I actually have an Avenged Sevenfold tattoo on my body.
Over all Avenged Sevenfold the album is 10 times better than the others.
I can't honestly say with a straight face that every Avenged Sevenfold album is my favorite.
I can honestly tell you, if it wasn't for our fans, there would not be Avenged Sevenfold right now.
I like Avenged Sevenfold and Five Finger Death Punch, with whom I did a single.
The funny thing about being creative is that, especially high school people, I kept noticing I'd always go to these certain materials. I'd always be picking up trash and picking up paper and using it.
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.
It's been an incredible experience, playing with Twisted Sister, Stone Sour, Avenged Sevenfold, jamming with Ace Frehley and Peter Criss, and the list goes on and on and on.
The thing about me is that I'm very fortunate to have had the opportunities with Avenged Sevenfold in songwriting. I really think it's helped to bolster my guitar playing as well.
These fans are the reason why we're here. They're awesome and very crazy. They love Avenged Sevenfold, and we love them. Having that is rare.
We're not gonna write a fusion song for Avenged Sevenfold, obviously, but I love having those elements and blending it in, and having the eclectic arrangements and stuff like that.
A band like Avenged Sevenfold I've praised quite a bit publicly, because it's a band that has moved into that arena-size thing for a hard rock band.
We moved from the suburbs to L.A. and I picked up break dancing when I was 10. I joined a dance crew in high school and I was battling. I also took ballet most of my life until high school.
I didn't know what my passion was until I discovered the dramatic arts in junior high and high school and I realized, 'Oh, I like this. This is something I feel like I'm good at.' But, the idea of moving to Hollywood and becoming an actor was really unrealistic.
After I left Dream Theater, and I was doing Avenged Sevenfold, Twisted Sister... all these other things, I made a lot of new fans in a lot of new areas.
A lot of people have ideas and opinions on what Avenged Sevenfold should be or what we should do, and I think our No. 1 rule is to always make sure we never listen to any of that and to always do what we believe.