The Warrior Spirit With CARMINE APPICE From KING KOBRA

Interview by Kris Peters
When it comes to drummers they don't come more top shelf than
Carmine Appice.
After leaving Ozzy Osbourne in the early 1980s, Appice decided he
was done with working for other musicians and decided instead to
forge his own path, with his own band.
That band became King Kobra who burst onto the music scene in 1985
with their debut album Ready To Strike.
With a sound that nestled somewhere between heavy metal and glam
metal, King Kobra have undergone several line-up changes over the
years, as well as taking more than one gestation periods off, but
one thing has remained constant throughout.
Carmine Appice.
Now, with a renewed line-up featuring Quiet Riot guitarist Carlos
Cavazo and former Dio member Rowan Robertson, King Kobra are back
with their seventh and arguably best album to date titled We Are
Warriors. It is a typically hard hitting album from the band and
one which Appice promises will be the start of another fresh era of
metal from one of the greats.
HEAVY sat down with Appice to find out more.
"I've always tried to stay within the limits of whatever band's I'm
working with," he began. "We Are Warriors started out with me and
Paul (Shortino, vocals) and sometimes Rowan and sometimes Carlos
putting some ideas down because we all have studios. The whole
album was done by everyone in their home studio, because the kind
of budgets you get today and everybody lives in different places...
it doesn't pay to fly everybody in and get hotels and sit around
and write songs and then go into a studio. You might as well throw
your money out the window that you're getting. Me and Paul probably
made 5c an hour making that album because we spent a lot of time on
it. A lot of time writing the songs. But we did it all by the
internet. As you can see I have my studio behind me and I engineer
my own drums. We did everything that way."
In the full interview Carmine goes deeper into the writing and
recording process, what he was going for musically with We Are
Warriors, what the new members bring to the sound, how much King
Kobra's sound has changed from their debut album to this one,
working with Ozzy Osbourne and being sacked by Sharon, changing
with the times and more.