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Cephalic Carnage - Steve Goldberg

16/01/05 || Global Domination

Cephalic Carnage

_This interview is made by pornstar/staff-girl Tash, and the following bullshit is what she had to say for an intro:

I remember how I discovered Cephalic Carnage as clearly as though it were yesterday. Some South American freak that used to inundate my mailbox with violent outbursts wouldn’t let me rest until I’d heard Cephalic Carnage, and his way of making sure I did just that was to send me an mp3 of “Hybrid”, the first track off “Exploiting Dysfunction”. Of course, the intro to that song is a little on the muffled side, so I upped the volume. I heard Lenzig mutter “listen” and then all hell broke loose. Needless to say, I shat myself, fell in love with the band instantly, and just had to drop anybody from the band a line to complain about my soiled panties. Steve replied, and the rest is history._

Global Domination: Jesus, Steve. You’ve no idea how strange it is approaching you in an interview situation when we’ve already been talking shit for years, and I fucken hope you’re stoned for this rather momentous occasion…

Steve: Actually I am.

Things are definitely hotting up for Cephalic Carnage. Apart from the heavy touring you’ve been doing over the last year and half or so (has it been longer?) you guys just played a local (Denver) festival with a couple of gay bands. How did you guys go down with all that?? Did I just say go down? Be thankful the preposition was “with” and not “on” or this is all would have gone South really quickly.

I was just in a Bad Mood that day. Alabama Thunderpussy was playing down the street and I wanted to check them out. But the show we did was killer. Catheter was on it, they are probably the sickest crusty / grind band from Denver. There were some other local bands on it too that were entertaining. One band was a 2 piece, kind of like Pig Destroyer style. But the guitarist/singer was wearing a diaper and fish net stockings…like I said, entertaining.

Now, if you don’t mind me getting a bit of history out the way, as far as I understand, in 1996 you and John waddled over from Molester to reform a then disbanded Cephalic Carnage. How did that happen? Were Cephalic Carnage thinking of reforming and recruited you guys, or did it happen in a stoned moment? Because you guys do smoke weed. Copious amounts of it too, judging from the artwork on ‘Conforming to Abnormality’...

Well, they just got back from a tour I think and the drummer and guitar player quit. And there was a show one night out here with Kataklysm, Monstrosity and Dying Fetus. We were all getting nice and drunk in the bar, and Zac asked John if he wanted to record some songs with them. I was standing right there and they needed another guitar player too, so we agreed to record a demo with them. Everything went so well we all decided to stick together and see what would happen. So I guess it was more of a drunk moment than a stoned one.

At this point, I think I have to eludicate my introduction somewhat so as not to confuse the masses, who probably think I called you a retard. Back when our paths first crossed, I exclaimed my surprise at you guys being able to play as fast as you do smoking the amount of weed you do, whereupon you grinned “no..I’m the slow one”. Nice footwork babe – you evaded the question rather skillfully, but my question still stands. So how do you do it? I mean…marijuana slows one down, and there’s nothing slow about that way you guys approach your music – you included.

You either have a good memory, or you’re making shit up, cause I don’t remember saying that! But I guess sometimes it makes us lazy and not want to be at practice. It doesn’t affect our playing in any way. Maybe the drummer, but that’s more understandable. We just pull our chairs and sit down and be lazy. When we smoke before we play live, it’s almost half pointless. By the third song we have sweated out whatever we smoked.

Must be the famed short term memory loss combined with our general shit-talking – I’d never make shit up and my memory is excellent (I always remember your birthday dude).

I can’t even remember my mom’s birthday.

So how much do you guys smoke?

More then we can afford.

Were you guys drunk and stoned (or just stoned) when you came up with the term “hydro-grind”? The word play is too clever to not have been weed-inspired (and I refuse to believe you guys are naturally punny). Who came up with it anyway, and how is it different from regular grind?

I don’t remember who made it up. It came from the hyper-blast term people would say about bands like Cryptopsy. So we just changed it to hydrogrind, cause it doesn’t make sense, and we like it that way.

Right. Back to the history lesson. I wasn’t done with it, I just went on one of my Legendary Digressions. Whoah. Nice name for an album, don’t you think? Sounds like it could have been one of yours…

Similar, it does make for a good album title.

Effective too, since I went on one again. Just now. Did you notice, or were you too stoned?

Ted Sanchez.

So. After the release of the second demo, Headfucker Records released “Conforming to Abnormality” in 1998. You guys must have shat yourselves that some unknown label in Italy of all places chose to release the first album. Since then, Headfucker must have gone under since they’re just nowhere around. Any plans to re-release “Conforming…”?

We have repressed it under our own record label. Highbryd Records. You can get it through our website. That’s cephaliccarnage.net , ... again its c – e – p – h – a – l – i – c carnage dot n – e – t.

After the release of “Conforming..”, Jawsh took over bass duties from Doug Williams (now of Origin), the band joined Relapse, and set to work tailoring and sharpening their style for a new album; maintaining frenetic extremity and exploring the darker side of weird with respects to grindcore. It seemed to happen around the same time that bands like DEP began to destroy audiences across America. Bearing in mind you guys display a similar (but not the same) tendency to use elements of jazz to freak the Christ out of the unsuspecting, would you say that they had any influence on Cephalic’s music, or was it just a coincidental yet natural progression in your songwriting process? (and for the record, I’m NOT saying you sound like DEP...)

I don’t think they influenced us too much at first. None of us heard of DEP before we wrote a lot of our songs, up through Exploiting. When I read interviews with DEP, it seems like they were into a lot of the exact same stuff we were all into growing up. A lot of the Earache crazy bands like O. L. D. and Naked City and stuff, and the Earache grind bands like Terrorizer and Napalm Death. I think it’s just different interpretations of what both bands grew up on. But now that we are all more familiar with DEP we have parts here and there that probably sound like they are influenced from them.

Do you ever get shit from the grind purists?

Of course. If we didn’t sign such a huge mega deal with Relapse, and didn’t have new Cars, and Houses, and Vacations to Taiwan every 4 months, they wouldn’t talk shit.

Why jazz?

I don’t know. We don’t even have too many traditional jazz parts. We are going to go for country / western next.

That sounds like an interesting swing. And good news for all the country / western fans we have at Global Domination (and we have plenty). I suppose it’s way too soon for a spoiler, but I’m wondering if the vocals will change over the c/w parts of if you’ll be doing that as a sort of intrumental interlude in the middle of the hectic parts…Have you practically fucked around with it or is that all still in the embryonic idea stage?

It’s going to sound like a dump truck falling off of the empire state building.

Moving right along…now…you guys went on tour with DEP after the release of “Exploiting…”. That must have fucking killed, but at the time, the oddball fusion of influences and styles both bands toy around with was still a new thing to the ear. What was the crowd response like and what was the most memorable thing that happened on that tour?

The crowd response was great. The band Drowning Man was on it too. We were definitely a little different type of band for that package, being more of a metal based band, rather than a hardcore based band. But for the most part the kids response was real good. 5 years later, and it was still some of the best shows we’ve ever had. And we found out that vegans have the worst smelling farts.

I could have told you that! By the way, thanks for the Mastodon tip. You’re also solely responsible for exposing me to Converge and Botch. Now…there are a bunch of perverts out there who might look at that last sentence and snigger….but you know what I mean. Speaking of exposure and shit…now would be a good time to tell me about your influences. What made you pick up a guitar in the first place? Who can we blame?

Learning Metallica songs is pretty much how I learned to play guitar. I was also into Megadeth, Anthrax, Slayer, then it moved to Sepultura, Kreator, Death, etc. Then it moved to Carcass, Terrorizer, Morbid Angel, etc…

What’s catching your fancy these days?

The Red Chord, Ion Dissonance, Neuraxis, Estradasphere, Secret Chiefs 3.

I haven’t heard of the first 3 you mentioned, but since a lot of the things we like are similar, I think you’d better spill. On Esphere and SC3, all I can say is your taste is remarkably good bro.

What can I say, we have a lot of good mexican food here.

I don’t have “Lucid Intervals” (a flogging offence, I know – I plead poverty and third world status as mitigating circumstances), but it seems to be the one that people are murmuring about the most. You guys have been promoting it for ages now…the press tout it as one of the most ambitious grind releases to date (a description that makes my sphincter twitch with anticipation). So what’s next?

You’re a jerk for not having the CD, and I won’t answer this question until you at least get a burned copy! .... jerk.

Bitch. I’m still waiting for you to send it to me. It’s fucking impossible to get your shit in South Africa you know – and that’s part of the reason why you haven’t come down here yet. I spoke to Wayne from Witchdoctor Records about you guys, that you’re hot enough to squawked about by the likes of Cannibal Corpse (who wanna come here), so you should be worth it. He looked at me and asked what you guys sound like as he’d never heard of you before (but at least he knows my taste and knows I don’t make a fuss about nothing when it comes to music). Bringing bands down here is more of a task (and more difficult) than it would be to organise a tour in say, Europe, so you’d first have to be known. As it stands, I’m your biggest (and only) fan down here so I was hardly likely to find somebody with a copy I could burn. I assume I’ll find everything in Sweden, so I won’t be without it for long. But still. If you want to see Africa, it’s time to expose yourself. I’ll help you with that in my own fashion, but that’s another discussion for another time. Remind me to be in touch with you in that specific regard. That is, if your short term memory holds….

It will hold like a 5 pound anvil.

Europe saw you guys this year on a tour with Exhumed and then Macabre. Did they understand you?? Europe I mean, not Exhumed or Macabre…(!!)

Heck yea, the tours were both killer. Hopefully next year we can get on some of the festivals that go on out there.

Now…apart from touring with Cephalic Carnage, you also happen to pimp yourself out to bands like Goatwhore as guitar tech. How on earth do you manage to find the time for all that?

I was Immolation’s tech instead of Goatwhore’s, but they were both on tour together at the time. Zac was about to have a baby, so we took a little time off so he could get situated. So during that break, that’s how I spent my time. In the middle of the tour we got to play the show here in Colorado, so it worked out good.

On top of all that, you also have side projects. I’m not even sure how to explain them to the masses, but I think they’re pretty special in their own right. mAd_c0w because it is quite fucken mad and chaotic, with some song titles I still have a giggle at…and…well…I think you’d better explain Sons Of Rurik. But first mAd-c0w. This is a side project you started with merd, who does your album insleeves and shit. Spill, taco-eater.

It’s a drum machine silly grindcore band. We used to have a killer mp3.com site up, but that’s long gone. You can get a few mp3s from www.level36recordings.com. Relapse is putting out a CD called The Days the Machines Took Over the World. It’s a bunch of drum machine bands, and mAd_c0w will have a couple songs on it.

And Sons Of Rurik?? I think that one deserves some pecial attention. Special as in ‘retarded’. Have you received any hatemail from true Vikings over that band??

Songs of Rurik is silly viking metal. No hatemail yet, but I’d love to see some. You can also download songs at www.level36recordings.com You can also get a lot more weird funny stuff from there.

Do you ever play live with any of your side projects??

Songs of Rurik played 3 shows. I was on tour with Cephalic during 2 of them, but I got to play one, and it was awesome, there are videos of all the shows I think, maybe someday we can post them on the website.

So can you sit there and tell me that you have played “Coming From Norway” live?? (and were you wearing the horns?)

Yeah I think we played that song, of course I had on the horns, I would not be allowed to play if I wasn’t wearing them!

And speaking of live shows – it has been stated that a Cephalic Carnage show is something you have to see to believe. Apart from playing instruments at breakneck speed and having material that will melt the brain out your head, what exactly do you guys get up to? I take it you have no dancing goth chicks and stupid props – that’s pretty gay…

If there are gothic chicks on the stage when we play, we will attack them! We have done it once, we have no problem doing it again. “play some sexy jazz”...come on! We actually break dance and do a bunch of acrobatics while we play.

You attacked goth chicks. Riiiight. Smudging their mascara doesn’t count you know…I heard you got smacked at a show once upon a time…

Smacked up? Maybe you’re talking about the time I took heroin and shat myself? I don’t know…

Hmmm…I can only roll my eyes and say nothing. With respects to Global Domination, I used to think I was alone in my Trey Spruance worship, but we have another afflicted one on the staff, and probably a couple who come in to read us…I can’t let this interview end without discussing John’s tour of duty in the Secret Chiefs 3 camp. And if you say that’s something I’ll have to talk to him about, I’ll brain you. How the fuck did that all happen? Is he a permanent member of SC3 now or is he just filling in?

It started when Estradasphere and SC3 went on tour together. Estradasphere is one of the only bands I’ve never heard of that completely floored me live. They are definitely one of my favorite bands of all time. So we got to meet the guys in Estrda, and we kept in touch with them. Their drummer had left, and they wanted John to record their metal songs with them, and they said SC3 needed a metal drummer for some parts. So the lucky bastard John flew out to California and recorded with both bands. He is not a permanent member of either band, but he is supposed to be on the next nine SC3 albums.

Fuck. Estradasphere IS fucking good. Pity they’re not better known out there. Ditto to SC3 – the fact that they have another 9 albums forthcoming is the best news I’ve had all year. Doing drums on those 9 will probably be tantamount to a university degree in drumming, which will be beneficial to Cephalic Carnage I imagine. Which reminds me. Have you ever collaborated on a track or two with any of the bands you’ve been on tour with (and if not, got any plans to?)?

We’ve talked about it, but no collaborations yet.

Part of you must have gone “whoah”...and burst with pride. I mean, one of THE geniuses of the planet picks your drummer to be his drummer. That speaks fucking volumes. I suppose it’s not that difficult being in 2 bands at the same time, but did it ever cross your mind that maybe John would leave Cephalic to be with SC3 full time??

It did cross my mind, but I don’t think John would leave us. We would beat him silly.

You know…you’re looking more and more Mexican as time goes on. Is this a result of all those taco’s you’ve been abusing? And don’t lie… I remember all the virtual food obsessions like it was yesterday. Hmm. It WAS yesterday…

I was going to name my cat Taco, but my girlfriend wasn’t having it.

Interesting syntax, babe. So when are you going back to Europe??

Most likely when the next CD comes out.

I’ll definitely see you then. I mean…we have to at least get stoned together in person for a change. You’re not afraid are you?

Please bring weed or hash to the show!!!!! We had a hard time finding anything last time. And I’m only afraid of balloons and whistles!

Consider it done. By the way – do you still listen to Groinchurn?

I haven’t listened to them in the longest time, but I bust out the red shirt every now and then, thanks again for it!

Excellent. I suppose I’d better let you get on with it as I could carry on talking with you for ever and some of it may be of interest to the masses, but mostly they’d have their eyebrows raised. They’d only understand us up to a point, hermano. Thanks for the chat.

Interviews