Robert Vigna Interview

Chad Bowar: What are your upcoming tour plans?
Robert Vigna: We have some European fests and one-offs confirmed at the end of April/early May. There is a slight possibility that we might be out in May/June in the U.S., then we plan to play as many of the Open Air fests in Europe as we can over the summer. After that we will do two full headline tours in the fall, both in the U.S. and Europe. So we plan to be as busy as possible both this year and in 2011.
Where haven't you played live that you'd still like to get to?
Japan, Australia, Brazil/South America, Iceland, Greece, should I keep going?

There are quite a few places, so we are looking into all this as well, so prepare to be seeing and hearing a lot of Immolation in the live scene!

With so many albums under your belt, is it difficult to put together a set list?
Extremely difficult, especially on this late tour we did. We only got a half hour each night. With 8 albums and 1 EP, picking the set list was a miserable task! We did about 7 songs a night, and chose what we thought would work. We like to change it up from tour to tour too, so we are not playing the same songs every time we go out. It’s tough, I can tell you. But hopefully when we do our headline runs, we should be able to get some good stuff from each album in the set.

How does life on the road today compare to when you started?
It’s not too much different. We are much more experienced now,..so you know what to expect and I think that really helps. We’ve got out (crap) together much more now, and we learn to deal with all sorts of situations, good and bad. But it’s always an experience each time, and I think it gets better each time.

We still get excited to go out, especially when it comes to playing in Europe as well as getting to see other places we have never been. We love it. We like getting out there and playing the music, meeting the people, seeing and making new friends. There is nothing else like it and it is a priceless experience to this day.

How did you get started in music?
When I was younger I liked music a lot, then slowly got into some of the hard rock stuff like Van Halen, AC/DC, Black Sabbath, etc. But it wasn’t until some friends of my family asked me if I wanted to go see a concert one day that it really hit me. They said Ronnie James Dio was coming to town, and asked if I wanted to go with them. I said yes and it was all downhill from there!

The experience of the whole show was awesome. Plus, they got me into some of the underground stuff too, and it really opened my eyes to the music, and with that experience of the live show, I was hooked. I wanted to learn, I wanted to play, I wanted to tour. And I guess I ended up doing so after all. We may not be superstars, but the music, the touring, the traveling, the places we’ve seen and especially the friends we’ve made, it is all priceless and it’s all because of metal.

Who are some fellow guitarists you admire?
In this scene today there are some really great musicians out there. A few that come to mind are Moyses from Krisiun, Dallas and Karl from Nile, Eric Rutan is a great player, Ralph and Jack Owen from Deicide. There are quite a few and I’m forgetting a bunch, but these are a few that came to mind. They are all great musicians and players. I’ve seen all these guys up close and how they can play all different kinds of stuff, I think they are all excellent at what they do.

What was your first band?
Rigor Mortis (NY). We put out a couple of demos starting in '86. It was death metal, just a more basic form of what we do today. It was the beginning stages, but I can still listen to those demos today and enjoy them. They had a real cool vibe and style that I think still holds up even today. There is a MySpace page that the bassist/vocalist Andrew has, it’s worth a look!

How did Immolation form?
Once Rigor Mortis broke up in early '88, myself and then guitarist Tom Wilkinson formed Immolation. We had known Ross, as we hung out with him and the other Yonkers metal militia back in those days., and asked him to join. And my friend Neal Boback, from my neighborhood, was on drums. We did a couple of demos in '88 and '89 and got involved in the whole demo swapping and selling thing. Before we knew it we had demo cassettes flying around all over the world and two contracts in the mailbox, one from Earache and one from Roadrunner.

Describe the band's very first live show.
We did our first show as Immolation at a small place called Blondies in Nyack , NY with Revenant (John McEntee’s original band, now Incantation) and Ripping Corpse, both from New Jersey. I think there was a local band called Deranged as well. It was a fun show, and our first time really getting know all those guys. We played a few originals and some covers. I know we definitely played “Chapel of Ghouls” from Morbid Angel. We were sloppy and horrible, but we were metal as hell! It was also great to see more of the scene. With Rigor Mortis we only played the same local NY club Streets like 4 times. With Immolation we started playing different states and getting out there much more. But that first show was quite an experience, a very cool time.