Interview with Thirty Seconds to Mars June 2010 on musicstage

Tomo Miličević, Jared and Shannon Leto from Thirty Seconds to Mars are back in Sweden for the second time this year to continue promoting their latest album This is War.
Musicstage.se caught up with the guys at the Swedish radio station Bandit Rock’s studio in Gothenburg before their gig at the Pier Pressure festival to have a little chit chat about festivals and the ongoing tour.

Welcome back to Sweden! Are you only doing festivals during the European summer?
- We have a couple of headlining dates in between. ’Cause you know, festivals are during the weekend, says Tomo.
Jared: We did Leipzig, Dortmund and Frankfurt.
Tomo continues: …we’ll be in Bielefeld in a couple of days.

So, how was the Download Festival? [The second biggest festival in the UK]
Shannon: Download was amazing! It was very, very crowded. I don’t think any more people could have stood in front of us.
Tomo: Yeah, Download was great, Rock am Ring was great, Rock im Park was great. All the festivals that we’ve been playing so far have been great. Provinssirock in Finland, Caribana in Switzerland.
- Caribana, a little hobbitville. They’ve all been really, really fun, says Shannon.

I saw you supporting Linkin Park a few years ago. I also saw you back in February headlining your own show, and I’ll be seeing you at the Pier Pressure festival tonight.
What kind of shows do you prefer playing?
- Nothing beats a headlining show really, Jared almost whispers. But they are all cool though.
Shannon: Yeah, opening is fun but headlining’s the ultimate. It’s your show, you get to do basically what you want, you know.

You are touring pretty intensely right now, how does the band’s future look like?
Tomo: Basically right now, we’re really not thinking about new stuff so much ‘cause we’re touring for This is war, and focusing on promoting that record but I know that during soundchecks there are some melodies and some stuff starting to appear again now, so we’ll see what happens. But right now it’s all about This is war. We’re touring for the rest of this year, and we already have shows booked into 2011, so we’re not done with this anytime soon.
Jared: We’ve been touring for seven months, and we have July-December... another six months, so that’s thirteen months straight.
Tomo: We’ve had maybe a total of three weeks off. Including Christmas break.

… so when you’re touring, you are really focusing on the tour. You are not thinking about new stuff...
Tomo: Not at the moment. I mean, at some point Jared will start fiddling with some new ideas.

Do you (Jared) write all the songs?
- Yes, pretty much. Shannon wrote a song on the last record that was very nice called L490.
Shannon: If you are an artist you never stop creating. You’re always creating. I’m always banging drums. Always. There is always something.

What’s the next leg of the tour, Asia, South America?
Tomo: Everywhere that will have us.
Jared: We’re going to Australia, Asia, Russia...

Do you find the time to listen to other bands?
- It’s funny, for some reason lately I haven’t been listening to very much at all.
It’s weird ‘cause I usually listen to everything, Tomo laughs.
- I listened to M83 last night. It’s really good. Some other bands I keep meaning to listen to, like Phoenix, Fever Ray, says Jared while yawning.
Shannon: I was listening to The XX yesterday. It’s interesting.
The new Crystal Castles record is really, really cool. And La Roux! I like La Roux, how funny is that! says Tomo and laughs again.

Final question, what can we expect for tonight’s show?
Shannon: You know, we don’t know!
Tomo: It’s very spontaneous for us. We just go up on stage and whatever happens happens.

…'cause I was looking at some previous setlists and I noticed that you’ve played a cover of Lady Gaga's Bad romance...?
- Uh oh! says Shannon with a smile.
Jared: We did it for Radio 1 in London. So it’s kind of something different.
Shannon: Tonight can be really exciting. Very spontaneous. Lots of energy. There will be a surprise tonight as well. Huge. The most amazing. Ever.
Tomo: it will be the most profound thing anyone in this country has ever seen. Or heard.
- Tonight. Here, says Shannon and looks like he really means it.

Thirty Seconds to Mars was actually coming back for the third time this year to play the Hultsfred festival tonight. Unfortunately the festival got cancelled.


You can see pictures from the show here.


credit : musicstage