In their second decade of being a band, Maryland-based rockers Clutch are as busy as ever. Not only are they celebrating their 25th anniversary this year, they are also out on the road promoting their hard-hitting 11th studio album, Psychic Warfare. Guitarist Tim Sult recently checked in with Pulse Magazine after a successful tour in Europe to talk about his band’s upcoming fall tour here in the States, what it’s like to be an aging rock band, and his approach to living on the road.

Pulse: Clutch recently wrapped up a tour in Europe. What is your favorite part of touring over there and how is it different from touring here in the states?

Sult: The cities are a little more pedestrian and friendly, and there’s a little more to do, like outside of the show. Whereas a lot of towns in America, there’s not a really too much around the venue that you’re playing at, in Europe there’s a lot more kind of historical stuff that you can do before the show. We toured mostly in Western Europe, but went to Poland for the first time and Croatia for the first time, as well, so those were super fun.”

Pulse: A lot of rock bands tour extensively in Europe, now more than ever before. Why do you think they enjoy touring in over there so much?

Sult: It seems like these days it’s a little easier to tour Europe because the people over there are just more into live music and more into rock music.

Pulse: To what do you attribute Clutch’s success for so long and keep all of its founding members?

Sult: When I think about it, it does seem pretty ridiculous that we’ve been around for 25 years, but I always attribute it to the fact that we always try to move forward and try to write new songs and try to write new albums – just always continue to write a new song, as opposed to just putting out an album and just playing that album for the next five years, or whatever it is. Just the fact that we’re always trying to book the next tour, trying to play some shows, write albums, write songs and just try to remain creative. That’s what it’s really been all about for us.

Pulse: What was the music scene like in Maryland when you were growing up?

Sult: I moved to Maryland when I was about 14 years old, so the first show I went to that was not like a regular concert was this band Unorthadox, who were part of the Maryland doom scene – is what they call it down here. I was already into hardcore music, but I had never really been to any hardcore shows at the time. So that’s what was going on down here – a lot of hardcore and doom music.

Pulse: How would you describe your new album Psychic Warfare for those who haven’t heard it yet?

Sult: I would describe it as a very high-energy, focused Clutch record. We worked a long time on it; it seems like that album is so old to us because we actually recorded it in early 2015. But with that one, we worked really hard and we made sure all of the songs were focused and they flowed pretty well on the album. I would say that it is the probably most songwriting we ever did for an album, as far as the amount of the material that we came up with. We managed to streamline it down to something that we felt was an easily digestible 45 minutes worth of music.

Pulse: Is it difficult finding inspiration to write new music nowadays?

Sult: No, not really. Honestly, it does seem like when we get together to jam, we have more ideas these days than we did back in the past. I don’t know if it’s the fact that we have more time to dedicate to the songwriting process, but it honestly feels these days that there are more ideas than there were in the past.

Pulse: What can you tell us about the fall tour?

Sult: We have the biggest opener we’ve ever had – we have Zakk Wylde’s Black Sabbath cover band actually opening for us, so he’s raising the bar as far as bands that tour with us goes. It’s going to be great.

Pulse: Between touring over in Europe and then here in the States, you’ve been playing a ton of shows. How do you manage to keep it fun and avoid becoming burnt out?

Sult: Believe it or not, we’ve managed to take a lot of time off. We’re very consistent with our touring, and it seems like to other people that we’re always constantly on tour, but we have a lot of time off at home for our families and for writing new Clutch songs.”

Pulse: What are your plans for the next Clutch album?

Sult: We’re going to start getting serious about the songwriting process for the next album in January. So we’ll hopefully have an album to record by the end of the year. That will be the plan.”

Pulse: That’s not that long of a gap between albums. It seems like most bands today wait about four years between releasing new music.

Sult: Yeah, we’ve done that a couple times. We’ve done the long gap between albums a few times. We’re trying not to do too long this time.”

Pulse: Do you have any cool tour stories you’d like to share?

Sult: These days, I just try to remain as mellow as humanly possible and let people from other bands do all the crazy stuff. I’m too old for partying hard on tour; I just can’t do it anymore. It makes me too tired (laughs).

Be sure to check out Clutch when they perform an all-ages at show at the Palladium on Oct. 30. Tickets are $29 in advance and $35 at the door. Doors open at 7 p.m., show starts at 8 p.m. For more, visit facebook.com/Clutchband.

By Jason Savio