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On this week’s episode of 95.5 KLOS‘s “New & Approved” show, VOLBEAT frontman Michael Poulsen discussed what it was like for him and his bandmates to play several shows with former SLAYER and TESTAMENT drummer Jon Dette in late January and early February after the group’s regular drummer Jon Larsen, tested positive for COVID-19, the disease caused by the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus. He said (as transcribed by Phoosi.com): “It was very early on [our U.S. co-headlining] tour [with GHOST]. Suddenly Jon got hit by COVID and we had to get him out of the building and then get him into a hotel. And he was there for — I don’t know — five, six [or] seven days.
“The worst thing is always to cancel shows because you really don’t wanna let down the fans,” Michael explained. “But at the same time, Jon is the original drummer and he played every single VOLBEAT show there’s ever been. So we were, like, ‘Okay, what are we gonna do? Are we gonna cancel some shows or are we going to see if we can come up with a Plan B?’ And the Plan B was to see if we can come up with a drummer that could learn, like, 16 VOLBEAT songs in less than 24 hours. And Jon Dette was the guy. And we called him up and he was very excited about it. And he’s a very good friend of ours for a very long time. And he always said, ‘If I can ever help you guys out, just call me.’ So that’s what we did. And I don’t know how he managed to pull it off, but he learned those 16 songs within 24 hours. And he did very well. He ended up playing three or four shows; I don’t recall now.”
VOLBEAT canceled its show on January 29 at Ford Idaho Center Arena in Nampa, Idaho as a result of Larsen‘s diagnosis.
VOLBEAT‘s tour with GHOST will conclude tonight (Thursday, March 3) in Anaheim, California.
VOLBEAT‘s “Shotgun Blues” single, which is taken from the band’s latest album, “Servant Of The Mind”, recently topped both the Billboard Mainstream Rock and Mediabase Active Rock charts, the Danish/American group’s tenth top-charter, and cemented VOLBEAT‘s record for having the most No. 1 singles on the Mainstream Rock chart by an artist based outside of North America.
Revolver called “Servant Of The Mind” “excellent… the darkest and heaviest VOLBEAT offering yet.” For the LP, the band, which consists of Michael Poulsen (guitar, vocals), Larsen, Rob Caggiano (guitars) and Kaspar Boye Larsen (bass), took its signature heavy metal, psychobilly and punk ‘n’ roll sound up a notch while showcasing Poulsen‘s keen ability for songwriting and storytelling. “Rarely has such a successful band sounded so ravenous,” says Kerrang! magazine of the album.
“Servant Of The Mind” was written and recorded during the shutdown and quarantine necessitated by the COVID-19 pandemic. The LP includes the “double barrel” of summer songs the band released this past June: “Wait A Minute My Girl” and “Dagen Før” (featuring Stine Bramsen), the former of which became the band’s ninth number one single on the Billboard Mainstream Rock chart.
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