Gotthard have just hit the road in support of their new album 'Human Zoo'. I caught up with bassist Marc Lynn early on a Sunday morning following a show in Italy the night before and found him in surprisingly chatty humour..

So Marc, you're up and about early this morning. No late night after show party then?

Well, a little bit, but nothing too heavy. We are in the middle of a tour so we all try to take things easy. It's a lot of work doing six shows a week. We put a lot of energy into our live show, so we try to stay in shape.

The new album 'Human Zoo' is more of a return to the Gotthard sound of the first three albums. Was that an intentional move on the part of the band?

Well we decided to make a little bit of a heavier album this time around because all the success we have had recently has been with the lighter material such as the ballads, and people who have started listening to us lately don't know much about our past. Anybody who has seen us on TV or heard us on radio called us a ballads band. We wanted to go back to our roots and basically say, well we are a rock band. This time we have some really good rock songs on the album and the ballads are more …well, power ballads really.

You mentioned that people associate you with being a ballad band. Did that upset you in any way considering Gotthard were always a bona fide hard rock band?

Not upset, but we are a rock band and rock bands always wrote the best ballads. We are very proud of the ballads but what people didn't hear were the rock songs, so this time we have a harder edge on the album. We just want to let people know that we can rock too. What we would like to do is introduce the people who would normally listen to our ballads to the rock side of the band.

The lead single 'What I Like' was released a while back in Europe. I believe it did very well for you?

It's a strange situation right now. We feel that we don't get the support we should get in certain territories, that is why the single was only released in Switzerland and Germany. We did really well at radio, which is very important because it can introduce you to an entire new audience. The album went in at number eighteen in Germany and we have been four weeks at number one in Switzerland.

Why do you think that Gotthard have not only been able to survive in the current musical climate but continue to increase your popularity and increase you album sales with every release?

We have a lot of spirit. We have been together for over ten years with the same line up. I think the fans can appreciate that we are a real band which is very strange in this day and age. Also I think we have improved with every album we have done. Another big thing for us is the live show, we are a very good live band and when people come to the show they go away happy knowing that we can do live everything we do on record.

With the success you are having it now seems that Gotthard are not only leading the way, but you are opening up the market for other rock bands as well?

That's right, but we are playing new places also: Sweden, Russia and even Japan. I think it is a combination of hard work and a good band that open up these opportunities for us. If we can help open the door for other good rock bands along the way then that is good too.

You parted company with Chris Von Rohr, your long time producer, which came as a surprise to many fans as you always appeared to have a good working relationship with him. This time around you have used Marc Tanner who amongst others has produced American Hi Fi and Nelson. Why the change after so long? Had things become stale?

I think we lost the magic. Chris was happy to continue to work on the same things, the same formula if you like. We said we don't just want to be released in Germany and Switzerland, we want to go further but he didn't agree. Our last album 'Homerun' he only produced fifty percent of it. I think after 'Open' we had started to lose the magic a bit. We have written so many great songs together, we have had a lot of success and great times. We didn't split on bad terms, we are still friendly but we just wanted to do something new. Marc Tanner is one of the top producers out there today. He was the first one to come to Switzerland to see us. We went out to dinner and then the next day into the studio. He was willing to come to our studio in Lugano and work with us - it was new to him and we wanted to try something new, so I think we suited each other. He is a singer, songwriter, guitarist and producer. He is a very positive guy - he offers you a lot of options. When he came we had about twenty five songs written which is unusual for us. Previously when we worked with Chris we went in with eleven and recorded them and that was that. Marc was able to give us his input into the new material which helped us decide what would make the final cut. There are also some different arrangements on some songs such as intros and endings which we have never done before. It's like a new world for us.

We discussed earlier the success you have had with the newer material, but for older fans such as myself it has been said 'Great, Gotthard are back to being a hard rock band again!' Did you at any stage come under pressure from BMG to continue writing and releasing the 'softer' material that has helped you sell a lot of records?

They pretty much left us do what we wanted. We have been with the same label BMG/Ariola Switzerland for a long time and they have worked hard for us but they did want to hear some demos. We played them twenty five demos and when they heard them they just said 'Fantastic, go ahead.' We have confidence in each other - they know we want to give them the best quality album we can, they have always been supportive of us and they never try to tell us what to do. This is our last contracted album for them so maybe the pressure is on them a little to show us what they can do for us. To tell the truth, the band is not happy with BMG except in a few countries. We cannot get a release worldwide, only in Germany and Switzerland, Japan too. So we said to them this is your last chance to show us that you believe in us and to really get behind us. There are a lot of other companies out there who would like to have us on their label.

I remember the Bonfire guys saying the same, that they were only being released in certain countries

Yes, it's a problem. I remember with the four first albums we supported Magnum in the UK for two weeks. After about a week a record company guy met us and said 'Ooh sorry, I was on holiday and forgot about you.' He put up a poster or two and that was it. I mean, come on! But you have to work with what you've got, so we have decided to finish out our contract and then see what we will do.

If you don't re-sign with BMG, realistically it looks like you may have to sign with one of the larger 'indie' labels, perhaps say Sanctuary. Would it bother you that you would no longer be on a major?

It would affect us. It's a catch twenty two. They may not have the same resources as a major, but if you are a top band for them selling a lot of records, they will spend more time working with you, come up with good marketing ideas etc. Sometimes it's best to be a big fish in a small pond rather than a small fish in a big one. I don't really like the business side of it, as musicians all we want to do is make an even better album next time.

I think it may be hard to top this one

Oh, I think we can still do better. We have a new producer who is also a songwriter. That means we have a new song writing team so things are looking really good for the future.

A comment was passed on the internet that you have, with this album, outdone Bon Jovi. Were you aware of that?

No, but I'll take it as a compliment. We toured with them in Switzerland last year. We were in the great position of not wanting to play but they needed us to help fill the stadium, so we said well okay, but you have to give us the other two shows also. We also supported AC/DC in Turin, so we had to dig out all the old stuff. It was great rocking like the old times. That doesn't mean to say we want to take a step back. We want to go forward, maybe 'Human Zoo' is taking the best elements of all our albums and making one great record.

One thing I noticed watching your DVD was that in the front rows of the live shows you have a lot of teenagers and some even younger. That is a strange occurrence for a band that has been around for in excess of ten years. It means you are doing something right?

I think so. Young people don't know rock and roll, not the way people of our age do. The Beatles have just had a number one album because a lot of kids are just discovering them for the first time. They don't know Deep Purple or Jimi Hendrix. It's not their fault, they weren't born. They are now discovering good music. At the show we recorded for the DVD the youngest we had was four years old and the oldest was eighty eight! Every time we play now there are so many kids - last night was packed with kids. I think they are discovering it for themselves - they have to, MTV certainly isn't responsible for it. Back in the eighties when rock was huge it died because there was too much of it, over saturation, and I think that's what's happening now so they are looking for something different. They are tired of these TV shows like 'Search for a Star' or whatever - they find a talent and make them a star for eighteen months and then they are forgotten about. That's not selling music, that's selling emotion. I hope the kids raise their hands and say 'No more!' There is lots of great music out there, just give me a little bit of everything.

You are currently in the middle of another large tour but you keep forgetting England. There's the awkward question for you

This will be a really long tour. We will be in Germany, Switzerland, Italy first. Then we go to Russia for the first time. We are also waiting for a reply regarding the possibilities of doing some shows in Canada, Australia and the USA. We have a new manager over there - he was Sammy Hagar's old manager and even worked for Van Halen, so we are hoping something will happen. Perhaps we can even get back to England again, but we have to take it one step at a time.

You have been in England before but for some reason it has been forgotten

Yes, but it doesn't make sense to tour if the album isn't available - it's also about surviving, not losing money and selling records. We know playing live is our best promotion but we can't do it and lose a lot of money. We sold about 450,000 of Homerun worldwide, we can play 5000 to 8000 seat halls in Switzerland and can 2000 to 5000 in Germany but anywhere else we're not sure about and neither are the promoters, and that's the problem. We may have to take a chance by playing other places but so far we're not sure.

Is there anything you would like to pass on to our readers, especially those that may not have had the opportunity to see you live for a long time or in fact never have had the opportunity?

Please be patient. We will try to get over so you will have the chance to see our live show and enjoy the albums, and not at import prices. I can promise we will do everything we can to come to England. After Germany in Europe there's England and then America. These are the three biggest countries in the music world, you have to play there. England is where a lot of my favourite bands came from, and the other guys too - so much good music through the years, we'd be crazy not to come…