The Ace Drops. Interview with Riccardo and Emanuele

Interview by Andrew Stanton

The Ace Drops are a new Thrash band from Sicily. Andrew Stanton talked to them about their new album.

- Can you tell our readers a bit about your history, please?

Riccardo: We have known each other since our early teenage years, back when we were living in Sicily, and we were part of a huge local Metal scene. After we both moved to London, during the pandemic we started recording some ideas which organically lead to produce and releasing our music.

- What bands did you like growing up?

Emanuele: We grew up mainly listening to NWOBHM and Thrash Metal, we’re particularly fond of Annihilator, Venom & Testament, some odd favorites are Alestorm for Riccardo and Intervals for Emanuele.

- Do you consider yourself Death Metal or Thrash Metal?

Riccardo: We are definitely more oriented to Thrash Metal, although we draw heavy influence from our NWOBHM upbringing.

- What does The Ace Drops mean?

Emanuele: It’s a word play on a Sicilian joke well known in our region, saying “the ace drops” in Sicilian: “l’assu cari” sound identical to “you must suck it”, the “ace” we refer to is the ace of clubs in traditional Sicilian cards, you’ll see it included in the logo as a reminder of our origins.

- What are your lyrics and themes about?

Riccardo: We don’t have a specific theme; we have a very free-flow creative process And we cover in our lyrics everything that catches our attention as long as it tells a story, our inspirations range from 80s b-movie violence/imagery to barbecue/drinking/partying.

- There doesn’t seem to be much about you on the internet. Is that something you’re trying to change?

Emanuele: Due to how we compose and record songs, we opted for releasing our songs fairly slowly, aiming to produce a music or lyric video for each track. We’ll steadily grow our internet presence with time with every release on all major streaming platforms.

- Are you touring anywhere?

Riccardo: Not at the moment, we’re focusing more on songwriting/recording and preparing for our first couple of live shows.

- What other Sicilian bands should our readers check out?

Emanuele: There are a lot of extremely valid historic bands, the first that come to our minds are Trinakrius, Inside the Hole, Cadaver Mutilator, Crimson Wind.

- Why did you move to the UK?

Riccardo: We moved to the UK independently from each other but coincidentally in the same summer of 2014, like many other young Italians we were both looking for a more stable life and job security, with the dream to, one day, be able to use that security as a base to create and release music with no restrictions.

- Do you have a message for our readers? Thank you for your time.

Emanuele: If you like Thrash metal, please give us an honest shot, we’re 200% sure you’ll get a kick from our music! Search us on Facebook, Spotify & Youtube, we’ll be releasing new songs soon!