Five Finger Death Punch

Catch one of just two UK shows, with Megadeth supporting.

We catch up with guitarist Zoltan Bathory as the Las Vegas-based metalheads return from a lay-off that saw frontman Ivan Moody enter rehab in a bid to save his life.

A new press release claims that 5FDP are currently the third-biggest artist in hard rock when measured by sales and streams, surpassed only by Metallica and AC/DC. When I saw that list for the first time I was shocked, but it’s now very possible to measure music’s digital footfall.

With heavyweights such as Black Sabbath and Slayer retiring, it’s great that a new tier of festival headliners is ready and waiting. Yeah, and we were given a shot by Korn, Disturbed and Slipknot, who allowed us to open for them, so we take great pride to give a helping hand of our own. We are keenly aware of the need for fresh blood, so I manage a couple of bands and we take new bands out with us.

It begs the question: how did you manage such a feat?

We did the work. We were on the road two hundred-plus days a year. This [F8] is record number eight for us and we’ve been together for fifteen years.

And yet it could all have gone badly wrong. Although Ivan Moody is now sober he seemed to be in self-destruct mode. We went through a tornado of shit. Even sober, Ivan is like the Joker. He will rob a bank just to set the money on fire. The guy doesn’t give a shit about anything. With someone like that it’s tough to make them see sense. I really thought he was going to die.

How did you make him get himself into rehab? He realised that we were serious about throwing him out, also that his actions weren’t fair. All of us had worked our asses off to get where we were – I came from a freakin’ communist country with a guitar and a bag of clothes. Ivan was throwing it away for everybody, not just himself.

And Judas Priest’s Rob Halford helped with these issues. Rob had gone through those same struggles. Jonathan Davis [from Korn] told Ivan: “You’ve got the world at your fingertips, don’t throw it away.” And it worked. Ivan has been twenty-one months sober. He’s a completely different guy.

Megadeth are your ‘special guests’ on these dates. How do you feel about that? Megadeth were my favourite band when I was growing up. There would be no Five Finger Death Punch without them – we’ve told them so and there’s a mutual respect. From the outside, people might wonder why Megadeth are supporting these kids, but Dave [Mustaine, ’deth mainman] knows we’ve done the work, and, as uncomfortable as it might be, it all comes down to numbers.

“There’d be no Five Finger Death Punch without

Megadeth.”

5F DP play Cardiff on January 30 and Wembley 31.