Herman Li from Dragonforce was interviewed by the Japanese Magazine "Geki-Rock" to talk about the live collaboration between BABYMETAL and Dragonforce at Download Festival 2015 and Metal Hammer Golden Gods Awards. Herman Li shares the inside story behind this collaboration. Read what he said below.
Herman Li of Dragonforce talks about the collaboration with BABYMETAL on Geki Rock
"At first, Metal Hammer offered BABYMETAL to play at Golden Gods, which was so sudden request that BABYMETAL couldn't afford to arrange performance with Kami Band.
We happened to be in London to prepare for Download Festival, and when asked to perform together. We accepted the original offer to play only Gimme chocolate at Golden Gods.
But I said because we made Road of Resistance with the BABYMETAL project, I felt good if we played Road of Resistance together with BABYMETAL on stage for the first time, convinced to bring something special to our and BABYMETAL's fans. Most of all, Sam and I joined all the guitar parts of Road of Resistance.
It was concluded to add BABYMETAL to a guest of Download Festival to play a song with us WITHOUT any rehearsal, and finally played Gimme Chocolate. We were scared because it was the first time to performance with BABYMETAL ever, moreover there were no rehearsals.
On the other hand, we and BABYMETAL rehearsed all the day for Golden Gods. ** **We and the BM project worked out the details; when and how for BABYMETAL girls to dance, which guitar part to go front at the stage and to play solo. That show was huge success.
In England the show was broadcasted on TV, so I hope the other fans of DragonForce and BABYMETAL watched it.
Before the lives, we made a lot of arrangements and BM staff by both meeting directly and e-mail. It was very comfortable to work with the BM project.
The responses of fans at the both shows were not so different from ours, and we felt good response. I think BABYMETAL suited our audience taste at the shows. I won't dare to say BABYMETAL is similar music tendency to us, but we both share many musical elements in common. I like BABYMETAL album and listen frequently. The album ‘BABYMETAL’ is one of my favorite albums in 2014.
Before the beginning of stage at Download, all of us felt very nervous, because BABYMETAL members had never danced to the our play. **Anyway everything went well in the end. We tried to synchronize our play to the dance of BABYMETAL girls with communication and interaction with the girls, exhibiting a feeling of unity between us and girls."
Translation by: 44444444four
