ANDY BIERSACK

The only real inspiration or muse that I have is just the life that I live.

My job as the host of a rock awards show is not to be as divisive as possible, but certainly you want to be able to interject your jokes and how you feel about stuff.

I was homeless for almost a year and a half, just living in my car or bouncing around peoples' houses, going to 7-Eleven at the end of the day and asking them for the taquitos that they were going to throw out because I hadn't eaten in two days.

I don't really have any interest in allowing other people's kind of idiotic, unnecessary, either bigotry or hatred or whatever derision they have for me, I don't allow for it to really bother me, because I don't need it.

I'm not against making new fans, but I'm not going to go out of my way to pander to someone and try to make them like me; that's not who we are. It's not as if we're fighting to find an audience - we have our audience, and anybody else is definitely welcome.

We're not here to make the ignorant people happy. We're here to write our music for those people that are interested in good rock n' roll music.

We made 'Wretched and Divine,' and as much as I love it, it's a pretty sparkly record - it's a record that could be done as a play because it's very theatrical with no grit.

I think Heaven and afterlife is for the living; it's for the people that continue on and remember that person, and if you've done something that is substantial in your life then you can leave a legacy and do something positive.

We never made attempts to say we were anybody's role model or the be-all-end-all of what people should look up to. We have always just been very open about the fact that we have difficulties and we are messed-up people, just as our fans are.

You can't deny a band whose fans will literally do anything to see them win the awards. We're very appreciative to the fan base. That mutual feeling of appreciation is something that really helps.

I go to a lot of self-help groups in the day, and then I can sleep pretty well at night.

It's not easy to be the weird kid or the rebel.

Being able to be one of the headline bands on Warped Tour was a dream I had since I was in middle school.

The devotion of the BVB Army, with its very big online presence, is amazing. We've been fortunate from the very beginning. It was something that was really able to spur on our career.

All I ever wanted to do was be in a band.

I am a clinical zombie.

Even if you don't like what I do, and you don't like my band, you might have a fan that likes both of us, and why would you wanna alienate them?

I see the merit in religion, and I see the need for faith and hope and sometimes people who are more snide look at people who are religious, particularly people in rock bands, and they'll say, 'Oh that's dumb, you believe in whatever,' but I think everybody believes in something.

For us, all we care about is maintaining what we do as a band.

For us, we are interested in doing what's cool for us and what's cool for the audience. That's it.

When I walk around on the street and someone comes up to me, I have just as many full-grown men with large beards in Slipknot shirts saying he likes my band as much as I do girls with bright pink hair.

In terms of stage presence for me, I'm influenced by a myriad of things. A lot of punk performers, people like Dave Vanian from The Damned and Davey Havok from AFI was a huge influence on me when I was younger.

I don't know what metalcore is. I know what rock n' roll is... It's not rocket science.

If you nominate us for something, we're going to win.

The older I get, the more interest I have in writing other kinds of music.