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."