The subject matter on The Taking at times seems kind of dark one moment and then really uplifting the next. What inspiration went behind songs like Executioner’s Song, We Win and Indian Summer?

It was kind of an accidental, after-the-fact concept record really. When you’re listening to the songs they can all stand on their own as independent thoughts, if you will. The record as a whole … what had happened, to put it simply, we as a band had witnessed two very good friends of ours go through a fractured relationship, then a divorce and then the ultimate kind of reconciliation. This all happened during the last tour and the guy in this couple was on our tour bus so we couldn’t really take sides … we didn’t. Most people gossip about things, or at least talk about it a little bit. Guys don’t call it gossiping, they just call it talking shit or whatever. We actually didn’t talk at all about it. It was almost like Zen Buddhism … and because we were such good friends with the female of the couple too, we just didn’t even talk about it. So when we started writing songs for this record, the first song was called Easier Lying. One song would then form another song and we still didn’t think these songs were about this situation but when we finally got done with the record, we realised we had written about all the stages of these people’s relationship. The deceit in Easier Lying, the anger which is Your Name, Lords of Abaddon and Executioner’s Song into the divorce where they became better friends after the fact and that is where We Win comes in … if that makes any sense. I think good songs come from a little bit of strife. You’ve got to have some strife, and this time it wasn’t my own personal strife but it was very interesting to write about another situation and not even be aware of it. We all have common experiences, you know? I’ve been through break-ups and all that anger, all that stuff before. You can draw from your own experience but it’s nice to not have to go through it personally and be able to still write about it.

I totally agree. I have to say though, the one song you are probably going to get asked the most about is the song Cocaine, no doubt due to your past. Was that a song about a habit you kicked or about someone else?
That was actually the one kind of stand alone song that we were going to keep off the record and have as a bonus track because it didn’t really fit in with the concept, but then we were like, f@#k it. That’s kind of a tongue in cheek song. Usually a riff will inform my vocal and that intro riff to that song, to me, is so reminiscent of Guns N Roses stuff. Loaded never even approaches that territory musically and we had this one song that to me was so obviously Guns N Roses that it reminded me of my 1993 when I quit cocaine, but I amped up all my drinking and my other drugs and people around me were really scared for me and I’d say, “What’s your f@#king problem? I quit cocaine!” And it’s only funny because I survived, you know what I mean? It’d be a sad tale of that story if I actually died. But I survived and to me I can actually look back and say how ridiculous some parts of my life were, and that song is just telling about the ridiculousness of my 1993. That was just before I had a really bad health issue in 1994 and ended up in hospital for a few weeks. I got sober after that. It was either I get sober or I was going to die. Those last couple years I call my dark period and the only memories I have are unfortunately really dark, scary memories in '93 and half of ‘94. Hopeless, just hopeless.