Larry Barragan – Helstar – Interview Exclusive
Written by Mark Taylor
Friday, 25 November 2011 05:15
Power metallers Helstar finally got to give us UK fans a long overdue taste of their live ‘Glory of Chaos’ recently when they headline debuted at London’s Purple Turtle venue in Camden. I got to chat with the band’s founding member – guitarist Larry Barragan to find out exactly why it’s taken him quite so long to get his band over to Blighty and what his thoughts were regarding the live metal scene in 2011.
Hey Larry may thanks for taking the time to chat with me tonight ahead of your first UK show, I was going to start by asking you why its taken you so long to finally play the UK but with the trials and tribulations you’ve had getting here tonight I think I’ve just answered my own question (laughing).
Yeah that’s why man, actually I don’t really know why its taken us so long, I mean we talked about it but I’m sure why it’s proved quite so hard for us to come over here you know. We’ve actually do a few tours of Europe since the band got back together but this is the first real opportunity we’ve had to bring this version of the band over here. Then when we wake up the morning and we’ve got these guys asking us if we have the right paperwork etc etc, there really wasn’t one member of the band who wanted to cancel tonight, we all wanted to finally play the UK you know.
And thankfully you did make it over here via that short cross channel journey and there is a crowd out there already tonight really stocked at the prospect of finally seeing you guys. But let’s talk about the history of Helstar for a minute here you originally formed the band around 1981 wasn’t it?
It was more like a proper band around ’82, we sort of met as a band for the first time as friends around ’81 but as a band it was a year later. That’s when we really started properly recording demos etc.
And your first album ‘Burning Star’ was released in 1985. Just as bands like Metallica and Anthrax were taking off, do you think the emergence of thrash took the edge off what you and band’s like Exciter and Raven were doing?
You know were found ourselves in the middle of everything with that record, we weren’t thrash we weren’t power metal so when people wanted us to be one or the other we stuck being us, and doing what we always wanted to do.
And to this day you still do that right?
Yeah, yeah, even with the latest album ‘Glory of Chaos’ we mix it all up you know, there’s some thrashy stuff but there’s also some melodic parts too you know.
And now you’ve also managed to as near as damn it get the original line up back together. How important was that to you and the guys?
Actually Rob is not an original member he came in on the second album ‘Remnants of War’ and I think having Rob in the band allows us to have that heavy edge you know. The songs he writes are a little heavier, gritty a little more straightforward punch in the face type things. To me to have Rob and I back together gives the band more of that ‘Remnants of War’ sound you know.
In 2008 you did an album ‘Kings of Hell’ which was your first album in thirteen years as a band and now you have unleashed ‘Glory of Chaos’. Tell us what happened in-between these two releases and what lead you to records such an excellent new record?
Well like I said the new album is a lot more punch in the face in its sound, and umm we really had to take a chance on this album because we knew that to a lot of long time Helstar fans this was not what they would expect from the band. And we had to go through that whole do we just continue doing what we think these fans will like or do we do something we know that we like? And at that point we realised we have to be true to ourselves you know, Our fans aren’t stupid you know they’ll spot if we just do something that sounds like ‘Distant Thunder’ or ‘Remnants Of War’. We simply did not want to do a mere continuation of the last album. If you listen to our back catalogue, every album has its own soul, and for ‘King of Hell’ that soul was very dark and heavy and the soul of ‘Glory of Chaos’ is perfectly summed up in the album title. Its fast and aggressive you know, and somewhere we had never really been before.
So tell us a bit about your singer James Rivera, he really is a true heavy metal singer, someone I’d rate as highly as say Rob Halford. It really must be great working with him every night.
James has been my brother in crime since ’82 so I guess you get to take it for granted a little bit, but he’s a great performer with great energy. And it’s great to have a kick ass singer like James in the band, but beyond the mere vocal prowess of the man there is a mutual brotherhood feeling you know, that actually transcends all that shit.
Although this is your first UK show I actually first caught you guys back in 2009 in Germany in the Open Air Headbangers Ball. What are your memories of that day? It was pretty weird turning up for a gig as a punter in what seemed like a farmyard I can tell you.
I liked that day man, it was really cool, and had a different feel, but as Helstar I thought we played really well that day. It was a great set even though we had a few issues that day. That day was our first show with Mikey our drummer, our other drummer had pulled out three days before we were due to leave and Mikey came in having known James from another project as well. So he knew some Helstar stuff but he still had to learn two songs and they were really hard you know. (laughing) So yeah when it came down to having to replace Russell there was no reason for us to go anywhere else other than to Mikey. We had already fallen in love with Mikey so it was all plain sailing from there.
So what other festivals have you played like that one that we may not have heard of that you would recommend to the more hardcore travelling heavy metal fan?
Man I don’t know, that’s a really good question. Umm I like Rock Hard too that’s a big one though, Keep It True as well I mean that was the festival that probably got us over here in the first place. They found out we were back together for the 25thanniversary of ‘Remnants of War’ and they asked us over you know. That kind of got the ball rolling for us to say, “Let’s just do this”.
Well Larry it seems like I’ve run out of time here as the crowd are waiting for you to hit the stage here in Camden tonight.
Thanks man, it’s been a blast.
If you want to check out all the latest news regarding Helstar click on the link below for their official Facebook band page.