Muramasa (2:51)

“I wrote this one a while ago with Jake,” says Mansoor. “We needed a live intro for our tour, but we felt like it had to be in a specific tuning. We put it together, and Spencer had some really cool lyric ideas for it right away.

“And then what happened was, I completely forgot about the song! When it was suggested that we use it for the album, I was like, ‘No way, that thing sucks!’ But Jake sent it to everybody, we all listened again, and I was surprised: ‘No, wait, it is pretty good. I thought it sucked, but it doesn’t.’

“It came together pretty quickly. The fact that it was a live intro made it a good opening for the album, as well as the fact that it, along with track seven, Ragnarock, and the last song, Masamune, are all linked thematically, lyrically, and they even share riffs. I think the same line that starts the album ends the album.

“The tuning is the Zyglrox tuning – AGCFAD. We have a song called Zyglrox, and that’s the tuning we have on that one. You get a really cool, big interval. For all the six-string stuff, I used either my Mayones or my Blackmachine B2. The Blackmachine B2 is my special guitar – it’s the most perfect, prized guitar.”