Five Finger Death Punch Touring With Godsmack in October

Five Finger Death Punch, who are currently enjoying incredible radio success with their cover of Bad Company's self-titled song, are about to hit the road with Godsmack and Drowning Pool. The band is ready to slay fans each and every night on the tour, and expect them to of course play the Bad Company cover among some pretty spectacular, jaw-dropping stage set ups.

"We became a headlining band on our first record cycle, which on one hand is a great position to be in, but on the other, we didn't have enough material to play longer sets required of the headliners," guitarist Zoltan Bathory told Noisecreep about the genesis of the song for their live sets. "So we had to play a couple of covers, but we wanted to do a song that spoke to us. When you're trying to find a good song to cover, you have to consider a lot of the obvious choices are already covered by other bands, or many times the song is great but the lyrics [don't] quite fit us!"

That dilemma was solved when FFDP realized that Bad Company are not commonly covered by metal bands. "It was a miracle that Bad Company was not covered by anyone we heard of, and it's a great song with awesome lyrics," Bathory said. "When we had it in the set, we were getting a really good reaction so we decided to record it and put it on the second record. It's actually not a surprise that the song is doing great at radio; after all, the original is one of the gems of rock history. I'm just glad we were able to cover it without frazzling the feathers of the purists but still give the song a heavier modern sound."

FFDP are supporting 'War is the Answer,' an album full of anthems that rally the troops -- literally. The band was invited by the USO to play for the troops, which they consider quite an honor. "Of course everyone has an opinion about the war and politics," Bathory said. "I don't care -- we picked our colors and are doing our part."

He recalls that the USO shows were "crazy" and said, "Imagine two to three thousand soldiers armed to the chin, rifles on their backs rocking out in the Iraqi desert, starving for some entertainment and a piece of home. The mosh pits were quite wild, when the lead singer has to say, 'Check if your safety is on and no grenades in the mosh pit,' that's pretty funny!"

The band also used pyro for the first time during their USO tour. "Apache helicopters came over the stage and fired off flares into the desert night," Bathory said. "We shook nearly 10,000 hands and had seen things not many people have the chance in life to experience ... like sitting in Saddam's throne, eating cereal, sleeping in one of his castles. That trip was fairly dangerous, but I would do it again in a heartbeat." Some of the footage the band recorded is in the video for 'Bad Company.'

The Five Finger Death Punch tour dates with Godsmack begin on Oct. 3 in Maryland, and it's not a moment to soon for FFDP. "Teaming up with Godsmack is interesting to us, because they have more of a hard rock crowd, so we will be playing front of people that maybe wouldn't come out to a straight up metal show," Bathory said. "We have a fairly elaborate stage set, so hopefully we can set it all up. It will look insane in an indoor setting. We were getting a lot of props for it during the Mayhem run, and that was at sunset. The indoor lights will make it even more striking. It's our eternal goal to put up shows that people will never forget ... it's important that the crowd is a part of the show, and I think it will be a great tour."