Richmond area residents and international touring act Lamb of God have once again earned themselves a Grammy Nomination. This time the band has been nominated for Best Metal Performance for the track “In Your Words” from the album Wrath. The band’s newest project, Hourglass, is a collection of classic Lamb of God songs along with various collectable items and packaging options. I recently caught up with drummer Chris Adler in Carytown to discuss the new record and their upcoming South American tour.

RC: I understand you guys are off to South America, Mexico and Australia?
LG: “Yeah we are going to finish up this last touring cycle in Australia and New Zealand with our new buddies in Metallica, and we are doing South America on our own for the first time, which should be a lot of fun.”

RC: Are there any countries that you have not gotten to that you would like to play?
LG: “Wow that is tough, because in the last six or eight months we have done some pretty crazy parts of the world - places I didn’t even know existed. We have not done anything on the continent of Africa. We have had several opportunities to play South Africa, but the timing was just off travel wise. That is definitely one place I still would like to get to.”

RC: How has Hourglass been selling so far?
LG: “It has been doing really well. I think The Mayhem Festival really helped with that. It was kind of the reason why we did it anyway. The record company came to us and said now that we had six or seven albums out, perhaps we should do a greatest hits record. Everybody in the band was like ‘absolutely not.” Then we realized that we are right in the middle of recording cycles, the last record came out about two years ago, and it will be another year before we are done recording and have the next one ready to go. We had gone into The Mayhem Festival hoping to steal some fans, so if we had a new product to offer that kind of contained, on a simple level, the songs that have made a difference for us in a live setting, if we did end up stealing any fans on this tour they could pick that up. They would not have to decide which of the six or seven albums to pick up. If they like that fine, and if not they could throw it away. That was kind of the idea with the simple package. Then we realized that for the older fans or the fans that have been with us for a while this basically looked like a greatest hits package, and we needed to make something special for them as well. We tried to come up with different ideas, and I think we have hopefully found a way that has something in it for everyone.

RC: Did you ever imagine you would be releasing records almost 15 years later?
LG: “No, man. I never imagined we would ever make one. This was kind of a way for us to get together, have some fun, find some beers, maybe travel around and have some laughs. In the end I think we have maintained a lot of that which has enabled us to keep doing that…but no I never imagined this would be an actual career. This is too much fun.”

RC: Any closing words at all?
LG: “Thanks for wanting to chat. Thanks to the fans that have been supporting us. We never thought we would be around this long and it is all because of them. We will try and keep up the quality of the metal.”