Interview: Lacuna Coil

**So you’re currently on your Dark Legacy Tour, playing a 2 hour-plus set including material from all of your albums. Is that right?**

Yes, that’s correct.

**Why did you pick now to do that? Why this particular point in your career?**

Well, we had a new album, _Dark Adrenaline_, out at the end of January. It’s our second last release with Century [Media Records], so we wanted to do something special for the fans. The show is split into three parts, starting with old stuff, then some acoustic stuff, then a mix of a couple of newer ones and some of the classics. We just wanted to do something out of the ordinary.

**Is it tiring playing such a long and eclectic setlist night after night?**

It is more tiring, especially for the singers. We just have to move around more, but we can do that just by feeding off the energy of the kids having a good time. It’s a pretty heavy set for singers. Despite the level of energy we have to put in, it doesn’t really feel different from playing 75 minutes, like we would normally at a headline show.

**Do you have a particular favourite song to play within your current set-list?**

There is no song I prefer over the others, but playing the stuff from our new album _Dark Adrenaline_ is the most fun at the moment, as we haven’t played it for as long, so it’s fresh and new to us. But no song from the album in particular is preferred to the others.

**You have five dates in the UK on your current tour, all next week. How does playing in the UK rank compared to other countries?**

To be honest with you, it’s awesome! It’s probably our main market in Europe, and really one of our preferred places to play, with bigger venues, and more people. We always get a great reception in the UK. It’s been special to us since the start, and always has been one of the best places to come and play. We’re very happy to start the tour in the UK, for sure.

**Do you have any particular favourite place to play within the UK?**

There are a lot of really good shows everywhere, so not really. Of course, London has the biggest crowds, but playing small clubs, say in Glasgow, is awesome too just to see everyone rocking out and having a really good time.

**Your latest album, _Dark Adrenaline_, peaked at no. 4 in the UK rock chart, and at no. 15 in the U.S. Billboard 200, selling more than 20,000 units in the U.S. alone. After so many years together as a band, how did that level of success feel?**

This year is the 15th anniversary of the band, and all this success is more than we’d ever hoped for. In these difficult times, especially for the music industry, it’s amazing. It’s great to have the recognition, really cool. We consider ourselves very lucky.

**Earlier this year, you toured with Megadeth and Motörhead on the Gigantour in the U.S. Were these bands an influence of yours in the early days?**

Yeah, we started listening to rock and metal as kids when these bands were at their peak. It’s a dream come true, because we still admire, and love these bands, despite differences between our sound and theirs. Also, we get to meet the people behind the music, which is pretty cool. We always have a good time touring with bands like that.

**Earlier this year, you supported Marilyn Manson at the Brixton Academy. How was it, playing with him?**

It was cool. You never know how his fans will react to our music, but from the second we took the stage, we knew it was going to be great. The Brixton crowd reaction really blew me away. We played Ozzfest there back in 2004 with a load of metalcore bands – that was popular at the time – but our show was successful even though Lacuna Coil had a much more melodic sound than these bands.

**What’s next for the band? A new album in the pipeline? More touring?**

We’re already putting together stuff for new album. We don’t want to wait as long as we did for _Dark Adrenaline_ to put the next one out. We’re back in the states for the 70,000 Tons of Metal Cruise in January. I’m really looking forward to that after hearing from others that it’s a great time. Then we’re going to tour South America, tour some more, maybe across Europe again, and then get back into the studio some point in 2013 to start recording again.