UDO DIRKSCHNEIDER Interviewed On 'Heady Metal With Jeff Olson' (Audio)

Former ACCEPT and current U.D.O. frontman Udo Dirkschneider was interviewed on last Monday's (July 18) edition of "Heady Metal With Jeff Olson", the Internet radio show hosted by original TROUBLE drummer and RETRO GRAVE mainman Jeff "Oly" Olson. The chat can now be streamed using the audio player below.

In a recent interview with Sleaze Roxx, Dirkschneider was asked about his decision to reunite with ACCEPT in 2005 for a number of exclusive shows. "Yeah, we reunited in 2005 for some festival appearances," he said. "I have to point out that there were no plans to do more than these appearances. We did not have plans to record or continue further."

He continued, "There were promoters that wanted us to do this. I was on a break from U.D.O. so at that time I said, 'Okay. Why not?' It was a lot of fun, but as I said, we weren't going to do anything further.

"It was in 2009 that once again I was asked to take part in a reunion.

"Let me make this as short as possible: Wolf [Hoffmann, guitar] has been saying in interviews that he was not interested in a reunion, but this is not true. They asked me. I said to them, 'We have already done a reunion in the '90s and it did not work out.' My thought was this: if I do this reunion, then I have to cut down U.D.O., and U.D.O. has become quite successful. I said to Wolf, 'Okay, when this reunion doesn't work out, I'll have to continue under the name ACCEPT.' I wanted the rights to the name, but Wolf didn't agree to those terms and I said to them, 'I wish you good luck.'"

When asked why it would not have been possible to do both U.D.O. and ACCEPT, Udo said, "For me I would rather not have two bands at the same time. I want to be able to concentrate on just one band. I have restarted U.D.O. twice at this point; the band has been in existence this time for 14 to 15 years now. I've been together with some of these guys in this band longer than I have been with the guys in ACCEPT. [laughs]!"

Regarding whether his decision had to do with a struggle for control of the name, money or both, Dirkschneider replied, "Well, money, of course, but money isn't the most important thing in the world to me. I wanted assurance that I could continue under the name ACCEPT if things didn't work out because I had the most to lose by putting U.D.O. aside. So when they wouldn't agree to this, I said, 'Thank you very much, Wolf!'" [laughs]"

"Heady Metal With Jeff Olson" is Olson's first radio show endeavor and features interviews with musicians from different metal genres across the board, interesting people from all walks of life, comedic segments, music news, and giveaways.

Olson has been writing and recording in the music industry since the formation of TROUBLE (1979) and holds a Bachelor of Music degree in film scoring, cum laude, from Berklee College Of Music.