Jeff Loomis joined Arch Enemy in 2014, replacing Nick Cordle.
Arch Enemy guitarist Jeff Loomis, who is also a member of Conquering Dystopia and was previously part of Nevermore and Sanctuary, said he hopes to contribute to the songwriting of his current band, since he wasn't involved in the songwriting process for their last album, Will To Power , released in 2017.
In an interview with All That Shreds, Jeff said that playing with Arch Enemy was “a big change” for him, and spoke about the impression people have that the band doesn't give him creative freedom: “If you were to reverse everything and put me in Michael [Amott]'s place, for example… Let's go back to when I was in Nevermore, right? That was my band, I wrote the songs, and we, just like Arch Enemy, had a rotation of guitarists coming in and out who wanted to compose and participate, we granted that to some musicians who wrote cool songs, like Steve Smyth and Tim Calvert. For the most part, it was Warrel Dane [vocals] and me who wrote. It's the same thing with Arch Enemy: Michael and Daniel [Erlandsson, drummer] handle a good part of the songwriting, they know how Arch Enemy should sound, simply because they are the founders of the band.”
Loomis continued, saying, “I didn’t want to be that guy who comes into the band and says, ‘Here are 10 songs and they’ll be on the next album.’ It’s not right to do that, so I’m just taking a break, just hoping that on the next record, maybe there will be that opportunity.”
“Since I joined the band, I’ve had many musical ideas that I hope to contribute in the future. I wrote three or four songs for the last album, but they didn’t make it onto the album because they weren’t in the style they were looking for. Luckily, I played guitar solos on the last album, so that makes me happy.”
“I’m looking forward to maybe writing some songs with them in the future and becoming more of a member, so to speak, you know, that’s cool,” he said. “I’m very happy with my position. I’m very lucky to be playing in front of so many people every night and to be able to tour the world and visit so many cool places. I consider myself a lucky guy.”
Will To Power was released in September 2017 via Century Media Records.