Heavy Stories Podcast

Nina Saeidi is the singer and co-founder of British progressive metal band Lowen. On episode nine of Heavy Stories, she talks about her ancestral roots in Iran and how her Middle Eastern heritage has inspired the music she makes. We discuss the country’s ongoing war with the US and Israel, which has deeply impacted many of her relatives who still live there, as well as her parents seeking asylum in the UK in 1979, how her aunt fled the country after being a political prisoner for nine years, her experiences with racism, falling in love with metal, the time someone actually died on her on the London Underground, and much more. (Image: Katja Ogrin)

Lzzy Hale is the singer, co-guitarist and co-founder of Grammy-winning and Platinum-selling US rock four-piece Halestorm. On episode seven of Heavy Stories, she talks about the band’s formation and journey up the rock’n’roll ranks, starting with their early days as a family affair featuring her brother Arejay and dad Roger. She discusses playing her first gigs in churches, why organised Christianity wasn’t right for her in the end, the tumultuous making Halestorm’s of 2009 debut album and winning a Grammy with the single Love Bites (So Do I) in 2013. She also goes deep on writing songs about sex, coming out as bi via social media, her wildest fan interactions, meeting the legendary Ronnie James Dio and her experiences as a woman in the massively male-dominated 2000s and 2010s metal scene. (Image: Jimmy Fontaine)

Zakk Wylde is the leader of biker metal rifflords Black Label Society and the longtime right-hand man of the legendary Ozzy Osbourne. On episode five of Heavy Stories, he sits down for a quick conversation midway through a Black Label US tour, where his own Black Sabbath tribute act Zakk Sabbath are serving as support. He looks back on how he got his gig in Ozzy’s band, playing a show in an infamous prison, starting Black Label, that time he and his fans drank all the alcohol in a venue, his unlikely friendship with Star Trek actor William Shatner, and lots more. (Image: Justin Reich)

Gary Holt is the guitarist of veteran California thrash metal bands Exodus and Slayer. On episode three of Heavy Stories, he talks about how his upbringing as the youngest of six children influenced him to make loud music, and looks back on learning his first guitar chords from his high school best friend and Exodus’ founder, future Metallica guitarist Kirk Hammett. He reflects on the backyard party scene that made Exodus (in)famous, the night he spent in jail aged 17, meeting late frontman Paul Baloff, becoming blood brothers with his bandmates, bootlegging his own t-shirts, kicking his meth use and much, much more. We also talk about how he joined Slayer in 2011 and what keeps him going while contemporaries such as Megadeth call it quits. (Image: Jim Louvau)

Mille Petrozza is the singer/guitarist of German thrash metal royalty Kreator. In the first episode of Heavy Stories, he talks about his youth in Cold War-era Germany, where violent gangs roamed the streets, he heard horror stories about the Berlin Wall and he tattooed himself in the back of class. He also discusses seeing Metallica on their first-ever European tour, almost joining extreme metal innovators Celtic Frost aged 18, being pen pals with Sepultura, the state of thrash during the turbulent 90s, having his music featured in hit Netflix series Dark, and much, much more. (Photo credit: Robert Eikelpoth)