The Italian metalcore act Tasters has seen a lot since forming in 1999; playing over 100 shows all over Europe, releasing 3 albums, and building up a sizable following along the way. Their mix of the melodic with punishing metal and touring work ethic has paid off, and now the band has released their latest album 'Reckless 'Til the End' on Nuclear Blast Records. We at Neuweltmusic took some time to ask the guys some questions before they embark on their tour with Texas in July next month.

Hello guys! Could you please introduce yourselves and give us an introduction to Tasters- how did the band get its start? What is the story behind the name?  Hello there I'm Tommy from Tasters! We are an italian band, precisely from the beachfront town of Livorno. We try to play music and kick asses since the year 99! Nice to meet you :) The name was choosed by our old drummer and singer, we still dont know the reason :)

Tasters have a style that alternates between very brutal, hardcore metal and extremely melodic rock- where do you draw inspiration from- what are some influences for the band?  I think in the last years,the bands that impressed us the most are Parkway Drive,Bring me the horizon,Architects,Periphery,The Ghost inside and The Devil wears prada, together with a lot of other bands in other styles. In general we listen to lots of music, every kind, and we got inspiration from them but also from everyday's life and from the world that surrounds us.

Tasters is from Livorno, Italy- what is the metal scene like there?  The metal scene in Livorno like in italy is really poor and almost unexistant, we went touring outside italy in the last years just because of this.

You just released your latest album ‘Reckless ‘Till the End’ on September 16th on Nuclear Blast Records. How did the deal with Nuclear Blast happen?  It's been like the mechanism of a clock. In that moment,every piece was in the right place and in the right time. We have to thank Andy Siry from Nuclear blast and our managers Deville schober and Chrischa Fassler as all of them believed in Tasters and made everything happen.

Tell us a little about the writing process for this album.  In the beginning, Luke writes the riffing and drumming parts of the song. After this, the recordings take part at Adrenaline Studio in livorno, professional recording studio ran by our singer Dani and soundengineer Sigi. Here Dani adds all vocals and Izio writes the electronic stuff. Once that the recordings were done, we rearranged the songs and choosed only the better ones.


’Reckless ‘Till the End’ has a lot of metal scorchers, like ‘Please Destroy This World’ and ‘Sleeping with Spirits,’ but also some quieter, almost ballad moments, with songs like ‘Shadows’-  Yeah we wanted to created the right mix of our influences. We love hard stuff like you mentioned and also slower songs and music.

How is ‘Reckless ‘Till the End’ different from your previous records ‘Shining’ (2005) and ‘Rebirth’ (2009)?  It's completely different. Songs have been selected on more than 20 ones, and we had the possibility to record, rearrange and do everything we wanted because we recorded in the recording studio of our singer and sound engineer named Adrenaline studio and based in Livorno working in a very professional way.

You released the opening track ‘Katherine’s Got a Secret’ as a free download on your facebook page- what was the reason behind this?  Of course we need to be known from more people as possible and all together with the label we decided this to give a present to all our fans and to grow a little bit in the scene. And everybody knows that today people use to download albums so we gave these songs to a better quality, so people could taste how the album sounded like.

The album artwork is very interesting- can you explain to us a little about the ideas behind it?  This drawing and almost all the rest of the drawings inside our album's artwork are made by Dario Dell'agnello, a friend of ours that impressed us by his talent. The cover represents a mix of the things leading this world. The love from girls can also destroy you and the world around you as well as representing a lovely and sweet figure but able to spread evil and destruction. Not that the women are evil, but they can represent the beauty and evil together, that's why we used them in the cover.

What do you hope listeners take away from ‘Reckless ‘Till the End’?  All the time and work we spent for it. Every detail is there because of some reason, and we tried to give the best originality we could give to the tracks and the sound.

The band recorded over 20 songs during the sessions for the album- was it a difficult process picking songs to put on the final product?  This is a thing that came natural, these 11 songs were good all together and had a powerful impact . We have no regrets about the left-out songs also if some of them could be good in “Reckless till the end”.


Tell us a little bit about the making of your video ‘Please Destroy This World’… Do you have any interesting memories from the shoot?  It was really cold! We were in a very big firm without conditioner and in general inside it was colder than outside! And another funny thing is when our singer unintentionally punched in the face the guy with the mask.

You’re about to embark on a Fall tour with fellow Metalcore act Texas in July- what can fans expect at these shows?  They should expect the total chaos. We want to show to our fans that Tasters give its best in the live shows and hope we will be able to involve people and have fun with them.

Since forming in 1999, Tasters has played over 100 shows all across Europe, and opened for such bands as 30 Seconds to Mars, Bleed From Within, and Sonic Syndicate- the band recently played Metalcamp in Slovenia and has also toured extensively in Russia… On one of those tours you did the whole stretch (22.000 KM) by car! What are some of your fondest tour memories and experiences?  In the last years we decided to focus our targets outside italy, because our country is missing a real musical and I would say, Metal and Hardcore, scene. We did 2 tours in the UK,some gigs in Europe and 3 full tours in Russia Ukraine and Latvia, reaching Siberia too and driving for 22000 km. It's been one of the best experiences of our life, very hard I would say but still unforgettable. People in Russia are the craziest ones but we hope to find the same in Europe this fall!

How has this touring work ethic shaped Tasters into the band it is today? How much of your success do you own to it?  I think the live shows have grown 200% from that . Maybe also labels and managements noticed us because of these tours and also, after touring Russia and Siberia, I think we are ready to tour everywhere in the world, isnt it? :)

Three albums you’d want in the bunker with you in case of zombie apocalypse?  Architects – Hollow Crown | Parkway Drive – Horizons | BMTH – There is a hell believe me i've seen it...

Is there anything you want to plug before we go?  We hope to see everyone on our tour this fall and rock with us!