TWENTY BIG ONES with JOHN CAVALIERE, BLACK MAJESTY – August 2024

Shane | 20 August 2024 | Reply

TWENTY BIG ONES with JOHN CAVALIERE, BLACK MAJESTY – August 2024

By Shane Pinnegar

Black Majesty make a rare trip out west this weekend for Stormrider Festival’s Tenth Anniversary, playing Night One – Friday 23rd August!

From Stormrider’s press release: “Melbourne’s Black Majesty are without doubt one of the country’s most successful Power Metal exports. With seven studio albums, appearances on some of the world’s biggest Metal festival stages, European headline shows, appearances in Asia and domestically with the likes of Helloween, Blind Guardian, Nightwish, Saxon, DragonForce & many more, we are pleased to welcome Black Majesty back to Stormrider to showcase a set celebrating over 20 years of Power Metal which is not to be missed!”

Frontman John Cavaliere tackled TWENTY BIG ONES for us.

1. You’re playing Stormrider Festival in Perth! Is it a rare opportunity to get across to WA and play for fans you don’t normally get the chance to be in front of, and how do you best capitalise on a chance like that?

The best way I think is to just have fun and let people that are watching have the same experience.

2. Tell us a little about your latest release. Are there any hidden nuggets the band put in the material that only diehard fans might pick up on?

Well, the new album has 12 tracks. I think we have kept on the same track as always as in songwriting, but also maybe the end result came out sounding with a bit more of an edge to it compared to our past recordings. We have taken a while to get this album recorded mainly due to a lot of lineup changes but now in its final stage it seems to have all come together very well. I hope that people that listen to it get as much enjoyment as we did making it.

3. What got you into music, and can you tell us about the moment you realised you wanted to be a musician?

Ok, this is going to be a long answer! I had a teacher in primary school everyone was terrified of, because he was the one you got sent to if you got in trouble, and he would give you a chest thumping with his finger pretty hard… Anyway, to cut a story short, I visited him a fair bit of times lol, but when I got to grade six he ended up being my teacher. But what I never knew was that he was a guitarist. I was already listening to metal by then and he found out I liked music, so he asked if I wanted to learn guitar and I said yes. So, as it went, I learnt a little guitar off him and I thought this is great!! He actually was a very nice person. One day I was humming along with something and he said you sound pretty good with vocals, so at the school concert I ended up singing Greatest American Hero, that ‘80s show theme song. I was very nervous but after it was done I thought this is insane, and that’s where the love of singing and music came from.

Then also there was metal – my biggest love – and at the time I was listening to Dio, Manowar, Helloween, Queensryche… so I started to just sing in my room relentlessly. I would sing every day of the week to songs from those bands until I ended up in a band of all 16 year olds – all teenagers – and that’s when I did my first show. From then on it became like a drug and it’s been like that ever since and I’m still loving it, but I do enjoy more playing live than recording. I love the rush of it and knowing that people are liking something we have created.

4. What is it about music that makes you feel passionate?

I think it would probably be when I write a song that has a meaning to it. Something that comes from my deepest beliefs and a song that would somehow touch somebody in the world the same way it made me feel when we wrote it

5. Who would be your main five musical influences?

Ronnie James Dio , Eric Adams, Jeff Tate, Micheal Kiske and Bruce Dickinson.

6. If you could call in any one collaborator to do a song with, who would it be?

I think it would be Dio (RIP) or Michael Kiske.

7. How would you describe your music to someone who’d never listened to you before? What is the one comparison a reviewer or fan has made that made you cringe or you disagreed with?

Fast heavy and sometimes evil! [laughs] I was once told that I sound like Ted Polley from the band Danger Danger, but I sound nothing like him! Not that there’s anything wrong with him, I just don’t think I sound like him.

8. What is your favourite activity or hobby outside of music – what do you like to do to unwind?

Just, like, to chill in a darkened room.

9. Do you have a best and/or worst performance anecdote you’d like to share, and if things do go awry during a show, how do you try to turn things around?

Worst would be when I sang with Silvio Massaro, my good friend from Vanishing Point. We were singing Vanishing Point track Surreal together live and I just kept bumping into everything – drums, keyboards, foldback, I fell off – it was a nightmare. So I just thought ‘stuff this, I’m not moving anymore until I finish the song!” The best would have to be at a festival in the Czech Republic called Basenfirefest. I had a lot of fun and the crowd was fantastic, but there has been many like that.

10. What’s the best piece of advice another musician ever gave you?

Just have fun and stop over thinking .

11. Do you follow a process or ritual before a performance to get rid of nerves or performance anxiety?

Not really, just a warm shower if available and just go out there and do it and hope it all goes well.

12. When was the last time you were starstruck and who was it?

When I saw Jorn Lande live.

13. What’s the best thing about being a musician? If you could no longer be a musician for whatever reason, what would be your dream job?

It would be creating music and dream job would be to be a musician.

14. When the band are all hanging out together, who cooks; who gets the drinks in; and who is first to crack out the acoustic guitars for a singalong?

When we hang together we actually more go out get something to eat together, or just tease each other about silly stuff we’ve done in our past. [laughs]

15. Looking back over your career, is there a single moment or situation you feel was a misstep, or you would like to be able to “do over” even if it didn’t change your current situation??

It would be to have started Black Majesty 10 years earlier than initially in 2002.

16. If you were made ruler of the world, what would your first orders be?

Everyone to be nicer to each other and to listen to Metal!!

17. What is your favourite rock n’ roll movie, and why?

Pick Of Destiny and Step Brothers. I know it’s not a real rock movie but fuck it’s funny. And Dio is in Pick Of Destiny!!

18. Talking about songwriting, where do you think the magic comes from?

Well, I don’t know if it’s magic, but basically from the mood we are in on that day, or what is happening in the world or around us.

19. If you could magically go back in time and be a part of the recording sessions for any one record in history, which would you choose – and what does that record mean to you?

Helloween – Keeper Of The Seven Keys Part One. Masterpiece – that’s what it means to me.