ELEGANT WEAPONS: Heavy Metal Supergroup Featuring Members Of JUDAS PRIEST, PANTERA And RAINBOW Sign Album Contract With Nuclear Blast Records
October 25th, 2022
International heavy metal supergroup Elegant Weapons have signed an album contract with Nuclear Blast Records, revealing this development on October 25th, 2022.
Guitarist Richie Faulkner, also of Judas Priest, issued the following statement: “It’s exciting to be part of a label like Nuclear Blast that has such a rich history and level of respect among fans and the music industry. Monte Conner (Nuclear Blast VP A&R) knows Andy Sneap well, and Andy has always held Monte and label in very high regard. Monte has loved the record from the very early demo stages. It’s very valuable and important to me that the label I sign with understand and connect with the music. This record represents for me more of my DNA as a guitar player and a songwriter. Heavy, but moving slightly outside the realms of ‘heavy metal’. Those roots are obvious, but I wanted to reach in a bit and see what else came out that wasn’t necessarily ‘expected’.”
Monte Conner, Nuclear Blast Vice President of A&R, added the following: “I am such a huge fan of all the players involved, especially Richie. As a diehard Priest fan, I have enjoyed watching him help breathe new life into the band and add to their incredible story and legacy. What an amazing player he is. People always focus on leads, and of course Richie is a master in that department, but I can listen to him play rhythm guitar all day long! His rhythm playing is just so tasteful and magical. I can’t wait for fans to hear this album and discover how multi-faceted he is.”
Elegant Weapons’ line-up is as follows:
Ronnie Romero (vocals, Rainbow / Michael Schenker Group)
Richie Faulkner (Judas Priest, guitars)
Rex Brown (bass, Pantera / Down)
Scott Travis (drums, Judas Priest)
“I’ve always wanted to make a record with Scott outside of Priest,” shared Faulkner, who regards Elegant Weapons as featuring his “dream line-up”. “Add to that Rex Brown’s unmistakable tone and attitude is something special. Having those guys as the rhythm section is a guitar players dream. The icing on the cake was Ronnie Romero. One of the new breed of instantly classic vocalists, Ronnie brought a character and a swagger to the songs that is instantly iconic, making these songs his own.”
Debut full-length studio album Horns For A Halo will be issued in spring 2013 through Nuclear Blast Records, with production from Andy Sneap.
Musically speaking, Faulker described Elegant Weapons as “a mix of Jimi Hendrix, Priest, Sabbath, solo Ozzy and Black Label Society – heavy, catchy, and with melody. Sort of old school and modern at once if that makes any sense, and actually down-tuned a whole step. The Marshall Plexi basically does one thing, but you’ve got to crank it to 11 for it to have that distorted sound. It hasn’t got a lot of bells and whistles on it or different channels and effects. It basically does one thing and does it very well. But again down-tuning creates more of a modern sound, and by using the classic sound of the Marshall Plexi, you get that juxtaposition, that contrast. All told, there are a lot of guitar solos and the songs are on the heavier side. And even though there’s a lot of melody, it’s still going to shake your bones.”
Specific to the tracks, Faulkner explained that “me and acoustic don’t really get along, so there’s only one mellow song on it, a sort of smoky, haunted, New Orleans kind of tune called ‘Ghost Of You’, with de-tuned 1920s piano on it. That one is about a memory, or ghost of a lost love. But that’s about as acoustic as it gets. I’m not really attracted to acoustic guitar in general. It’s mainly kind of heavy and full-on, really. There’s a song called ‘White Horse’, plus ‘Horns For A Halo’, which is like Tony Iommi crossed with Alice In Chains. That’s about the way we justify the bad things we do. When we turn up on Judgement Day, will the angels kind of confuse our horns for halos, if you know what I mean.”
