“Big rock” is how Sevendust guitarist Sonny Mayo describes what the band’s concert tonight at the House of Blues will be like.

This will be Sevendust’s first headlining tour with the new guitar player since their original guitarist, Clint Lowery, left the band in 2004 due to “personal issues.”

Mayo – formerly of bands such as Amen and Snot – said his experience with the band has been incredible. He said the band is “the most productive band I’ve ever been with” and that it’s great to see “all 5 members working as a team.”

The fans have been pleased as well. Being a close friend of the band for 10 years, “a lot of Sevendust fans already knew who I was and we just embraced each other,” Mayo said.

Losing their guitarist was not the only problem that the band faced – it also caused a split from their record label, TVT Records.

After parting ways with TVT, the band recorded their latest album titled Next.

“Creatively, Sevendust was sparked,” said Mayo. This shot of creative energy came from the band recording the album without a label so they “didn’t have to consider what a record exec would say.”

After the album was finished, they shopped it to different record companies until they signed with a new independent label called WineDark Records.

The deal with WineDark led to them starting their own label imprint, 7 Bros. Records.

“A lot of people think ‘Cool! You’ve got your own label.'” Mayo said, “But, if anything it’s more work for us.” Since the band has been touring, it has yet to sign anyone to the label because “we’re so busy, it would be unfair to sign anyone at this point.”

The fruits of Sevendust’s labor have apparently paid off. Despite being independently marketed, Next debuted in the Billboard Top 20 Albums with sales of over 41,000 copies.

After completing a brief tour with Mudvayne, Sevendust is spearheading their own tour with other hard rock bands such as Nonpoint, Socialburn and Wicked Wisdom.

Mayo said that fans should expect 90 minutes – the longest set it has ever played – of some their hardest material spanning from their first self-titled album to Next.

The band has decided to keep their slower, melodic songs such as “Angel’s Son”, “Follow” and “This Life” off of the set list because it wanted this tour to be “more energetic.”

After the tour ends in early March, the band plans to book a few radio shows before heading overseas to play some radio shows in Europe.

Contact ALL correspondent Andrew Gaug at [email protected].