Top 108 Quotes & Sayings by M. Shadows

For me, 'Far Beyond Driven' just had an oomph that kicked it over the edge and just pure aggression. And I always appreciated that.

To me, a lot people really get wrapped up in the technical side of metal and what's metal and what's not and more double-kick and more blast beats and more technicality, but for me, I'm a song person. So I think you can write good songs in any type of style of rock and any type of style of metal, and that's kind of what I'm a fan of.

We are ever evolving and never repeat ourselves.

We write when the time comes, and we try to be exciting, and stuff that excites us usually makes the record.

We love the idea of putting out music in a non-conventional way.

Those who are not very good at understanding mental health issues are not going to know what other people are going through in depression. You have to kind of put yourself in somebody else's shoes.

The 'Black Album' was my real first introduction to Metallica. I was, like, 12 or 13 at the time. We were just getting into music, and I liked that album a lot, but it didn't necessarily change my life. But when I started picking up all the other Metallica records, 'Master of Puppets' was the one to me that stuck out with its songwriting.

It really does help everyone when there are some big bands leading the charge.

I went to this vocal coach, Ron Anderson, who has worked with Axl Rose and Chris Cornell, to train my voice and learn a whole new way of singing.

If people respect us as artists, they know we'll give them something different every time; they know we're pushing ourselves.

Personally, I just want to hear good songs.

I used to get a huge kick out of walking into a record store and finding something I didn't know was out.

We always want to do covers, but we found it kind of boring to do covers of bands in our genre, and we were always asked to do those.

I think everyone in the band has had someone that's served in their family. I wouldn't say that anybody has a military family, but both of my grandfathers were in the military.

I'm kind of a geek when it comes to talking about chord structures or melody, so I always loved in-depth conversations with musicians about things. I also enjoy when a fan can just put something on, and they really know nothing about music other than they like it and it touches them in some way.

The thing about covers is that the first thing you're going to notice is the vocals, because it's not the same person.

I was a fan of 'Call Of Duty: Modern Warfare 2,' and I got into 'Call Of Duty: Black Ops,' which was my favorite 'Call Of Duty' game of all time.

I've always been a really open person around my friends.

When we were writing the 'Stage' album, we realized we'd never really done proper covers, where we were taking songs and making them our own and kind of playing around with them. I came up with the idea of doing a cover of 'Wish You Were Here,' but we didn't really want it on the record.

I've had friends who've had depression or been on medication because their pituitary glands aren't giving out enough hormones - so I've been around a lot of people who've had problems like that. I've always been open to talk about that.

The song 'Paradigm' talks about nanobots - and how they can potentially be used to cure diseases and help you live forever. But how much of a human being would you be at that point? If you're 70 percent machine and 30 percent human, are you going to lose yourself?

The Brexit thing to me just looks like a difference of opinion. I know things were lied about, but that should be a wake-up call to get all the information before you vote about something. Educate yourself.

One thing I loved when I was growing up, you maybe saw one review from a magazine like 'Rolling Stone,' but now there are 150 reviews before an album even comes out. There are so many opinions out there, but the only one that really matters is your own.

One thing that was frustrating to us, always, was having to do so much press building up an album, and you're asked so many questions about, you know, is it more melodic, is it heavier, are you doing your old stuff, is it new?

Unless someone physically tries to attack me, I don't care what anyone does.

I think Kanye West is brilliant at what he does: he's got a different live show, different merch for every tour, different vibes, and he just puts out great records.

The metalcore has been left behind. It's not something that any of us find enjoyment in listening to, so it's obviously not the direction we would write songs in.

Someone sent me an article on AI that was written by Tim Urban on the website Wait but Why - that was kind of where I stuck my toes in the puddle, and I said, 'OK, I've gotta learn about this!' I felt like this is one of those things that our generation is going to have to answer for, eventually, and I just wanted to educate myself on it.

I think 'The Stage' is kind of left field.

If there's something I really like or a chord progression, I write a note in my Blackberry, and maybe a year later, I'll revisit it and ask, 'What did I like about that?' I really don't try to think too much about it. I like to be fresh.

We write music because we have to; it's a part of our very being.

A lot of the metal bands that were around when Metallica put out 'The Black Album,' now they're playing clubs, and Metallica is playing stadiums.

Most people know we're kind of one of the only bands around right now that will admit that we're Republican.

A lot of times, people just want to be more extreme than the next band or the next person, and that's all they focus on. That's kind of lost on me.

We kind of reached this point in life where we don't really want to put out anything just to put something out. We really don't want it to be like, 'Two years are up. You've had your break; now do another record and get it out there.'

It's important to know the ins and outs of the music business, but you can also dive too deeply into it and forget that you're really here to make music.

Our band has always been really big on imagery. We've kind of used that as one of our strengths; we tend to do that pretty well.

I listen to a lot of Pink Floyd, the Doors, Elton John, Sabbath, Metallica, GN'R, Megadeth - just classic rock, classic metal stuff.

I got an email saying we were nominated for a Grammy, and I instantly thought it was a joke. So I started Googling the nominees, and there we were!

We grew up with every type of band from Primus to Mr. Bungle to Elton John to pop music to metal, and we try to throw it all in a blender. And whatever comes out of that is more Avenged Sevenfold than metal or metalcore.

All I can say to people who don't think depression is a real thing, or say 'just suck it up and get over it' - they just really have no idea. You have to give people the benefit of the doubt that they're doing the best they can to get through it.

We do a lot of things that kind of annoy people and our fan base. We try not to get overloaded on it. For us, that means we don't do social media stuff - we have an Avenged Sevenfold social media, but none of the band members have Facebooks or any sort of Twitter.

We're trying to change the whole way our merch is viewed, in terms of just not a bunch of skulls interlaced; you know, every album can look the same, so they're going to be stylized and different.

People want things now. People in the rock world seem to not want to give it to them - they want to keep doing things the old way - and one thing that has always bummed me out is when we get a single three months out, and then you have to keep getting fed with bread crumbs.

As we develop, I just see us following our heart on this musical journey.

I just think that a metal band covering a bunch of metal songs is so boring, so 'done before.'

Always from day one, we were the band on Warped Tour with a fog machine, and our backdrop had to be up - everyone thought we were the biggest idiots for that, total posers. But for us, we wanted to be over the top.

Usually, when you're putting out a record, you have reviews from people a week before, and you have a vibe 'cause everyone's heard it - you've heard feedback from everyone, and they've listened to your single for a couple of months. Radio's playing it.

We don't want to become like country artists where there's a formula.

I want to stay away from trends and do what we want to do musically.

The more kids that we can meet or kids that are terminally ill, we try to do it because it's really important, and you can see the hope in their eyes and in their families and their parents.

I know that sometimes we, as Americans, we reach outside of our means, and every once in a while we like to 'police the world,' but I think we do a lot of good as well.

I think one of the biggest sleepers that people are going to be able to dig into later is 'Fermi Paradox,' it's the song before 'Exist.' To me it's got the coolest, it's just so bizarre because it's got one of the most melodic vocal melodies, but we put it over a black metal blast beats.

Musically, I just like when people are knowledgeable about music and they can talk to you about it.

We really like having songs where we think the arrangement is just as important as the melodies, even though they're typically not.

The reality is you either step into the future, or you become a dinosaur.

The idea of turning an album into a living piece of art and adding new installations is really intriguing. It expands the journey.

Every once in a while, we can touch somebody's life in a way just by writing a melody or writing some music, which is always really special.

I feel like our whole discography up through 'Hail to the King' was young, fun, and exciting. It was aggressively driven. 'The Stage' was the first step in the band becoming a more mature musical entity.

Honestly, I never thought we'd get a nomination for a Grammy, period. To be honest, we felt that if we were ever going to get one, we thought we had 'City of Evil' and 'Nightmare' and 'Hail to the King,' and those were all big records, and they never even sniffed at us.