“I felt like I’d expressed everything I had inside me and nothing was left. After 20 years I thought, ‘Man, maybe I’m done’”: How Eddie Van Halen inspired Todd Jones to pick Nails up off the canvas for a face-ripping comeback album

Like many artists, Oxnard, California-based hardcore metal outfit Nails were creatively blocked as the Covid pandemic ravaged the world. However, frontman Todd Jones can’t blame the virus for stifling his creativity. His songwriting tank was already empty after the band released its third album, You Will Never Be One of Us, in 2016.

“I felt like I’d expressed everything I had inside me and nothing was left,” he says. “After 20 years I thought, ‘Man, maybe I’m done.’”

Jones tried to spark his creativity by listening to music far outside the band’s oeuvre: artists from the British Invasion, ’70s classic rock, ’80s pop... It was no use. “Whenever I picked up a guitar, nothing sounded good. I couldn’t get excited enough to make any more Nails music.”

Jones’ bandmates weren’t exactly supportive of their frontman’s crisis, and in 2019, guitarist Leon del Muerte quit. Then bassist John Gianelli and drummer Taylor Young left, leaving Jones the only original member.

NAILS - Every Bridge Burning (OFFICIAL FULL ALBUM STREAM) - YouTube

Watch On

Determined to continue Nails with new musicians and push through his writer’s block, Jones kept listening to music he enjoyed in his youth, convinced that something would open the floodgates. It worked.

“I was listening to a ton of early Van Halen, and I felt so inspired by Eddie’s playing,” Jones says. “I started learning a lot of those licks, and that got me excited about playing guitar and making a new Nails record.”

The fourth Nails record, Every Bridge Burning, won’t remind anyone of Van Halen, but it is tighter and more structured than the band’s earlier albums, offering 10 songs of rapid-fire riffing and palm-muted crunch in a concise 17 minutes, 44 seconds (their second-longest record).

“There’s not a lot of times when we let things ring out,” Jones says. “It’s more of a closed fist to the face as opposed to an open slap.”

While losing his bandmates was initially unsettling for Jones, it turned out to be a blessing in disguise. The new members – Guitarist Shelby Lermo (Ulthar), bassist Andrew Solis (Apparition) and drummer Carlos Cruz (Warbringer) – attack their instruments with precision and rage, and they helped shape the songs.

“I was never much for jamming,” Jones says. “But playing with Carlos and Shelby, we were able to work out parts together, and I think the record benefits from that.”

• Every Bridge Burning is out now via Nuclear Blast.