When Angela Gossow stepped down as Arch Enemy’s frontwoman in 2014, the melodic death metal pioneers’ future seemed uncertain. In a recent interview with Metal Hammer, celebrating the 10th anniversary of their pivotal War Eternal album, guitarist Michael Amott and drummer Daniel Erlandsson reflected on that turbulent time and how they almost disbanded.
“The band had kind of fallen apart a little bit,” Erlandsson candidly admitted. The news of Gossow transitioning to the band’s manager led to a critical meeting where Amott posed a stark question: “I remember us having a meeting and you [Amott] asking if we want to continue or not. Are we gonna continue? What are we gonna do?”
Ultimately, what kept the band together was the material they had already begun crafting—songs that would later define War Eternal. The album introduced Alissa White-Gluz as their new vocalist, following her departure from The Agonist, and marked a fresh chapter for the band. “We already have some sort of demos, and we took that with us into War Eternal. We worked really hard on that record,” Amott recalled. “We knew it was going to be scrutinized and analyzed, you know? It was kind of a do-or-die moment for us, I guess.”
For Amott, the shift felt daunting. Drawing comparisons to iconic acts like Iron Maiden and Black Sabbath, he noted how long it had taken for fans to embrace lineup changes in those bands. “I didn’t really have high hopes, but I didn’t realize there has been like a switch in society, where we are more accustomed to news, and yesterday’s news is more like last year’s news, people get used to new things much quicker.” he admitted.
White-Gluz’s seamless integration, coupled with the strength of the music, proved to be a winning formula. “She (Alissa) was great, the songs were great, everything was perfect in that record, I think. We did the work, we went out and played around 300 hundred shows for that album,” Amott added. The success of War Eternal even led other musicians to ask Amott how Arch Enemy had managed the transition so effectively. “I was like, ‘I don’t know,’” he laughed. “It was the right moment and the right album.”
In a 2021 interview with Metal Hammer, White-Gluz shared her perspective on joining the band. “It was all relatively simple, which sounds strange,” she said. A friend of Gossow, she recalled receiving an unexpected email from Angela:“I’d met Michael and the rest of the guys a bunch of times, although I didn’t really keep in touch with them. I was on tour with Kamelot at that point, and we were in South Korea when I got an email from Angela that said, ‘Can you jump on the phone with Michael real quick?’”
Now, with three successful albums featuring White-Gluz under their belt, Arch Enemy is gearing up for their fourth, Blood Dynasty, set to release on March 28 via Century Media.
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