After an absence of 12 years from Australian stages, Cannibal Corpse is embarking on a tour in support of their latest album appropriately titled Kill. The band has been on the road for the past two months with the Sounds of the Underground Tour and I managed to get a hold of Alex Webster at his home in Tampa, Florida, where he is relaxing for a few weeks before their trek to Australia.

Cannibal Corpse have definitely grown from their beginnings in 1989. The banning of albums in Germany, the censorship of albums practically across the whole globe, still have not hindered their progress. Sounds of the Underground featured bands such as In Flames, Trivium, Black Dahlia Murder and Behemoth along with headliners As I Lay Dying to name a few,  Playing with such ‘commercial’ metal bands like In Flames and As I Lay Dying, has brought more widespread acceptance for Cannibal Corpse in the ‘commercial’ metal market without having to sugar coat their material and image. I asked Webster his thoughts on sharing the stage with those bands.

“It was definitely something we weren’t used to,” Webster says. “Of course. we’ve been pretty much touring with mostly brutal death metal and really fast black metal bands for most of our career. We’ve never done something like this before. Except when you play the occasional big festival, like Wacken or something then you’re playing with a wide variety of bands like this.”
 
“But to actually to do a whole tour where it’s a festival tour with a wide variety of bands, I think it turned out really well for us. Definitely. We got along fine with the other bands. They’re all bunch of nice guys. Very professional and everything. And I think for the most part the audience; they all seemed to like us. And if they didn’t like us, they didn’t let us know. You know we weren’t getting things thrown at us or anything. It seemed to be really good for us. Like I said if people didn’t like us. They just whatever … went and did something else. You know how it is at a festival. There are other things you can do. But we always had really good responses every night. So it seemed to go really well.”

Former member, guitarist Rob Barrett has joined the fold again, bringing back the intensity of The Bleeding and Vile days. Most Australian fans would have witnessed Cannibal Corpse on DVD with Live Cannibalism or Monolith of Death Tour. Barrett fuels their brutality both musically and personally and the leaving of founding member Jack Owen didn’t faze the group.

“The frontline of our band is really going pretty sick,” Webster says. “And it’s been working better than it has in a long time. Our stage presence has improved with Rob back in the band.”

Moving on to the new album Kill, I was curious about the thrashy elements of the album. “Obviously we are a death metal band but I think there’s definitely that Slayer influence in our music.” Webster states. “Those kinds of things have always been an influence for us, as far as how we write, and this album is no exception. But I think just having Rob in there and Rob really likes that more thrashy side of death metal and Pat does as well, so you know having those two guys working together and have a similar guitar sound which is very death thrash really crunchy guitar sound. I think it just came together naturally and it did end up having a little bit more of that slayerish kind of evil thrash sound.”

Considering Kill sees a trashy spin on their material once again, much like their beginnings I felt the need to quiz Webster on his opinion of each Cannibal Corpse release. To put him on his toes I asked him for a one word answer for each album.

Eaten Back to Life: “primitive”
Butchered at Birth: “brutal”
Tomb of the Mutilated: “bass”
The Bleeding: “difficult”
Vile: “evil”
Gallery of Suicide: “long”
Bloodthirst: “fast”
Gore Obsessed: “distorted”
The Wretched Spawn: “clean”
Kill: “violent!”

With 10 full length albums under their belts, a mass of touring across America, Europe, South America, Canada and England, it’s all hard work being the biggest death metal band there is. They’ve hit the one million album mark and it doesn’t look like they are going to slow down anytime soon. The saying goes that there’s no rest for the wicked, and Cannibal Corpse definitely don’t seem to rest that much.

Whether they’re writing new material, recording their new album, touring across the globe, the boys of Cannibal Corpse sure have come a long way. Long enough that the hard work has paid off for them to live the dream of writing, recording and playing death metal as their employment. “We’ve been able to keep things going as the band for quite a while now. We actually tour often enough in Europe and the United States that we’re able to make ends meet. If we didn’t tour we wouldn’t be able to.

“Between the sales of merchandise and doing a lot of touring for each album, basically we’ve never taken a rest either,” Webster continues. “If you look at our album catalogue we’ve had an album out at least once every two years. So we’re either making a record or touring in support of it. So we’ve been able to keep from having to work and make ends meet just with the band.”

But is it all glory and mansions for the band? Alex replies with obvious laughter “We’re not living in mansions or driving Lamborghinis,” he says. “Trust me.” 

We come to the obvious topic of the Australian tour. 12 years is a long time to wait for anything. Finally the Australian ‘ban’ has been lifted and they are returning to our shores with an extra seven albums worth of material since the last time they hit our stages. So what can Australian audiences expect?

“A very energetic, enthusiastic, tight performance on stage,” he says. “We try to make sure we play the songs pretty much exact the way are on the record or very close. At the same time we want to have a high energy level. Like a ton of head banging. So I think that yeah people will be impressed with the energy level. That added enthusiasm of having it be a place that we don’t play all the time.” The lads of Cannibal Corpse are not going to disappoint anyone here or New Zealand. “

They know it’s been a long time, we know it’s been a long time and they are coming to destroy stages across the country. And if their next tour is in another 12 years? He laughs at the thought. “We all will be in our 50s or late 40s,” he jokes. 

See Cannibal Corpse on the following dates:

October 3: The Hifi Bar, Melbourne
October 4: The Gaelic Club, Sydney
October 5: The Arena, Brisbane
October 6: 420, Auckland
October 7: Indigo Bar, Wellington
October 8: Gaelic Club, Sydney
October 9: Fowlers Live, Adelaide
October 10: Club Capitol, Perth