Killswitch Engage’s Adam D. is Not a Fan of Album Anniversary Tours

After several years of album anniversary tours being all the rage, the trend has seen some pushback lately with members of Soilwork and The Acacia Strain voicing their distaste for the nostalgia-driven, yet admittedly lucrative, fad.

Killswitch Engage guitarist/mastermind Adam D. has now added his opinion to the discussion, echoing the sentiments expressed by Björn “Speed” Strid and Vincent Bennett that neglecting to promote new music in favor of a trip back in time is not necessarily in a band’s long-term best interests.

Mr. Dutkiewicz recently spoke to Kerrang! about the 15th anniversary of The End of Heartache and addressed why the band won’t be playing it in full all over the country for an anniversary tour:

“We’re in the middle of trying to set up the new record. It’s funny, our bassist, Mike [D’Antonio], was like ‘Hey, should we be thinking about doing a 15th anniversary tour for this record?’ and I was like ‘No! We should be thinking about this new record!’”

“We shouldn’t live in the past, y’know? I feel like there’s been too much of that recently. Maybe more people should focus on writing more material, and not just trying to rehash stuff, y’know? There’s just too much of that!

“I’m happy that everyone agreed with me that it wasn’t a good idea, especially because we literally just finished our new record. So we have things to worry about.”

I’m inclined to agree with Adam: even though I can very much enjoy an anniversary tour when the time is right, it’s ultimately way more productive for bands to focus on new music than it is to congratulate themselves on their past successes. On the other hand, the above quote is coming from an extremely talented musician who has chosen to “rehash” (his word, not mine) the same format over and over again instead of branching out and trying new things (despite clearly being capable). On the OTHER other hand, Killswitch Engage have a new album slated for this coming fall, so the jury is still out! Here’s to hoping. At the very least I’m glad his head is in the right place.

You can catch Killswitch on tour with Clutch this summer. Dates here.