Tankard – Andreas “Gerre” Geremia

Tankard are a band that have done things their own way and their front man, Andreas “Gerre” Geremia, is a front man and vocalist unlike many others. Seventeen albums and numerous other releases pay tribute to the bands endurance and popularity among the beer soaked legion of the thrash metal hordes since Zombie Attack launched the bands career in 1986. 31 years later, Tankard releases a brand new album to promote, the blistering One Foot in the Grave, out now through Nuclear Blast.

“I have a little bit of a hang over from yesterday”

The opening stanzas of our chat lived up to the cliché of expectation. Gerre knows how to have fun, and we both have a chuckle before launching into a series of questions about the bands career and One Foot in the Grave.

The most pressing question I sought an answer to relates to Tankards famous sense of humour. Gerre offers the following commentary.

“This is really the most important thing in the band that we have kind of a combination, mixture of a lot of humor and thrash metal. We don’t take ourselves too seriously, although we have a lot of serious lyrics over all these years, but we still have fun.”

Given the band members genial nature, cartoonish album covers (Gerre- “I think the new cover should be on the list of the top five Tankard covers. It was my idea to bring back the alien”) and the fact the bands name is dedicated to a drinking vessel almost exclusively associated with amber nectar, it masks what has been happening for years: Tankard offer many songs with both titles and lyrics addressing global social and political issues. How much of the current global political climate has affected the music on One Foot in the Grave?

“A lot of journalists ask me (if) Tankard is getting really serious on the new album. I think we did this kind of mixture; the last 20 years always had furious lyrics. We still have a lot of humour and fun but we don’t walk around with blind eyes and so we have some really political songs on this album like Syrian Nightmare. Syrian Nightmare was the first song we had written for the album. The idea behind that is so many countries are involved in this war and there are so many interests. Everybody is watching how normal people really suffer from this war, looking and talking so much, but nobody is doing anything. So that is the theme with Syrian Nightmare.”

Gerre then moves onto some commentary around an album cut that addresses the most recent Presidential elections in the USA.

“We have a song Lock`Em Up! That was my idea when I saw Mr Trump before the elections in the United States. When they were talking about Hillary Clinton and all those supporters they just yell, ‘Lock her up, lock her up’ and so this is a song about that, lock them all up if they do not have the same opinion like me lock them up. So, this is another very critical song.”

It seems the new album is immersed in a political narrative that will demarcate FY17 from all others.

“We have Arena of The True Lies. This is about fake news, everybody’s talking about other people on the Internet and spreading lies and there are still a lot of people who believe those lies, this is a song about how nobody is talking face to face anymore. Talking face to face is retro…”

Rest assured, the album still contains Gerre’s famous sense of humour.

“…but of course, we still have some fun songs on the album like Sole Grinder. This is a funny song about our manager. After 35 years, we had to do a song about him. He is a nice guy, sometimes he is a little bit choleric and so we did a funny song of him. So, I think still a good mixture but all the people think that we now got really serious, but I think we didn’t change so much. It’s still a mixture of serious and funny lyrics. “

Will Tankard will ever be included alongside Rage Against The Machine or even Napalm Death as bands that offer meaningful social commentary? Time will tell!

Our awareness of the world is vastly different in 2017 than it was in 1986. Tankard has endured all sorts of changes and musical trends, so I ask if it is Gerre’s intention for the band and himself to be performing and releasing albums in 10 years time?

“This is very difficult question. We think now we are going to have a 35th birthday this year and this is somehow like a break, you know One Foot in the Grave. Maybe the next album we are going to call One Foot Out of the Grave We are Back Again (Laughs). So, I can’t really tell you what is going on in 10 years, but to be honest I could not imagine my life without playing in Tankard. So, I guess we are still there, getting older and older and a lot of pain in the back and in the knees but still we keep on going. I’m still going on stages, still playing thrash metal.

Long may Gerre and Tankard continue to create and perform thrash metal. With an album as strong as One Foot in the Grave, fingers crossed the band find the opportunity to bring their show to Australia.

“We did a little tour three years ago, it was in 2014. We played Brisbane, Melbourne and Sydney and that was the very first time we have been to Australia. You have a very strong metal community. Not so many fans but you have a strong community and we had really a lot of fun. I was staying there for one week longer because of the long trip. I visited some friends of my parents in Sydney and I was there for one week longer. But the flight is too long. But we had really a good time, it was really amazing and hopefully we are able to come back one day”

One Foot in the Grave is out now through Nuclear Blast Records.

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