Interview: Danny Kiranos Amigo The Devil

Danny KIranos aka Amigo The Devil recently brought his own devilish, macabre brand of murderfolk to the UK for a sold-out tour, and we chatted with Danny before the last night of the tour in Glasgow. Check in with the man himself, below…

Cliched start to an interview, but with it being your first trip overseas since live music returned, how has the tour been going?

It’s been going well. We’ve been touring quite a bit, before these dates I believe it was 57 dates that we played in the US, but the first few weeks of those dates were strange. Once we got used to what touring was like post-covid then it became a new routine, but to be honest with you it was not much different once you got a sense of how to remain as safe as possible and not be as completely reckless as usual! Just being on our toes a bit more.

How are you handling interactions with fans, you are quite a huggy person!

I’m still available! Maybe not as much as before [laughs]. I’m trying to keep the crew safe, and trying to keep us moving forward on the tour instead of taking too many risks. I’ve been taking pictures with people and having some drinks and conversations with some new friends, it’s one of those circumstances where you try your best without taking away what makes a tour, a tour.

During the early stages of the pandemic, was there ever any fear that you might not be able to perform overseas again?

Oh, it very much felt like that. I thought that I was just doomed, so I was keeping the memories that I had as the final memories. It really was doom and gloom and seemed like no hope whatsoever.

You mentioned memories of the last visit, one of those memories would be you walking on stage in Glasgow holding a bottle of Buckfast in one hand, and a glass bottle of Irn Bru 1901 in the other! You got the keys to the city after that!

[Laughs] Well I won’t be much different this time!

If you had also had a deep-fried Mars bar with you, then it would have been the Glaswegian holy triumvirate!

Oh, you wouldn’t even believe how many of those that I ended up with! Half of my body coming home was deep-fried Mars bars! I fucking love them!

The tour ends in Glasgow with a sold-out show, one of many on the tour that is sold-out, extra shows have been added in Manchester and in London; why do you think that the UK gets Amigo The Devil so much?

Now that I cannot answer, anything that I did say would be an assumption and I’m more inclined to just appreciate what is happening, more than analyze it! [laughs]. I want to know, but I don’t want to ruin anything!

The demographic at an ATD show is very widespread; punks and metalheads, mixing with folkies and hipsters, it’s incredibly diverse…

I’m just hoping that everyone feels welcome, but this time around it feels even more like you said, the diversity of everyone coming through and interacting with each other as well as their own groups. I just want it to feel like a welcoming evening…which for someone playing music, that is incredibly rewarding to see, that’s the ideal scenario.

You recently played your first ever show with a full band, was that an enjoyable experience?

I loved it. I wish that we had the band with us every show because it was very rewarding. The show was heavy, it was heavy-heavy and I didn’t think it would be as heavy. You could really hear the intensity of the music coming out in those songs with the band playing. We have a full tour with the band lined up once we get back to the US, we are going to be supporting Gogol Bordello, and a few dates before that tour, and all that is going to be full band.

Opening act on this tour is well known to you, your sister Katerina…

Yeah, my little sister!

Nobody can really push your buttons in the way that a younger sibling can…

[Laughs] Well, luckily she’s my best friend so it is easy to be on tour with her, and easy to do all this without getting frustrated with each other. We’ve always had a close understanding of how we each operate, and I’m just very, very proud of what she is doing, the main thing that I was worried about is that I didn’t want anyone to think that the reason that I was bringing her on tour was that she was my sister. I’m bringing her on tour because I really believe in what she is doing, and I want her to be exposed to a whole new set of circumstances and a whole new set of situations. This is her first tour, ever! She’s never been on tour before.

Amigo The Devil’s subject matter is very dark and macabre, but in the age of having atrocities just a click away online, can an artist go too far with their songs, or is it a case of what Ferris Bueller says and “you can never go too far”?

I think you can definitely go too far, yes. Especially if you are doing it on purpose, and you are just doing it on purpose for shock value. There is no real point to it if that’s the case. I feel that there is a difference between writing and exploring dark material and exploiting dark material just to use it against somebody else, and I think that once you start using it just to harm other people then that’s when you are going too far.

On the subject of going too far, you suffered for your art during the video for ‘Quiet as a Rat’ where your head was enclosed in a glass case that was then filled up with dirt, were there ever any doubts in your head that one of the crew would play a prank on you and leave you in the glass case a little too long after the director called “cut”…

I don’t think so because I would have actually died! I don’t think that they would have been that cruel to actually kill me…because then they wouldn’t have a job! [laughs] It would have been the ultimate prank though! But it would have meant carrying a heavy body back with them, so the joke would have been on them in the end!

 

All forthcoming Amigo The Devil tour dates can be found, here.

Interview – Dave

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