INTERVIEW: Chris Caffery, of Savatage fame, is having a year like no other
There’s busy, and then there’s Chris Caffery busy. The famous guitarist for the legendary band Savatage, who also is an instrumental part of Trans-Siberian Orchestra, is having quite the year. His old band has reunited, and they recently played Europe and South America, with hopefully North America on the horizon. Plus, he’s honoring his solo career with a new retrospective album called 20 Years of the Music Man, out now from Metalville.
“There’s so much going on right now in my life,” Caffery said in a recent Zoom interview. “There are a lot of things that as you get older you encounter with family members and age and health, so there’s a lot of huge ups and downs that I’ve been facing recently. But having Savatage back is kind of like putting this anchor in the middle of everything that’s really making me be able to focus, and stay healthy and happy amidst some of the craziest things that I’ve had to deal with that happen with life, so it’s a really good time, even though not everything is perfect.”
Caffery admitted that he’s been waiting a long time for Savatage to get back together again. In fact, his solo career was essentially a response to the band no longer playing live or recording albums. He needed an outlet for his creativity, so he has been releasing songs and albums for two decades. Some of those records include W.A.R.P.E.D., Pins and Needles, and House of Insanity.
“I’m in a really good place now because I’ve been waiting for so long for this Savatage thing to happen, and now I have this record coming out,” he said. “People make a comment about it’s not exactly 20 years since my first record came out, but then I tell them, ‘Well, it is from the time the first song was recorded until the last one was.’ It was 20 years of music, so that’s the way that it worked. I’m happy to have this come out.”
The guitarist had made the decision a few years back to stop releasing full albums; his last one was 2018’s The Jester Court. Instead, he was happy with the occasional single that would be unleashed on his metal and rock fandoms. In fact, he remembers one tune from last year that proved to be important for this new 20th anniversary project.
“I wrote the song ‘Do You See What I See Now,’ and I had the idea of getting Jeff Scott Soto to sing with me on it,” Caffery said. “When COVID had happened, Trans-Siberian Orchestra was doing a Pay-Per-View, and we rehearsed down in Nashville. And during that rehearsal, one day Jeff had asked me, ‘How come you never have me sing on your solo records?’ Well, first of all, I sing on my solo records. I didn’t really look for vocalists, but it got stuck into my head.”
When “Do You See What I See Now” came about, Caffery thought it was a perfect opportunity for both of them to sing together. The tune features two characters. One is a human who is calling out certain world leaders who convince their constituents to do what the leader wants. Meanwhile the chorus features the Devil singing about controlling everything.
“I should get Jeff to do this because he had sung the role of Mephistopheles on our Beethoven’s Last Night tour,” he said. “So I got a hold of Jeff, and that was finished.”
That new song is now featured on 20 Years of the Music Man, along with tunes like “The Jester’s Court,” “May Day,” “Seasons Change” and “Abandoned.” In total there are 21 songs spread across two LPs.
“I contacted Holger [Koch] from Metaville,” he said. “And I said, ‘Well, do you think it’ll be possible for me to do a 20th anniversary of that record [W.A.R.P.E.D.] and go back to the original title of the album, which was God Damn War?’ That’s what I wanted to call it, but because of TSO’s more religious audiences, I figured it would be smarter not to show up at those shows and signing sessions and have people walking down a signing line with a record that said God Damn War on it next to somebody’s grandmother.”
Metalville was not only into the idea, but the company was open to new songs as well; this wouldn’t be a strict retrospective of the past 20 years. “Well, let me see what songs I haven’t released, and I put some things together,” Caffery said. “I was like, well, these songs aren’t really making a good picture of anything I would want to put out as a record, so maybe I can add in a couple songs from my records and kind of fill in the puzzle pieces a little bit.”
Eventually Caffery came to the idea of two LPs: one focused on heavy metal music, and the other focused on acoustic and rock. Metalville was interested in that premise.
“I had to go through my albums and figure out the best way to represent those 20 years,” he said. “I had a few spaces to fill here and there. There were songs that I thought could still have a life now and that being ‘Music Man’ itself, and ‘Pisses Me Off’ I think has a lot of legs. … People were like, ‘Why don’t you record a new one of that?’ And I balked on that because everybody is so on edge about everything everybody says now, so the last thing I wanted to do was write a new song about what’s pissing me off now because all that would do was make some people laugh, but make some people angry.”
Caffery added: “I just went with the old ‘Pisses Me Off,’ which is a fun song as it is. I mean, there could be some things in that that would anger people, but the fact that it was 20 years ago, it’s not like people are going to latch on to you about that the same way. They know I have the song, and it rolls around better that way. I just wanted to have a good representation of what it was that I had done in those years when I was waiting for Savatage to play.”
For now, this double album is a sort of goodbye to his solo work because his focus is fully on working with Zak Stevens, Al Pitrelli, Johnny Lee Middleton and Jeff Plate in Savatage.
“I’m not really looking to do anything but Savatage,” the guitarist said. “That void is filled right now, so I did my solo records to basically be keeping my creative side and musical side busy while I was waiting like the fans for my band to come back again. Now that my band is back again, I’m really happy with that.”
By John Soltes / Publisher / John@HollywoodSoapbox.com
Chris Cafferty’s new album is 20 Years of the Music Man, out now from Metalville. Click here for more information.
