DN: Talk about your record. Where did you get the idea from? What is the inspiration behind this album?
MM: This album has been in the works for many years. I guess I started to get serious about it in college. Right around 1996-1997. It was a very different record then. Only “Lavender” and “Prelude/Epiphany” made it from the writing I was doing then. There are some other cool pieces from that period that will surface eventually as singles or on another album, but I wanted to make a definitive statement about who I am as a writer/guitarist today so more modern works had to be included. The title is a reference to the Borg character “7 of 9” on Star Trek. I am the second of five children so I thought it was pretty clever. I started preproduction before joining Fozzy. At that point, the album was shaping up to be much more progressive rock/jazz fusion than what it ultimately became. Having a worldwide audience of Fozzy fans gave me a bit more motivation to be tilted to the rock side of song choices and production. I had a bit of a ‘renaissance’ when I joined Fozzy. After being so discouraged in the '90s due to the shift away from guitar virtuosity in pop/rock music, I stopped listening to a lot of my favorite metal and hard rock records. Joining Fozzy gave me permission to listen to Judas Priest, Iron Maiden, Metallica, AC/DC, and Van Halen again! I think what I ended up with is a very honest snapshot of where I was by the time the record was finished. It's semi-autobiographical and that's the best thing about instrumental music. The listener brings their own experiences to what they hear so they can relate to it in their own way! Every song on the album has it's own story, but my main inspirational goal was to pay homage to my family and friends that had guided me to that point, as well as to set myself apart from the bands I had been playing with up through then. Artistic freedom with no restrictions! I planted my flag and put a little of my own destiny somewhere in the realm of the attainable.

DN: Who are the musicians that play on the record?
MM: I have had the pleasure of working with all of the musicians playing on this record often and in many capacities. We're all mercenaries for hire around the Atlanta area - soldiers of fortune, so to speak! John McKnight (drums) and Jon Schwenke (bass) together were the most coveted rhythm section in Atlanta for a good stretch. They just create a groove! Ya know? We started getting hired on the same gigs back in 1999 and we ultimately decided to just start a group so we could play together all the time! We ended up with two projects: The Hybrids and The New Yankee All-stars. That’s where a lot of my improvisational music started to take shape. And, as my writing continued to need new outlets, I started The Mike Martin Trio. We played a bunch of my stuff, obviously, but we also played a fair amount of Pat Metheny and John Scofield tunes. This is where Steve Mays (bass) comes in. I'm not a great jazz musician, but I am fascinated with the art. Steve is a prog-rock guy and a great jazz bassist. Playing with him really helped me to become “ok” with my jazz. We're both giant Frank Zappa fans too, and that bond came out in a lot of our performances. Eric Frampton (keyboards) plays with Agent Cooper and has toured with Mothers Finest, The Duke and Stuck Mojo. He's one of the brightest musical minds I know. We've been friends forever but it took a record and a tour of the UK in 2005 to finally get us working together regularly. He's my partner in crime now! We've done six albums together, tours, one musical about Zombies (“Song Of The Living Dead”) and another one about werewolves, “The Change”, premiering May 2010 here in Atlanta. Eric wrote the music to both of them and they are a scream! The performances by all of these guys are outstanding. They really helped bring life to the compositions which allowed me to make a record that is much more focused on the music itself and not just so focused on the guitar solos.

DN: Who are some of the bands that influenced you when you were growing up?
MM: It was my brother and his best friend Chris that got me into guitar playing. I was real interested in Van Halen, AC/DC, Judas Priest, Iron Maiden, Kiss, Pink Floyd. Then I heard the David Lee Roth Band with Steve Vai, then “Surfing with The Alien” by Joe Satriani and my life changed! The guitar became my obsession. I started digesting music by so many cool groups: Bad Company, ZZ Top, Ozzy Osbourne, Black Sabbath, Led Zeppelin, Eric Johnson, Alcatraz, Metallica, Anthrax, Megadeth, Tesla, Scorpions, Queensryche, Testament, The Police, Sting, Journey, Santana, Jimi Hendrix, Frank Zappa, Tool, Soundgarden, Alice In Chains, The Beatles, Hall & Oats, Lynyrd Skynyrd, The Allman Brothers, Kansas, King's X, Genesis, Peter Gabriel, Deep Purple, The Dixie Dreggs, Dream Theater, Dio, Extreme, Faith No More, The Red Hot Chili Peppers, Kansas, Jason Becker, Jeff Beck, Whitesnake, King Crimson, Motley Crue, Mr. Bungle, Nine Inch Nails, Phish, Primus, Queen, Ratt, Rush, Slayer, Steely Dan, Yes, Stevie Ray Vaughan, on and on! And I was also getting more and more into jazz music by guys like Pat Metheny, John Scofield, Alan Holdsworth, Wes Montgomery, Django Reinhardt, Mike Stern, John Maclaughlin, Paco de Lucia, Al DiMeola, George Benson, Miles Davis, Duke Ellington, Thelonious Monk, and John Coltrane. I used to think I had a narrow view of recorded music when I was growing up, but when I think back on it and look at this list of artists I was really shedding on, man! It's no wonder I didn't date many girls in high school!

DN: Do you have any projects that you are working on right now or any in the future? Any plans to tour?
MM: MM: Absolutely! One of the best parts of being a musician is being a touring musician. Music should be performed. Modern music has really gotten away from that. Too much emphasis on recording! The rub is that if you want to sell your recordings, you have to tour! So right now I'm in the process of getting The Mike Martin Band out on the road. I've spent so much of the last few years focused on performing the music of the bands I was in. It's well past time to be focusing on my own music! I'm also culling through my hard drives for music to complete my next album project.

DN: Any interesting stories you would like to share with us about the recording process?
MM: There are so many things that happened while I was working on it! My air conditioner went out on me early in the process and I didn't have the money to fix it right away so I just ran the attic fan for several weeks. It started getting hot and humid (I live north of Atlanta, GA!) and with all of the dust being brought in with the attic fan I started getting mold growing inside the house! Very dangerous! Needless to say, I got the AC fixed and stopped work on the record to scrub the house and everything in it with bleach. Not fun. The most interesting, and personal as it pertains to this album, is that our dog Buster died of kidney failure while I was tracking guitar solos. He was only ten years old and I took it pretty hard. We tried everything to save him but, not wanting him to suffer, we ultimately had to put him to sleep. I'm about as emotionally open as I can be when I'm playing guitar anyway, but this made working tough for me for a couple of weeks. I’d read about the Stanislavsky method of acting when I was in college wanting to get to a much more emotionally honest state of expression through my guitar playing, and I decided this was a good place to put it to work to get me through my mourning. The next solo I recorded was the final solo on “Peace Be With You”. I still can't listen to that solo without thinking of Buster and missing him with an ache in my heart.

DN: What was the most challenging part of making this record?
The biggest challenges I had in making this record were learning Pro Tools from scratch and working on the record in between international touring runs with Fozzy. I spent a good chunk of my album budget on creating a project studio in my house. I wanted to be able to do all of the pre-production tracking and final guitar tracking at home, where I could take my time with getting the guitar sounds I wanted and have a relaxed atmosphere to get the performances I knew I was capable of. Learning Pro Tools has been great for me. It has allowed me to utilize all of my experience and education as a composer and conductor to become a producer. Engineering and computer skills were the hard part for me but I can't imagine a world without it now! I've done the session guitarist thing for a while and it was a great experience having producers watching the clock and pushing me to get what they needed for their clients. I often left those sessions feeling like opportunities were missed due to time and budget constraints, but it was great to learn to work under pressure and still deliver the results they were after. With so much freedom to do what I wanted in my own studio, the next challenge was working in between tours with Fozzy. I'd work for a month, then rehearsals would crank back up. Then I’d be off to be the animal on tour in Australia for two weeks. Then back in the studio for two weeks and then back over to the UK for another three or four weeks. Home again for a few weeks and then back on the road again. What was cool was that it made me step away from the album and be specific about the things I was working on whether it was writing the string arrangement for “Peace Be With You” on an airplane, writing out the harmony guitars for “Lavender”, or just having rough mixes to listen to for weeks without being able to do anything but dream up what was missing or obsess about the parts that shouldn't be there that were clouding up the composition. It was tough switching back and forth, and I have found there is a definite difference between “Road Chops” and “Studio Chops”!

DN: Is there anyone you’d like to acknowledge for offering support creating this album?
MM: I could not have made this album without the love and support of my family and friends - financially, spiritually, musically. Honestly! All the guys that played on the record are some of my best friends on the planet. Mark Biniasz, Tom Samples, Brian Stephens and Terry Bradley contributed time, money and talents as well. My sister Sarah took amazing pictures for me. She and my mom both put up cash when it was not easy for them. My wife Kim for all of her patience and understanding while I put her through this process (and our home!). My cousin Gil Baptista got me through to the end. Without his financial help I'd still be saving up for mixing, mastering and replication!