Guest blogger Neil Sanderson of Three Days Grace checks in as a regular contributor with an exclusive column for Loudwire. In this piece, the drummer offers his thoughts on the recent Grammy Awards, gives us an update on the band's forthcoming album and shares his appreciation for the recent fan support in the Loudwire Music Awards. Plus Neil gives fans a look as he was just given a chance to build his ultimate drum kit with Yamaha Drums. Check out Neil Sanderson’s latest blog, along with the video, below:

Going down, party time / My friends are gonna be there too / I’m on the highway to hell

AC/DC slayed the Grammys. It’s cool when a song transcends all the genres, generations and fads … especially when it’s a song about partying with your friends in hell. Who can’t relate to that?!

I just got done watching Ed Sheeran perform 'Thinking Out Loud' with John Mayer, Herbie Hancock and ?uestlove backing him up (I DVR’d it). That was the real deal. For anyone who hasn’t checked out Ed's album 'X,' you should. I mean it’s not rock per se, but the songwriting and emotion that went into that body of work is heavy and very compelling … it’s world class.

Dare I say that some people are coming full circle back into the love for the realness of music … where it’s not so much about the props and dancers, auto-tune and posing? Perhaps we're back to appreciating the fact that sometimes live music gets a little rough around the edges, maybe even a little “outta-tune.” For me, the feeling of spontaneity and danger and free expression in music is more exciting than worrying about perfection. I feel like we as humans can sense when too much overthinking goes in to a piece of art. It needs to be real or else it won’t feel real. But one of the trickiest things about being an artist is that at a certain point, you need to just take the brush off the canvas, and call it finished.

3DG just did that. And now this record is done! We’re so proud of this new album, which we entitled 'Human.' We poured our hearts and souls into this thing. Hard to believe we started this record in 2013 … worked on it in Canada, U.S., Russia, Belarus, Germany, U.K., even Amsterdam … mostly with acoustic guitars in the back of a bus rolling after the show. What an experience! We decided to just keep touring and write this thing on the road. So much inspiration from this record has come from late night conversations … just talking about life, looking out the window and looking within our own lives at ourselves.

I’m a believer that you can smell the rain before the storm hits. I know it’s a weird analogy but that’s how I feel right now about 2015. The album is being mixed as we speak (Chris Lord-Alge and Nick Raskulinecz are killing it). Our road crew is making plans to be able to take us all over the world in the coming months and we’re about to start rehearsals and rock out the new tunes. We fly to South America in a couple months and play Lollapalooza and a bunch of other shows in Brazil and Argentina, then U.S., Europe and Canada into the summer.

I had an awesome few days last week when Yamaha Drums let me come into the warehouse and build my ultimate drum kit on the spot … no holds barred. My longtime drum-tech extraordinaire Colin and I hung out in the warehouse for a few days and put together the kit we’ve always talked about. Here’s a link to a video of the building process:

And last but not least, are you f’n kidding me?! 'Painkiller' took Loudwire Rock Song of 2014. All I have to say to that is thank you to Loudwire for supporting it, and to all the fans for voting. This is huge and means a lot to us!

NS

Our thanks to Neil Sanderson for contributing his latest column to Loudwire. Look for the band on the road at these locations. Follow Three Days Grace on Facebook and Twitter, and stay tuned for new album order information. The 'Human' disc is due March 31.

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