In 1998, around the time details of Bill Clinton's cigar escapades were coming out, I found myself promoting a New Zealand tour for Brutal Truth. It was the first time I'd ever done anything like that, so although the tour went pretty well, I didn't really know what I was doing and there were a few minor fuck ups along the way. One said fuck up involved not properly organising accommodation in Palmerston North, resulting in us all having to sleep on the floor of the venue (The Stomach). The next morning I recall looking over to see drummer, Rich Hoak waking up from under a bed he'd made from tour shirts he'd got out of the merch. Then becoming uncomfortably aware that, as some perverse form of punishment, Kevin Sharp's bare ass and balls were squatted, hovering less than two inches above my head from where I was lying!
This morning I checked facebook to see his over night birth announcement (see above).
Being once so horribly close to the origin of the offending giblet, I pulled no punches in asking the hard questions in the post comments.
Subcide Webzine: Congratulations. Did that come out through the eye of your dick?
Kevin Sharp: It sure did... wonderful feeling
Subcide: How big? (The stone)
Kevin Sharp: 3/8"
Subcide: What does it smell like?
Kevin Sharp: to be honest - you've asked some pretty fucked up questions... but sort of that new stone smell
Subcide: Was there blood when you pissed it out?
Kevin Sharp: no.. when these things bang around on the inside... you bleed a little bit every time... I was half asleep when it launched... barely noticed... just heard it bounce in the bowl... stuck to the side... didn't even have to dig it out... got any more questions asshat?
Subcide: why yes I do, scrotum face. When it stuck to the side of the bowl, did you have to put your hand in with all your piss or did it stick above the waterline?
Kevin Sharp: above waterline
Subcide: what do you think it stuck to? How heavy is it?
Kevin Sharp: fuk my life you're annoying... no idea.. not heavy... sorta like coral
Subcide: Thank you. That will be all.
Kevin Sharp: you sure... I'm here all night wise guy
Subcide: Can I publish this as an interview on my blog?
Kevin Sharp: Chris Rigby, you really don't give up - tenacious twat
Subcide: I take that as a yes?
Kevin Sharp: of course... now fuck off...
Subcide: Good night and Thank you.
Kevin is currently lead vocalist for 'Lock Up', who will be touring Australia and New Zealand with Napalm Death and Brujeria this October. You can find details for the Auckland show, Listen to the new Lock Up album 'Demonization' and see a close up of Quasimodo, all below.
I haven't felt much like writing over the past year or so. Something I promised myself when I started this blog in 2010, was that I wouldn't allow it to become a burden like the old print version of 'Subcide Zine' did. As it happens, right now I'm feeling quite creative and motivated. There are a number of releases that have inspired me in the last while that I'd like to tell you all about. They may not be new as such, so if you have already heard them I encourage you to take another listen. I've particularly enjoyed listening to and writing about this one.
Chris Rigby
Malevolence - Relentless Entropy (Self released)
Not so long ago I was checking out an old album by ‘Groinchurn’ called ‘Sixtimesnine'. ‘Groinchurn’ were a kick ass grindcore band from South Africa in the late 90s. When listening to it I thought "Man that was a great era for grindcore. Bands had started to develop musically. They were incorporating new diverse, intricate, interesting and engaging concepts into their music. The results being really enjoyable listening experiences." Brutal Truth were pioneers of this concept. Napalm Death had started to go down the same path and Nasum had just appeared on the scene. But where was this sound these days? Sure Napalm Death are still here and kicking ass. But Brutal Truth are over, as are Nasum, but why is there no one new doing this or developing it further?
As synchronicity would have it, after their 20+ years of existence 'Malevolence' come along with 'Relentless Entropy' to fill that gap. From start to finish it’s a consistent piece of modern grind art. It kicks off with 'Approaching Monster', an instrumental climbing intro which is later complimented by the album outro 'Retreating Monster', assumedly sequels to 'Passing Monster' from the 2007 EP ‘Eyes to See, Ears to Hear, Wrists to Slit’. ‘Approaching Monster’ leads directly into 'Digitize', a 1 min 49 second grinder focusing on our unavoidable existence of having our entire lives documented and tracked on line. Opening and closing with “Welcome unit, to the machine”, within Digitize we are issued with our serial number “3-4-4-4-8-4-9-3” which I’m pretty sure is also a clever reference to the guitar fret numbers of the riff beneath it. Then in the same tone we have 'Legalize', which talks about a dystopian future where food no longer grows and in order to survive, humanity must turn to cannibalism. Feeding on the vegetarians first, before farming thy neighbour. “The Adversary’ breaks the 3 minute mark for the first of only 2 times on ‘Relentless Entropy’. It also introduces the first section that could possibly be described as slower. The Adversary appears to be a character who is the “Anti-theist”, neither Christ nor Anti-Christ, they have come to free earth from the shackles of religion and to encourage humanity to “Think God out of existence”. ‘Transparent’, with its animosity toward the shallow nature of mainstream society, is the only song on the album where the music isn’t written by main man Daryl Tapsell, but by former second guitarist Nich Cunningham. Despite the different composer it still sits perfectly along with what sounds like a subtle nod to brutal truth played in reverse. The next 2 are short sub 1 minute grinders. The first is “Property of Satan” inspired by Daryl's tattoo.
Then we have the 23 second 'Butchered', which if I hadn’t read they lyric sheet I wouldn’t know was a personal tribute to the late Matt Hall, former vocalist of ‘Backyard Burial’, who in 2011 was “Butchered by a cunt!”
“Home brew Memories
BBQ smoking weed
Long nights of philosophy
Techniques of the scream
Mushroom recipes
Pros and cons of LSD
Some of what you were to me
Metal brother rest in piece”
'Bleed' tackles class warfare and highlights the fact that tory scum still bleed the same as you and I when you take their heads off. ‘Nothing and Nowhere’ reminds us that we’re all insignificant in the grand scheme of everything and explores the experimental grind style to a deeper level with its discordant chords riffs, before fading out slowly with various samples of scientific facts. 'Chased through the woods (with a rhyming dictionary)’ takes the piss out of immature gore themed death metal lyrics. All of which are of course rhymed. Track 11 '99942 Apophis' hits with a super heavy chaotic barrage, not unlike its namesake asteroid which is due to collide with earth on April 13, 2029. Apophis 99942 also is closest comparison to the war metal chaos that's currently coming out of New Zealand, and it comes nicely garnished with a sprig of vintage Morbid Angel. 'Human Suit’ has the most coherent lyrics/vocal and memorable chorus of the album, also the most catchy musically. It follows the life of a protagonist who becomes so disgusted with the human race they decide to murder it, finishing with themselves. ‘Idle hands' begins with a voice sample from the 1990/1 Ice T album ‘OG’ where Ice is introducing us to his new metal band ‘Body Count’. The song itself, the most straight forward metal tune, is a misanthropic view of someone who has sold their soul to their corporate job at the expense of everything else important. 'Life Machines’ is the album’s slowest and at 3:46min, longest tune. It begins with a creeping not-quite-doom riff, before ramping up the grind and death combo and Dives into slowness again briefly before finishing on an increasingly speed up War Pigs meets grindcore ending. ‘Life Machines’ spells out most directly the theme that’s been running right through ‘Relentless Entropy’ i.e. nothing we do in our lives will ever amount to anything of significance, we’re all getting older and we’re all going to die one day before eventually being forgotten. …Then the monster finally retreats wrapping up ‘Relentless Entropy’.
Malevolence have been around for over 20 years now, and constantly get better every time I hear them. ‘Relentless Entropy’ is testament to that. It has a simple Black and white cover - Just like the best grindcore albums. It’s held together with trade off vocals from rock solid ass player Julian (I’ve known this guy since 1998 and I still have no idea what his last name is), intense drumming from Ben (also skin pounder for Vassafor) and of course the stellar guitar work of Daryl.
‘Relentless Entropy’ is modern technical grindcore at its best. It survives and grows upon multiple listens. It will be a treat to hear what level Malevolence elevate themselves to next!
It’s a grind album you should invest in! You can do that by going to www.malevolencenz.com and purchasing it in CD, Vinyl or digital form.
Carcass are about to play New Zealand for the third time since 1993 (the second time was in 2008). This time with Napalm Death. Thanks to Soundworks touring I was able to interview guitarist Bill Steer, via Skype. Rather than transcribing the conversation, I've decided to let you hear the full audio complete with my baritone mumbling contrasted against Bill's clear english accent.
This was actually the second time I've interviewed Bill. You can read my first interview with him, which took place in Wellington late 1993, here: Subcide Zine #1
Thanks heaps to Ami of The Mighty Scoop for hooking up this interview and also to Jesper and Anders of NASUM for taking the time to answer these questions. NASUM will be playing in Auckland later this month (See below poster for details), so if you live in New Zealand and are thinking of going, don't waste this one time opportunity to catch this awesome band got get your tickets ASAP!!!
1) You are playing in New Zealand for the first time this year (21 August 2012), what are your expectations of that show and your visit? What can the audience expect from your Live performance?
Jesper: Well, uh, a bunch of really fast music very loud? You know, what we do isn’t anything that hasn’t been done before – it’s five guys who scream and make a hell of a lot of noise whilst engaging in on-stage frenzy. I guess as with all live brutal music, it’s about being there in the moment and being sucked into the energy that comes out of the performance, for band as well as audience. Nothing I verbally try to describe will do the shows any justice, you just have to be there. Nasum has a big bank of songs, and on these shows we’re playing our best stuff and pushing the envelope a bit further, making everything harder, faster and more frantic than we thought we could. As this is a farewell tour, we have this last chance to prove that Nasum is and always was non-compromising, oppositional and deadly serious about grindcore. Also, going to NZ is obviously special for us – it’s close to Antarctica for fuck’s sake! Antartica is definitely a grindcore continent. Also, Ulcerate will open for us. Gotta love Ulcerate. Hopefully there will be a local grind band on the bill too.
Anders: The question is: what can we expect from the audience? If I don’t see one Orch stagediving, I will be very disappointed!
2) Your website has a gallery of peoples Nasum Tattoos and mentions that you have seen a lot more since you’ve been on the Farewell tour. What other unique things have you experienced on the tour? Please describe a few highlights.
Jesper: Well, it’s a bit like coming home from the war I guess. The band has been away for a long time, and just like coming home after a long time you don’t really know how things have changed. We knew there was some anticipation, but that it would be like this was overwhelming. How much Nasum has meant to people kinda took us off guard, and the lengths at which people go to see this is humbling. In LA, there was an entire family – mom, dad, two sons and a daughter - who had all travelled from Peru to see us. In a Czech fest we played there were a bunch of grind dudes from Saudi Arabia who knew everything about the band and had travelled there to see us. Stuff like that. Also, the sheer energy in the crowd at some of these gigs is pretty massive too. Can you imagine looking out over a hall at the Maryland Deathfest filled with of 3000+ people and every single person is moshing like mad. Or standing at Hellfest in France playing grindcore – this underground thing – in front of 10000 people? Insane. I am baffled every time. We never experienced shows like this before.
Anders: Although the huge stages and massive crowds are good for the ego, it’s the little things that stays in my memory. Like when we played a bar in Ventura, California. When we got there I was almost angry at the size of the venue. I thought: “Why have we been booked to a place where you have to set up your stuff on the sidewalk OUTSIDE of the club as there is virtually no space inside?” But after wolfing down a few pizza slices in the kitchen and seeing some of support bands go mental, our show turned out to be one of the most intimate and crazy things I’ve done. It was one hundredth the size of the crowd at Hellfest but very fun.
3) How did you make the choice to have Keijo Niinimaa from Rotten Sound on vocals for the Farewell tour? How is he working out? What was the main reason for a farewell tour?
Jesper: We fumbled around with a bunch of suggestions that felt so-so for a while, but noone really felt perfect. When we finally actually thought of Keijo it was like ”aw, hell, he is the obvious choice, how did we not think of this immediately?” We wanted the person to fill this role to have a great voice and be an awesome performer of course, but also, importantly, that he would have a closer connection to the band. We’ve all known Keijo for years, his own band Rotten Sound has opened for Nasum on a few tours, and they also recorded in Mieszko’s studio when he was alive. So he was a friend of the band, of Mieszko, he has a great voice and vocal range, and loves Nasum on top of it all. We are obviously happy that he wanted to do it.
Anders: One important thing to notice is that Keijo doesn’t do just Mieszko’s vocals, he does mine as well. On the first two albums I sung a lot, but live it was all covered by Mieszko – so the fact is that Keijo is actually doing something closer to the albums than what Mieszko did back in the day!
Nasum 2012
4) Shane Embury and Barney Greenaway of Napalm Death both cited hearing Nasum, and Inhale/Exhale in particular, as a definite turning point which helped them to rediscover grindcore and thus led to the recording of 2000's acclaimed Enemy of the Music Business.(Terrorizer #140, Spring 2005). I imagine this would be an honour to be referred to in that way by these people, but what do you think Nasum did differently that refreshed the Grindcore sound?
Anders: I believe the history with Napalm Death started with Barney wearing an “Inhale/Exhale” t-shirt in a video. That was unreal! And then we heard the stories and as some point I even heard something about the grindcore-unfriendly Mick Harris though “the band on N was quite good” after receiving a bunch of albums from Relapse, but in all honesty that can very much be a creative memory. Honour isn’t strong enough, it was baffling to realize that the band that inspired us to 90% when the band was formed a) knew about us and b) liked us so much that they claim WE inspired them. It still is quite sick, although we have a friendly relationship today. Anyway: I think there are a few reasons to Nasum’s success: 1) We have always been very serious about our grindcore, from the very beginning. Although some of the early – and late lyrics – perhaps didn’t have that political edge that is so closely connected with the band, we never fooled around too much and especially not with the music! 2) Once we started to add our own touch to the sound, leaving the quite strict form based on our sources of inspiration, we got a clear identity quite fast. We brought groove to grindcore and kept the doors open to other genres solely to pick inspiration, not to turn into some kind of mixtape circus act switching styles within the songs. 3) We put a lot of effort into the vocals and especially the vocal patterns, and thus creating real and memorable songs.
5) Where might Nasum have been today if it weren’t for the tragic death of Mieszko Talarczyk? What might have happened in the 7 years since the 2004 boxing day Tsunami?
Anders: It’s totally impossible to say. In a best case scenario we would be still alive and have another 4-5 records in the catalogue, but in a worst case scenario we would have disbanded by some other reason and never seen the 20th anniversary. Nobody knows. In 2004 we did our first headlining tour of Europe and felt a “break” coming and we had some slight plans to go into the studio and create something spontaneous on the spot, but that was the only plan we had when things went down the shitter.
The Late Mieszko A. Talarczyk "Mieszko never had the chance to be a hero or a survivor. He most likely died in the first wave. I do know that the last thing he did was to protect his girlfriend so in my eyes he died as a hero." - Anders
6) Tell us about “Coldworker” and “Burst”. What are they and why should we check them out?
Jesper: Burst was a band that me and my friends started as kids, and which gradually grew from a crusty punk band to a hardcore band to end up as a pretty brooding, progressive metal band. Burst was the reason I had to leave Nasum about a year prior to Mieszko’s death – the band started touring a lot more and grew gradually, and I felt I couldn’t handle two touring bands. As much as I love Nasum and always had, I had to make a choice. We made a bunch of albums and put them out through Relapse Records, and I am thoroughly proud of them. It has nothing to with Nasum or grindcore, rather it is more melodic in the melancholy sense, and slightly more experimental and metallic. Check out ”Origo” or ”Lazarus Bird”.
Anders: Coldworker is my (only) band, that was formed in February 2006 and so far has released three albums. I had about a year off from most musical adventures and eventually started to look around in my hometown for new people to play with. I found a few, and then some more and the ball got rolling quite fast. Coldworker is a death metal band. Someone once described us as “if Cannibal Corpse was from Europe” and that’s a good description. We like the American style of riffing but most certainly have an European edge to our sound. Coldworker hasn’t tour that much and up until now never really been judged on it’s own terms. There are ALWAYS comparisons to Nasum in the reviews, which is totally annoying and unfair as the only connection is me. For more info and samples and stuff, visit coldworker.com.
7) Would you ever consider continuing the current line up after the farewell tour, perhaps under a different name? Why?/Why not?
Anders: No. There are many reasons. The biggest one is that we have other bands that more or less waits for the Nasum thing to be over, and we need to get back to “normal life” and continue where we were. Another reasons is that whatever music this new band with same line-up would play, people would scream for Nasum songs and then we’ll just be Nasum under a new name playing Nasum songs and that, if anything, is milking it. So that’s out of the question. I’m not ruling out the possibility that some of us meet again for a project or something, because we play well together, but as of now we will not continue in any shape or form.
8) What is the future of Grind core?
Jesper: Grindcore will probably always exist. I don’t think it could ever be widely popular, but then that isn’t the point. This is a subgenre of a subgenre, and the oppositional nature of grind will probably keep it alive and healthy in the margins of the underground. Three ”new” bands I like are Magrudergrind, Wormrot and Massgrave, and I hope i’ll get new hope for the future when we go to OZ and NZ and see the local supports get jiggy with it.
9) I saw that you played a show (or some shows) with my good friends ‘brutal truth’. How were those guys on stage and in person these days?
Jesper: They’re awesome. Fuzzy and scuzzy, but awesome and sweet. I can’t believe fucking Brutal Truth (and Dropdead!) opened for us in the US.
Anders: To be completely frank, they are not “Extreme Conditions…” Brutal Truth anymore, but on the other hand they haven’t been that for a long time. Brutal Truth today is one big “fuck you” finger up the butt on… well, everything. They are super cool though, and Danny Lilker is quite the entertainer. You hardly have a boring time when he’s around.
10) Anything to add in closing?
Anders: Thanks for the support. Early on in this interview you asked about our expectations, and once the tour and show is done we will share our thoughts and if the expectations were met or not, as we have an ongoing tour blog at nasum.com. Check that out, and thanks again for the support!
