The latest album from long-running German party thrashers Tankard is A Girl Called Cerveza. The band has been around since the early '80s and has released more than 15 studio albums along with live albums, EPs and DVDs. The band's vocalist, Andreas “Gerre” Geremia fills us in on the band's latest effort.

Chad Bowar: Was your songwriting and recording process for A Girl Called Cerveza similar to previous albums, or were there any new twists this time?
Gerre: No, it was very similar to the last album Vol(l)ume 14. Our guitar player Andy wrote all the songs and I did the melody lines.

He always gives me a CD with the different guitar parts for each song and I try to work out some vocals for the different parts. Later on we meet in his little studio and try to create the song. As we started too late with songwriting as always, we had a lot of time pressure just before entering the studio. But I think Tankard is a band who needs this kind of time pressure to write good songs.

What inspired the album title?
This was an idea of our bass player Frank back in 2007 when we visited South America for the first time. He just spoke that kind of nonsense and our manager Buffo kept this in his mind. When we were sitting together talking about the next album title he remembered that and everybody was thinking that this should be a great album title really fits Tankard.

How was the video shoot for “A Girl Called Cerveza”?
We shoot the video here in our hometown city of Frankfurt and also visited our local brewery. It was very hard to found a girl called Cerveza, but finally we found her.

(laughs) We really had a lot of fun, especially partying together with the transgender, this was our date that day, filming in a pub. Everybody was really drunk at the end of that day. I think this video clip really fits Tankard as it contains a lot of humor!

How did you come to sign with Nuclear Blast Records?
The record contract with AFM Records was over and we had different offers to go on. The A&R at Nuclear Blast named Andy Siry is a big Tankard fan since the eighties and asked us to join the Nuclear Blast family. So we met with him and he really convinced us, so we signed with Nuclear Blast.

Does being on a bigger label increase your expectations for this album?
They do a very good job and a lot of promotion stuff, so I think this could be really a step forward for Tankard!

What has the early response to the album been like?
Most of the reactions were quite good and positive, so we are really looking forward what our fans think about the new album. We are really satisfied with the result, especially the sound. Everything is still transparent as on Vol(l)ume 14 but the guitars are much heavier than on the last album. So I think we really found the sound Tankard has to have these days.

What have been the highlights of your summer festival season this year?
We played already the Rock Hard and Bang Your Head Festivals. These two shows were really great and a big success. The next weeks we are going to play at the Headbangers Open Air, Party. San Festival and Summerbreeze.

What are your upcoming tour plans?
After the festival season we are going to play as often as we can all over Europe and next January we are going back to South America. As we all have regular jobs we are not able to play full tours over months, but we try to spend every free minute with band activities.

Any chance of a North American tour?
We really would love to come, maybe not for a whole tour, but for several shows. That would be awesome!

How difficult is it to put together a set list with such an extensive back catalog?
Very difficult. We always have a lot of discussions, especially when we are not able to play a full show, like at festivals. We always try to do a good mixture of old and new stuff, but sometimes it’s very hard to kick out songs, because some classic songs we really have to play.

What have been the high and low points for Tankard in your 30 years as a band?
High points were all the shows we played in foreign countries, especially South America, Japan, Thailand etc. Low points were the time in the middle of the nineties when thrash was really down and we had fewer shows and nobody was really interested in the band. But we always had fun playing that kind of music and never gave up. We are a little bit proud to be there for 30 years without a break or changing our style.

Are there any albums you think were underrated or underappreciated at the time of their release, but in retrospect have really held up well?
Nobody really liked The Tankard (1995), but I think it’s still one of the strongest Tankard albums, except the cover of course. We are starting to play songs from that album live again.

The music industry has obviously changed dramatically in the past 30 years. Where do you see it gong from here?
I hope that the CD and vinyl as formats will survive, because I am a big collector and love to hold a cover and a booklet in my hands while listening to music. Because of illegal downloading I’m afraid that sales will still go down and the prices for CD will go up. But I really can’t imagine listen to music just by downloads.

Who are your top 5 German heavy metal bands of all time?
Kreator, Perzonal War, Deathrow, Doro and Sodom.

There has been a thrash revival the past few years with a lot of new bands playing in the genre. Any of them catch your ear?
Yes. I really like Suicide Angels, Fueled By Fire, Bonded By Blood and Warbringer.

Anything else you’d like to mention or promote?
There will be a limited edition of our new CD containing a DVD with the new video clip, a bootleg film of our appearance at the 70,000 Tons of Metal cruise and an interview. Thanks for your support and keep on thrashing!