You spent a lot of time on the road last year, and returned to a number of places, particularly in Asia, that you had not played in a long time. Which of those places stand out as being especially interesting, fun or unique?
“One of my goals for the Post Traumatic tour, in general, was to make every show special. I wanted to change the setlists dramatically from show to show; to take requests from fans, and improvise on songs, and basically just vibe out on whatever the crowd was giving me on the night. With that said, I don’t think I have a favourite show of all of them. All of the shows were so remarkable, and I don’t even know what happened or how. I think we were all just going with the flow.”
You also released a new song, Fine, written for the soundtrack to a Russian movie called The Blackout. How did you get involved with that, and did that process differ from your usual songwriting method?
“When the filmmakers asked me to write a song for the film, I was a little sceptical – doing a song for a Russian movie wasn’t really on my agenda for the year, to be honest with you (laughs)! But once I saw the rough cut of the film, I really wanted to be involved. I wrote the song in a couple days after that. And we worked on the concept for the video together. I really wanted to be a bad guy in that one. It was a good pairing for the song."
Away from music, you got the chance to spend a week in the Kerrang! Editor’s chair last year, filling the magazine with things that inspire you. Boris even got involved in solving K! readers’ problems, which probably seemed like a good idea at the time, at least. How was that experience for you?
“I’ve never been an editor of a magazine before, and I have to say, it was a lot more difficult than I expected! Especially since Boris was involved. He’s such a diva.”