Interview: Rage (Written)

Rage, the legendary German heavy metal band, were recently on a week-long jaunt across the breadth of the UK (albeit with one cancelled show in Dudley) ending in London. A show that delivered a celebration of heavy metal and Rage’s career to date.

Many heads were banged – but before they took to the stage, we spoke to the band and what follows is an edited transcript of that interview. We spoke about the tour, the difficulties they have faced since COVID, the past and the future, what makes Rage such a machine, and so much more.

How are you guys doing? Tonight, last night of this particular tour, how are you feeling?

Peter “Peavy” Wagner (Vocals/Bass) – Relaxed!

Vassilios “Lucky” Maniatopoulos (Drums) – Yeah, relaxed. We’ve had a hell of a time so far. It’s a great travel party. We have like, the other two bands, C.O.P. UK and Secret Rule, and the crew. Everybody’s really nice. We’ve had a lot of fun, and I mean, we’re playing music every day, so it could be worse!

In December, even in winter, it’s pretty cold in the UK at the moment!

Peter “Peavy” Wagner (Vocals/Bass) – But it’s very cold in Germany, too. We have absolute snow chaos in south of Germany. Bavaria, Munich is completely off, no trains are going, no traffic moving, everything is standing still. No flights, nothing.

I’ve been to Berlin twice, and in the winter as well, but I’ve never experienced it in snow. I always imagine it being so beautiful.

Peter “Peavy” Wagner (Vocals/Bass) – It looks beautiful, but all the traffic has broken down completely.

So you said the tour has been good so far. Is there any particular show that has stood out?

Vassilios “Lucky” Maniatopoulos (Drums) – I’ll answer this question after tonight.

Peter “Peavy” Wagner (Vocals/Bass) – I liked it very much in Sheffield.

Vassilios “Lucky” Maniatopoulos (Drums) – Yeah, Sheffield was nice, that’s true. I like very much, but for personal reasons. Dunfermline, which is Scotland, because it’s like the hometown of my good friend Pete Agnew, who’s a member and founder of Nazareth. This is how it came to be, on this occasion that we could play there. It was super interesting to be in his village and to go to the pubs where he has drunk beer. I mean Pete is a legend, of course.

Have you had the opportunity to spend any sort of time out and about?

Vassilios “Lucky” Maniatopoulos (Drums) – Yeah, I’ve been in a few pubs.

Peter “Peavy” Wagner (Vocals/Bass) – Basically the stuff you need to do. Sightseeing, visiting some abbeys or whatever.

What is it about playing the UK that you enjoy?

Peter “Peavy” Wagner (Vocals/Bass) – Guinness every day, from the tap.

Vassilios “Lucky” Maniatopoulos (Drums) – Oh, there are various things that I enjoy. I lived here for six months. I lived in Essex, Chelmsford and so I like the culture, I like the open minded and freestylers that are in this country at the same time. You need one or two days to get used to habits and to understand the mindset of people. But once you are into it, you can have a lot of fun with them. And I enjoy those fun moments the most, I have to say. The humour is like nobody elses in the world.

Do you have a favourite UK city to play? Either because of the crowd that normally comes and you see them go crazy for you, or because of what that city has to offer?

Peter “Peavy” Wagner (Vocals/Bass) – I’m not that familiar with a lot of the cities, but London, I like a lot because there’s, of course, so many sightseeing things here, so many interesting things for my special hobbies.

Vassilios “Lucky” Maniatopoulos (Drums) – Also, it’s very multicultural.

Peter “Peavy” Wagner (Vocals/Bass) – A tour through all the beautiful cemeteries here. Although today was not really the best day for this, as it’s been raining.

Vassilios “Lucky” Maniatopoulos (Drums) – Yesterday was nice though. We were at the seaside. Brighton.

Peter “Peavy” Wagner (Vocals/Bass) – Right, at the beach. It’s very nice sitting at the beach and having a drink.

What happened with the Dudley show (it was cancelled)?

Vassilios “Lucky” Maniatopoulos (Drums) –Well, when we started this booking procedure, like, three quarters of a year ago, it’s the first time that we did something like this on our own. I’m running the company behind this. So we started to put requests out and things, and then it took us a while to get this tour together. But then right before the tour starts, like four weeks before, maybe, we started to realise that we probably shouldn’t have done like seven shows, maybe three or four instead, because we are in a post COVID situation right now and still the market is not where it should be.

I mean, we are humble enough to know that it doesn’t matter if it’s 10, 100 or 200 people. For us it’s the same. We go out there and rock and roll with them, that’s fine, but for the locals, it is, of course a business thing. So, we decided together to cancel the show. We almost would have cancelled a second one, but then we said no. The locals were like, no, let’s do it, it doesn’t matter. At the end, we have, like an average of something between 50 and 150 tickets that we have sold. It is not as good as it was.

The post COVID situation means that business is a bit lower than it would have been, but we decided to do this because everybody who pays for a ticket and wants to go to the show deserves to see a show. We do this for the fans and the ones who are into the band. So, yeah, Dudley was the one that we had to cancel, but all the others we did, no matter how much the sales were, and we enjoyed it very much.

I’m glad. We need confidence to come back so bands feel comfortable touring.

Vassilios “Lucky” Maniatopoulos (Drums) – I have to say that in our case, I don’t know what other bands do, other agencies, but in our case, we think that we contribute with these kind of tours to this confidence. If you announce a tour and you cancel the entire tour because of low sales, this confidence is never going to come back. People refuse to buy a ticket because they don’t know if they going to actually happen. Are they going to cancel again, and I might not get my money back? So, you have to go out there and you have to do it, in my opinion. In our opinion, so that people know that if you give your word that you’re coming, you’re coming.

Peter “Peavy” Wagner (Vocals/Bass) – Trust was broken with the COVID thing. Fans had like ten tickets at the wall and nothing happened. This is needed so we get better numbers for all of us.

It’s only going to help your reputation as well. The fact that you’re here, you’re playing these shows in the middle of December as well. It’s cold, it’s miserable. These shows are still going ahead. It’s fantastic, and of course, you brought C.O.P. UK and Secret Rule out with you as well. How’s it been touring with them?

Vassilios “Lucky” Maniatopoulos (Drums) – Kevin and Dale from C.O.P. UK are so unbelievable. Those two guys, they are from Sheffield and the Doncaster area, man, I don’t know if I had so much luck before in any kind of tour. Like, they are crazy. Secret Rule as well. Really polite and nice people, great musicians, absolute pros. Both are pros at what they do. Super humble. Nice. Yeah. Kevin and Dale showed us what it means to be in English and what it means to drink.

Peter “Peavy” Wagner (Vocals/Bass) – Last night was also cool. Kev couldn’t play the show, the drummer from C.O.P. UK couldn’t play the show. So all the other drummers here on the tour, they were helping out and learned a couple of the songs.

Vassilios “Lucky” Maniatopoulos (Drums) – So the drum tech learned a few songs. Me, I learned a few, the secret Rule drummer learned a few and we did the show for C.O.P. UK. It was a lot of fun.

Talk to me about building the set list for this tour, especially when you can draw from so much in the past, but you’re obviously still pushing and promoting the latest releases. How hard is it to pull together a set list?

Peter “Peavy” Wagner (Vocals/Bass) – Of course, you cannot fulfil all the wishes. It’s impossible, but we have a lot of old stuff in the set list. What I would like to hear. If I was a fan of the band, what I would like to hear?

Vassilios “Lucky” Maniatopoulos (Drums) – It’s an absolute nightmare, in general, to put the set list together. Rage have 27 fucking albums with like 600 songs. How do you choose? I remember back when Peavy came to me for the first time saying, what would you like to play on the next tour? Put like your favourites, but you can still only play like 15 or 17 songs.

I cannot choose, I don’t know. So, at the end of the day, we all have our influence but Peavy decides and he knows best. What is good for that tour, for that audience. We blindly trust him. He’s going to tell us what is the best songs to play and we give our best.

Rage never stops. The longest gap you had between album releases was with 21 in 2012 and The Devil Strikes Again in 2016. Do you need to be busy?

Peter “Peavy” Wagner (Vocals/Bass) – There were releases in between, just not a full studio album. Then there was the line-up change and we took a year off to do the Refuge thing which resulted in another album. We were busy all that time. I was thinking like, no, I’ve never had a gap. I am always writing and releasing stuff.

It is spectacular.

Peter “Peavy” Wagner (Vocals/Bass) – The next one is in the pipeline already.

Vassilios “Lucky” Maniatopoulos (Drums) – Would you expect anything else? There’s no other person that I know that is as creative as this gentleman here. Apart from like Frank Zappa who did like 27 albums, you know what I mean? It’s unbelievable, the amount of songs and to keep the character of those releases fresh. All throughout 40 fucking years in the metal scene, of being a pioneer.

Peter “Peavy” Wagner (Vocals/Bass) – Next year we have our 40th anniversary. For the first time, we will release a double album. Next year in March. End of March. First time ever, a double album, with thrashy typical Rage stuff, other types of metal, orchestration, and more. It is a lot of food for the fans.

You’ve seen so many changes within the music industry over Rage’s lifetime, and here you stand, still going strong. What do you point as a reason for your longevity?

Peter “Peavy” Wagner (Vocals/Bass) – I don’t know, we just did it. There have been questions of continuing when there have been so many problems coming up over the years and with so many line-ups broken down.

What can you do when your fellow musicians quit? It’s impossible to go on working with them. The only thing you have to is just find new guys and start again. That’s what I always did. I can’t do anything else. I’ve never really done a proper job, I don’t want to work and do something else. Thankfully there’s no need for it. There’s always people that want to be part of band like this so I always found good guys. With Lucky, I have a partner. We have known each other since 1988. There was a long gap where we didn’t play together, but finally, in 2015, it happened.

Vassilios “Lucky” Maniatopoulos (Drums) – We have built around this band, an entire company that nowadays has like 12 employees and supports 30 artists. This company grew just because of Rage. Without Rage, this company wouldn’t exist. We built an infrastructure around this whole band that gives us enough so that we can do what we like, that we can serve what the people are waiting for and create good moments for everyone.

You’ve witnessed a lot of changes. The one I really want to get your opinion on is the most divisive of all – the rise of streaming services. Do you see any benefits of it or do you see it as a negative thing overall?

Peter “Peavy” Wagner (Vocals/Bass) – Benefits for who? Yeah, for the music listeners, of course. It’s a lot easier, a lot cheaper. Music has lost its value, actually. No one is really willing to pay anymore for music. If you pay $10 a month for Spotify, this is now the most that people are willing to give, which is nothing for the musicians. So on this, see it from this point of view, it’s a shitty development.

Metal fans are still very true to their favourite bands. They still buy physical products, but it’s getting less and less. The physical music market is shrinking everywhere. I don’t know how it is here in England, but in Germany metal is still big, but it is a much smaller market now. If you go to Japan or Korea though, no-one is buying a CD anymore.

We’ve had a little bit of a revival of vinyl though. More as a collector’s thing?

Peter “Peavy” Wagner (Vocals/Bass) – They buy this more like they would buy a t-shirt. They want to have, physically in their hands, something that brings them closer to their favourite band, but it’s not really that they want to listen to this.

I mean, there’s a few, of course, that really listen to these things because they love the feeling you get from this sound. Which I understand perfectly because I grew up with this. However, I will admit that while I do I buy the stuff from my favourite bands still, streaming is so fucking easy. So quick. You don’t even have to pull something out and put it in the machine, and you have your fucking smartphone everywhere.

There’s nothing we can do about changing it whether we like it or not. Likewise, another thing that Rage has had to experience is the rise of social media and the fact that you have to be more open with your audience on there. Is that an area that you found it easy to adapt to and to find some enjoyment in?

Peter “Peavy” Wagner (Vocals/Bass) – I’m out of this because I’m a dinosaur. I mean, I have a Facebook profile, but that is already dated as I’m not really using it. Thankfully I have nice company; Lucky and of course, Jean and that is his job basically. He is the social media expert.

Vassilios “Lucky” Maniatopoulos (Drums) – It ties to what I said earlier on. We built an infrastructure around everything. It’s booking, it’s the label side of things, it’s the management, it’s the financial controlling of the organisation, the advancing productions, everything that we take care of, and social media is one very, very important part of it.

Jean is our diamond in this band, the young diamond, who’s like an extraordinary musician, an unbelievable guitar player, a super-duper guy as a person, but also super high skilled on this social media topic, and it is a blessing to have that in your own band. He’s taking care of everything. He’s interacting, he’s creating content, he knows exactly what we have to do. He pushes the two old guys. Sometimes he’s like – come on, guys, we have to do this, it’s important. So we do, of course, because we don’t understand how to handle this, really, but Jean is guiding us through this modern world, let’s say, and we’re grateful that we have that force in the band.

(It should be noted that Jean came into the room and joined the interview during this part)

Jean Bormann (Guitars) – Thank you.

When you reflect on 2023 as a whole, are you satisfied with what you’ve been able to accomplish this year?

Peter “Peavy” Wagner (Vocals/Bass) – To be honest, 2023 was more like a kind of year in between. We worked hard on the album, we started two years ago, but this year we actually finished it. That was one of the main things we did this year.

Vassilios “Lucky” Maniatopoulos (Drums) – We had some great festivals, of course. Summer has been one of the highlights, I would think.

Peter “Peavy” Wagner (Vocals/Bass) – Summer in Slovakia.

Vassilios “Lucky” Maniatopoulos (Drums) – The show with Helloween in Slovakia was a real highlight. We had a few Tel Aviv. Yeah. First time.

The Spain tour was great. We had shows. There were the Texas shows. Yeah, we had many good things going on. Yeah, as you start to talk through it becomes more notable. However, compared to a real busy year of Rage, this was a light year, with around 30 shows. So next year we’ll do probably 80. The focus was on the album, which those two gentlemen (Peavy and Jean) did a hell of a job to bring that in order.

That kept us busy and it was exhausting, for sure, but now we finished that. We’re finishing this tour here, then back home with our families and Christmas time, of course, and all that, and then going hard for the 40th anniversary starting in fucking Canada. First time.

Peter “Peavy” Wagner (Vocals/Bass) – I love it.

This is the part of the interview where Ozzy Osbone takes over and randomised questions are asked. Including many that have been submitted by bands and artists too.

What is your favourite swear word?

Vassilios “Lucky” Maniatopoulos (Drums) – Malakas. It’s Greek and means wanker, and we use it like you would use in your language, fuck. It’s the filling word, you put it everywhere.

What is a fan base that frightens you a little bit?

Peter “Peavy” Wagner (Vocals/Bass) – Football fans. It is a world I don’t understand. I’m not into football and I don’t understand the fans.

This one comes from Chris Towning, the guitarist of the punk band Suffocate Faster. As a parent, if you do have children or if you did have children, would you give them electronics like an iPad to distract them?

Vassilios “Lucky” Maniatopoulos (Drums) – I would send them in the yard to play football, go out there and play football or do whatever, but don’t use those devices the entire day. We grew up without those. We were out there after school. We were playing football. Communicating, socialising with other kids and people. I find it sad that this is getting less and less and people isolate more into this digital world.

Probably a combination of both is healthy. They need to keep up with that technology and they need to be in the game at the same time, but we’re losing the social thing.

Peter “Peavy” Wagner (Vocals/Bass) – I would at least try to keep them away from this as long as possible. I would not just bring it to them. They will eventually want it anyway – I want to have this. all my friends have one, and so on.

Have you ever had a wardrobe malfunction on stage?

Jean Bormann (Guitars) –Shirts, guitars, strings. There are plenty of things that were just, like, fucked up during a show.

What was the last thing to make you tear up to cry?

Vassilios “Lucky” Maniatopoulos (Drums) – Waiting 30 minutes in the cold yesterday in fucking Brighton. It was worse than cutting a fucking onion. It was so unbelievable cold, that teardrops would just fall out of your eyes.