every day. It is new and all the roles that I’m taking on in this band are kind of new in a way. Playing guitar or bass at the same time as singing is new to me, so it’s very fresh in that way and a bit scary as well.
Q: Have you been a lyrcist for a long time or is that also something new and if so is that pretty intimidating coming up with lyrics and then putting them out there for people to…
JN: Expose myself like that? I’ve been writing lyrics for a long long time. It’s been forty years that I’ve been writing lyrics. I wrote all the lyrics on the Flotsam and Jetsam Doomsday record. I had a hand in all of the Echobrain lyrics. All the other bands (after leaving Metallica) except Voivod, because nobody can touch Snake’s lyrics. Learning from all the great word weavers like Hetfield and Snake, I picked up a lot, but I also do my own thing. On this one I’m as proud of the lyrics as I am the music. This is going to be offered in three different EP forms as we spread them out over the year from this band. All of these lyrics I’m very proud of, the real deal, no wasted words.
Q: I’m excited that there are more EP’s to come. Will there be any cross country or world tour to go along with this?
JN: That is the plan. “Soldierhead” has been out there for about a week for people to hear. The calls have started coming in. There are already domestic and international offers, festival stuff, supporting stuff, some cool club stuff. I’m open to all of it. I have chosen a manager and he knows what it has to be before he even brings it to me as far as offers. I have to demand a certain standard. As long as my boys are safe in a good clean hotel and we got a good gig with good electricity and there are some good bands playing with us then I’m open to play anywhere, just like always. The quest is still the same, Ambassador of Heavy Metal through out the world, anywhere that will accept our westernized music I want to take it there.
Q: You’ve recently joined the social media world. When you were in Metallica you seemed like the guy who was always going out of his way to interact with his fans. In fact I think in the “Behind the Music” episode I don’t know if it was Kirk or Lars that were talking about how you’d pull the bus over to find fans. What took you so long to join the social media world and do you like it?
JN: I really like attention. Everybody likes attention, I really like attention. I like to showoff, everybody in bands likes to show off, that’s part of the deal. It became me and I became it. So now that I’m into this new world where I can just reach out from the comfort of my studio and talk to people all across the globe, places that we haven’t even gotten a chance to take the music to yet, they’ve heard the music but we haven’t taken it there live. These things are fascinating to me and because it’s so new to me as well and the reception has been so positive that I’m happy about it. I know that there are going to be sour spots, but right now it’s a very very good place for me and a good thing for me.
Q: Are you able to process, I mean Metallica is now up there with Led Zeppelin and the Rolling Stones and you’re a part of that. Is that something you can process?
JN: NO. [Expletive] NO. (laughs) No dude I can’t.
Q: It seems like you’ve made peace with that giant Metallica shadow that’s followed you since you left. Has that been something that’s been difficult?
JN: No, because of the way we’ve played it, by taking the high road and all of that type of thing, it’s mostly prideful. I had to come to peace with it within myself. There’s a couple of things that get under my saddle, but they don’t have anything to do with what people might imagine. It doesn’t have to do with the money because I invested my money right. I only do what I want to do when I want to do it, that’s how it has worked out for me and it’s fucking fantastic. There’s a couple of times that, not by me following it but by my boys coming in or my wife or my sister saying, ‘did you know Metallica’s playing in the United Arab Emirates.’ I’m like, ‘[Expletive].’ I didn’t get to play there; I don’t care what band it would have been with, if it were Papa Wheelie or Voivoid, I didn’t get to play there yet…[Expletive]. Hey they’re going to South Africa…[Expletive]. It’s not where’s the paycheck, it’s that I didn’t get to do that yet for those people there. So when I get to go there I’ll feel better about it, I’ll take this band there, but those are the only things that get to me. I didn’t get to go there, I should have been the one breaking the ice with that band for this thing, they’ve been waiting for Metallica for that long, I was the one to build that to get them there, GODDAMMIT. I was there for the peaks I was there for the valleys and now…once again prideful way way more than anything else.
