Marc and Neil managed to pull Jonny, Leks and Rick from Devil Sold His Soul aside for a quick interview before their set.

Are you excited to be playing at Hevy festival today?
Rick :Definitely, been looking forward to it for ages.

Have you seen many of the bands?
Leks: We were here a bit last night, so we caught a bit. We saw some Lower Than Atlantis.

Jonny: Yea Lower Than Atlantis, a bit of Deez Nuts. I wanted to catch Bleed from Within but traffic on the M25 was shit so.

Rick :Loads of bands today though. Norma Jean, Feed The Rhino.

Leks :The line-ups ridiculous really.

Jonny :Yea it is good.

You've recently been working on your third album "Empire of Light" is there anything you can tell us about it. How has it compared to the other albums?
Leks: Yea it was a lot more laid back for some reason. We were a lot more laid back for some reason, I think we were kinda less stressfull on ourselves. Just kinda let stuff go instead of arguing about certain things and I think it came out better because of it.

What inspired you while you were writing the album?
Rick: It's kinda just about looking back over the last 7 or 8 years of doing the band. Just kinda realising all the shit that we've gone through but all the good stuff we've done as well.

Leks : Yeah, kinda appreciate it and keep going.

Coming out of the other side of all the crap. How do you think it compares musically to all the others?
Leks : Yeah. It's pretty much an exact mix of the other two albums. Not that we planned it like that but it's pretty much an exact mix of the first two albums.

Jonny : I reckon that's pretty accurate.

Leks :That's the easiest way of saying it.

Jonny: Like you were saying it wasn't a conscious sort of thing it's just, oh that's how it's turned out. So yea it's cool.

Jonny you produced the record again, how important is it for you guys to have that control over the album, the artwork and the writing process. Like Four Year Strong had to throw away and redo one of their albums.
Jonny: I think it's really important. It definitely suits our style of writing and recording more because there are a lot of little lead ideas that were probably written and tracked while we were doing the final record.

Rick: I think it's good to have input on every aspect of the album and artwork and everything, especially if you don't want to leave important parts of the creative process to other people, it just doesn't make any sense.

Leks: If you’re the sort of band that’s got a strong enough vision to know exactly what you want, then if you can have that freedom to be able to do it that’s amazing.

No Remorse and No Regrets has been all over the radio, and you've just done a video. How was that and what do you think of the fan video's on YouTube?
Rick: I haven't seen any fan video's.

Jonny: If they've gone up already bloody hell.

Leks: We'll have to check those out.

Rick: Yea really happy with how it's gone down.

Leks: It was really fun to make, obviously we just got to shout and stuff. It was cool actually being able to watch a video being made rather than you just sweating your balls of playing all day. So yea it was cool.

Jonny: But I'm not too sure about people taking the piss out of my face.

Leks: Ahh there’s been a bit of that hasn't there.

Jonny: Yea there is quite a bit

Ricks: Well that’s always going to happen I guess.

Jonny: Yeah that’s fair enough.

Leks: Leks bashing it’s always good.

Jagermeister featured quite a lot in the video, how was the partnership and how important are those kinds of sponsorship?
Rick: Totally. Like, we couldn’t do a lot of the stuff we do without them. They’re the best.

Jonny: Jagermeister are it. Like literally. There doing so much cool stuff for bands now-a-days. Obviously they were before but I mean it’s just the scale. Like the spectrum and stuff, funding from the smallest things like plectrums up to well video production is crazy.

Rick: Yea to have that sort of support is amazing.

You've changed labels recently from Century Media to Small Town Recordings. Was that to do with the arguments you were having, a fresh start or just sort of happened?
Rick: It kinda just happened really. Obviously there are certain reasons why things happen, but you know for us everything has kinda been quite natural. So that might have ended but we've found a new home at Small Town Records and everything's just kinda fallen into place really well.

Leks: Yea especially with this album, everything’s like fallen into place so well.

And you’re headlining the metal hammer tour.
Jonny: Yea, and Alex is a really great guy he’s really enthusiastic as well which always helps.

Leks: Having someone at a label that’s excited about your music is always a good thing.

Are there any shows that you’re really looking forward too, is this a really big thing for you as a lot of people who haven't listened to you much before are going to wonder over or do you prefer your own tours?
Jonny: It's always nice to do festival sets and stuff like that. It's brilliant to do Hevy again because it’s been a couple of years since we did it.

Leks: Yea it’s always cool because you get to bump into loads of people you know, and see loads of bands play you know or you want to see. Then doing your own tours is a totally different thing I think. Both cool in different ways.

Are you looking forward to having Heights supporting you, or anyone in particular your really looking forward to supporting you?
Rick: They’re all great bands, Steak Number Eight, I heard good things about as well. I think it’s a really good bill. We've played with Heights before they supported us in our last album head, well tour.

Do you get along well with them?
Leks: Yea.

Jonny: For me it would be, I’m quite looking forward to seeing Heart of a Coward every night because there just awesome musicians I’m just going to be there dumb founded.

Leks: Yea it's going to be one of those tours where it’s just going to be fun to watch everyone every night.

Have you got any funny tour stories, or does anyone in particular in the band get very stressed?
Rick: Haha Leks’s arse is quite annoying.

Leks: My arse is quite annoying actually.

Jonny: Fart problems.

Rick: Our bassist got kidnapped didn’t he on one tour.

Jonny: Haha yea he did.

Leks: Ian, yea he got kidnapped for the night.

Rick: Miramar disaster one of the support bands, they grabbed him from the side of the road and they took him off to some house in the middle of Sheffield or something so.

Jonny: But we saw him the next day so he was ok.

Leks: He was alright.

Rick: Pretty quiet the next day.

Leks: And he had a bit of a weird walk didn’t he.

Jonny: Yeah yeah.

Our last question and we ask everyone this, would you rather be a Giraffe or a Zebra?
Jonny: I'd rather be a Giraffe, I quite dig being a Giraffe.

Rick: Zebra, I reckon. I don’t know why. Zebra's are cooler.

Leks: You’re just confused.

Jonny: You've got the casting vote.

Rick: If you’re a Giraffe you've got a massive neck.

Leks: I think Zebra's are cooler.
R Jonny: Oh screw you.

Leks: Sorry about that. No reason. Just looks cooler.

Interview by Marc Rich