Sepultura

Interview - Derrick Green

5/15/03

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Sam: So, tell us about the new album...since I haven't even heard it yet
Derrick: "I think with this new album, we're going through some crazy things, just the fact that we're switching labels, or leaving a label. We were fortunate enough to be able to leave and not really have any hard feelings. For us, we wanted to really move and work with people that saw Sepultura in the future and really didn't have that past connection. We wanted to work with new people, I mean the contract itself was way too long, and there was such a history with that label. It was time to really move on to something different with different people. And so, we just stationed ourselves in Brasil for the most part for the past 2 years and just really have been...started writing right after Sept 11th, around then"
Sam: Did that affect any of the songs on the album?
Derrick: "Yeah, definitely, I mean, there were so many things also going on in Brasil at the same time"
Sam: That we don't hear about over here
Derrick: "Yeah, I mean there were like serious elections going on, there was rioting going on, drug dealers controlling alot of what was going on with the rioting, it was insane...that all affected the writing. But before we started writing on the album we decided we wanted to do an EP of just cover songs for fun, songs that influenced us growing up. We also wanted to do a cover album where we were doing bands that weren't necessarily typical for Sepultura, where people would be like 'oh they'll probably do Motorhead or Black Sabbath' we wanted to do something that...we all like different types of music, growing up there were bands that influenced us so we picked like, the basic bands, like Hellhammer was a big influence for us, that was a cool cover that we picked and then we did a Massive Attack cover, a U2 cover, a Devo cover, Jane's Addiction, Exodus, Public Enemy. We just picked bands that would be kinda challenging to mess around with. So we did that, and then we released it in Brasil and in Japan, and we did a video for 'Bullet The Blue Sky', the U2 cover, and there's a video on the cd when you put it in your computer, you can see the video. And so we released that in Brasil and we toured alot of places that we've never been to, and those guys have never been to ever. Small cities, and it was great, because the turnout there, they've never seen Sepultura live and it was great, alot of inspiration to go into the studio and writing the new album. So we carried alot of that energy with us, and we just really trimmed it down, instead of doing the same album, like 'Nation', experimenting, we just decided to go with the basics, have 12 songs, like straight ahead. It's pretty brutal..."
Sam: Wish there was a cd player here...
Derrick: "Yeah, I know, but I think it's the tightest album that we've done so far. Just because I think we've actually become closer and closer, it's like I think the music gets better and better. I think alot of people will be shocked, I mean, now going out and playing shows there's alot of people that really liked 'Nation' that we never really got to hear, a full response of that. We got to hear a little bit, but it's cool going out now and seeing people really like 'wow, I really appreciate it' or like 'I never really listened to it that much until now' and I think with this alot of people will probably go back and listen to 'Nation' or 'Against'. We're really happy with it, it's very brutal and straight forward, it's very hardcore metal, has elements of all of the history of Sepultura."
Sam: You've been playing more guitar lately?
Derrick: "Yeah, yeah, that was something else that changed on this new album, I would just come into practice with ideas and then just play it for everybody, and Andreas would mess with it, or he'd be like 'oh that sucks'. You know, it's just like straightforward, which is the best way to be about it. So yeah, there are alot of songs I contribute to on this as far a guitar writing, I didn't play on the actual album, only a couple songs, but live I'll play alot of the new songs that we do live, so it's definitely a change up."
Sam: I just noticed after you joined the band, the first tour, it was like, a little thing with only one guitar...
Derrick: "Yeah, yeah, I mean, it's a challenge especially if you're a really good guitar player like Andreas, it's like you have to be a little more creative I think sometimes. We definitely have learned to make it work within the set, we can switch guitars and play, and do all sorts of things now. It's cool, I mean, once we come back when the album is out we'll be playing alot more new songs. Like tonight we'll play 2 new songs, and then we'll play 2 songs off of 'Revolusongs'."
Sam: You guys sweeping through here again after the album is released? Is this just like, a little preview?
Derrick: "This is like a preview, and then plan is to come back here with a totally different package. Basically, we had planned to put together different types of bands to open up, we have alot of ideas floating around, maybe like a festival type thing. In the fall we want to come back for sure. There are so many really good hardcore bands right now, like, underground, that aren't super popular."