ANVIL -

ANVIL - "For Decades, We've Had This Bomb Ready To Go And Now The Fuse Is Lit"

The following report is courtesy of Ben Rayner from here:
One could never accuse Toronto metal warlords ANVIL of doing things for the wrong reasons.

Of often doing the wrong things over the course of their 30-year career, yes. But only for the right reasons.

Anvil's tale is one of the noblest you won't find in the history books, a study in perseverance and sticking it out for the pure, blinding love of rock `n' roll so tragically poignant that it almost demanded to be turned into a movie. And lo and behold, it has.

Anvil: The Story of Anvil, already an audience favourite at the Sundance Film Festival, has the honour this week of opening the Hot Docs Festival with a pair of screenings – one this Thursday at the Winter Garden Theatre and another Friday afternoon at the Isabel Bader Theatre – that are already sold out. A third has now been added at the Royal on April 27.

With buzz on the film building, the directing might of Hollywood screenwriter Sacha Gervasi (who penned Steven Spielberg's The Terminal) behind it and superfans like SLASH, METALLICA's Lars Ulrich and ANTHRAX' Scott Ian coming out of the woodwork in support, more attention is suddenly being paid to what front man and guitarist Steve "Lips" Kudlow good-naturedly calls Anvil's "obscure, prolonged existence" than there has since the early 1980s.

The band, naturally, seems a little distrustful of the hype, but humbly concedes that it would be nice if a few more gigs came out of it.

Anvil's dance card isn't exactly full. The next show listed on the band's website after next Saturday's Hot Docs-related performance at the Bovine Sex Club is in July at the Perth Metal Meltdown in Perth, Ont. That show will take place in the local Legion hall.

"For decades, we've had this bomb ready to go and now the fuse is lit. We're in the process of waiting for it to explode," says bassist Glenn Five, an ardent fan who signed on with the stable Anvil core of Kudlow and drummer Robb Reiner 12 years ago.

"We're waiting. It hasn't happened. The energy is there, they're making a deal for it, so everything that's supposed to get done will get done, right? And then, let it roll," says Reiner. "Let's get it going. We're ready to go, to back up the movie, as a band and as ourselves."

Read more here.