Skullbanger Media recently conducted an interview with bassist/vocalist Schmier of German thrashers DESTRUCTION. You can now listen to the chat using the SoundCloud widget below. On the state of the world today: Schmier: "Of course, the biggest issues now, at the moment, are the lack of education that we did in the last ten, twenty, thirty years that we gave to our kids and that we gave also to immigrants that come to our country [Germany] are now paying back in a bad way, because we're having ghettos everywhere, we're having a lack of education everywhere, we're getting more violence. We have, of course, religious problems, because we're… I don't know. We wanna be tolerant, but are we too tolerant? And isn't this religious shit over? Why do we believe this crap? "I'm asking myself seriously… We can do everything with science, and then we're still praying to some people that are not even existing, that we don't have a proof of. "Religion has been misused for years, for hundreds of years, and it's still coming back and it's turning in circles, and it's a sad issue. But it's, of course, for me, as a songwriter and a musician, great topics to write about. And I'm still looking for answers. And sometimes it's nice to go deep inside your own soul and also to look around." "The world is kind of falling apart a bit. Also, the European Union is shaking, and it's not good to be [there] when everything falls apart, that's for sure. But on the other hand, we have to ask also, does this system work? I mean, I'm not a big fan of capitalism. I don't think that's the right way to make people happy. Because only some people are getting rich and the other have nothing. And that's not the way… I think it's important to share, but we forgot to share what we have, because our system doesn't want it. It's a big global problem. And I'm lucky that I can see the world; we can travel. We're gonna go back to South America. We're gonna play some of the poorest countries in the world, like Honduras, which is, I think, together with Haiti, one of the most poor countries in the world. It [will be] kind of interesting to see what the fans say and how the system is there. Are they oppressed or are they free? And who is free nowadays?" On the rise of violent religious extremism: Schmier: "When we tour, I talk to many people. We just played Russia , and we were facing this new wave of Russian orthodox Christians that are really violently trying to stop metal shows. Our shows happened, and everybody was, like, 'My God! Your shows happened. Great. You've been so lucky.' And they told us all the stories, and I couldn't believe my ears. And then now what happened to BELPHEGOR, obviously, everybody saw it online. It's a sad fact that we're turning backwards in many ways." On controversial U.S. Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump: Schmier: "He stands for the American Dream, of course. He has money, and America is ruled by the dollar. Donald Trump's populism is kind of very easy. You know, there was a guy called Adolf Hitler who did the same thing. Trump just shows how easy it is in a crisis nowadays to draw the people. But he doesn't have solutions for everything. He's just creating trouble. On the other hand, as we saw, in many cases of the world now, the world is destabilized, because some of those strong leaders are gone, especially in the east. And I think some countries definitely need strong leaders. Like Russia maybe also. Putin is kind of a weird guy, but when you go to Russia, most Russians like him. He's famous in the country, because Russians need a strong leader. I guess my opinion was wrong about freedom and about… What we call socialism is not what you call socialism in America. We're living in a socialist system, basically, here since many years. What we have here… Our parties, they call themselves Social Democrats, and in America, everybody's afraid that a socialist is a communist, which is not the case." DESTRUCTION's new album, "Under Attack", will be released on May 13 via Nuclear Blast. The band started recording the CD after the summer festivals last year and tracked segments in various studios between September 2015 and January 2016. They completed the drum recordings with Martin Buchwalter at Gernhart Studios in Germany, and mixed and mastered with VO Pulver at Little Creek Studios in Switzerland.
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