You are one loud guitarist, Matt.
I’ve actually got the volume a little more under control on this album. I can do some weird, interesting things by standing in different places in the room and coaxing different kinds of feedback. But, yeah, the album is still really, really loud. Everybody who listens to it will get punished.

But under all the volume, I can hear some unconventional melodies.
I never try to consciously grab someone else’s thing, because I want to play stuff that sounds unique. I’ve always loved Tony Iommi and Jimi Hendrix, and I typically just take metal riffs and mutate them by extending the intervals, or changing up the rhythms. I kind of just play things over and over until something interesting develops. But what you’re hearing may be the influence of guys such as John McLaughlin and Wes Montgomery. I’m also way into Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony. Beethoven was a master of the art of building tension and release. I also studied jazz and music theory at community college. I didn’t understand improvisation at first, but, after a lot of practice, it suddenly clicked. Once it all made sense, it opened up a whole new melodic world for my riffs and solos. I just started going crazy.

How did jazz improvisation guide the way you approach playing in a metal band?
Mostly, it inspired me to improvise my solos. Metal may seem out of control at first impression, but once a song is written and recorded, it’s usually set in stone. I don’t observe a lot of improvisation in metal. But I approached each solo on the album as an improv, doing ten entirely different leads throughout ten different takes. I’d only have a general idea of what I was going to play—maybe a few positions mapped out, or whether to start low and go high. When I was done tracking, I picked the solo I liked the best, and that’s what you hear on the album. The only drag to this approach is relearning what I did in the studio in order to play the solos live. Well, maybe I won’t do that. The recorded solos are basically just guidelines—the live solos seem to come out different every night.

How do you produce such a thunderous sound?
I want notes that come out of the amp loud, bright, and clear, and to get that sound, I play with an extremely heavy hand. My fingers are so strong that I always have to concentrate on not bending strings too far. In fact, I need a stiff and tight action, because if the strings are too loose, I’m constantly going out of tune. I twist the trussrods a bit to increase string tension, and I also set the action rather high. In addition, I play a 9-string with the top treble strings doubled, and that adds tension, as well. For some people, my guitars are kind of hard to play, but, for me, they’re perfect.

Where did you get the idea to double the treble strings?
I’ve always been into playing 12-string acoustics, so I thought it would be cool to play heavy music with a 9-string electric. My main guitar is a custom First Act 9-string that’s tuned, low to high, C, F, A#, D#, D#, G, G, C, C. It gives me this cool layered effect when I play leads. It’s almost like a chorused sound. I use custom Ernie Ball strings, gauged .012-.056, and I like Dunlop .73 Tortex picks. They’re comfortable and flexible—great for speed picking. I’m not exactly a tight picker, so the pointy end digs in deeper to grab the strings when I do string skipping. If I use rounded picks, I miss strings.

What other gear do you use? 
I also have two Gibson Les Pauls, a Takamine 12-string acoustic-electric, and a custom-made McNaught that I only use in the studio. It’s such a beautiful-looking guitar that I don’t want to tour beat it. I’m using a 100-watt Soldano Super Lead Overdrive through four custom-built 4x12 Emperor cabs. They really enhance my sound with their heaviness. I also slave into a Laney VH 100R head to get a darker sound. You just can’t make a Soldano or a Laney sound bad. I don’t use many effects these days, and I don’t have a pedalboard onstage. I don’t want to take away from the natural sound of the amps. I’m pretty much down to a tuner!