Cannibal Corpse – Alex Webster

Cannibal Corpse are easily one of the most well-recognised death metal bands in the world. Being known for their punishing tunes with ridiculously gory album covers and song titles, the band have gained a strong fanbase over the past 25 years as well as a lot of controversy, which includes not being able to sell their albums to minors in some countries, being pestered by religious and family first groups and not being allowed to play particular songs in certain countries. While a lot of this controversy has narrowed down recently, the band is still going strong, and just a couple of weeks ago saw them release their 12th studio album “Torture”. Following the release of that album, Metal Obsession’s Patrick Emmett had a chat to bassist Alex Webster about the new album and lyrical themes, Alex’s history as a musician, criticism of death metal, their soon-to-be-announced Australian tour and Ace Ventura.

Metal Obsession: So your most recent album Torture was released a couple of weeks ago. Has it been received well so far?

Alex Webster: Yeah it has. It seems to be received very well by the fans and the press, which is nice because that’s not how it always was for this band, that’s for sure. But yeah, it’s been a very good response so far. I think everyone can see that we’re definitely still working hard to try make the band better with each release, so people have reacted well to that.

Metal Obsession: After 12 studio albums, the band is still thinking of some of the most brutal ideas to write about. How do you do it? Is it Corpsegrinder on his own who writes all of the lyrics, or do the band brainstorm ideas together and try think of the craziest stuff possible?

Alex: Actually, George doesn’t write any of the lyrics, it’s our drummer Paul and me, I’m the bass player, Alex, and sometimes our guitar player Rob will help us write some lyrics. George actually voluntarily steps aside from the lyric writing process; he’s always been more of a singer than a writer. Once we have the lyrics written and arranged for him, he does a fantastic job. But it’s definitely something that I, Paul and Rob take care of, and we work individually on individual songs that we’ve chosen.

I will write the lyrics for the songs I wrote the music to, Paul writes the lyrics usually for the songs that Pat writes the music for, and Rob will write the lyrics for his own songs that he wrote music for. On this album, Paul also wrote the lyrics to a song that Rob wrote the music for. So there’s some pretty even division of song writing in this band, amongst the guys that actually do write. George is the only one that actually steps out of that part of the process, the rest of us contribute something song-writing-wise.

Metal Obsession: So where do you get the inspiration to write some of these songs?

Alex: There are a lot of different places you can draw influence from. Just the world itself is a very violent place. Just between these two interviews I was checking the newsfeed on my computer, and a human leg washed ashore recently about 50 miles south of where I live. It turns out they’ve identified that it’s a missing woman. So you see these kinds of things happen in real life, the kinds of things that we sing about; somebody being murdered and dismembered, and then having their body parts thrown into the water, that is unfortunately something that actually happens.

In addition to watching horror movies and reading horror books, novels and those sorts of things that you might expect, we also can take a bit of influence from things that we see on the news. I mean to me, that story is as gruesome and disturbing as just about any horror movie. It makes it more disturbing because it’s something that actually happened, unfortunately.

Metal Obsession: Let’s talk about your history as a musician. What inspired you to be a bassist in particular?

Alex: Well part of it was knowing that there were a lot more guitar players and more drummers around the town where I was growing up. I mean, I started when I was maybe 13 or 14. A long time before then, when I was 6, I had tried playing acoustic guitar and didn’t really care for it that much because I wasn’t being taught the kind of music I liked. When I decided to play an instrument again, I was around 13 or 14, and there seemed to be a void that needed to be filled in the neighbourhood as far as there were not a lot of bass players around.

Also, it seemed to me that bass was a little bit more of an easier instrument to master. At the time I wasn’t a musician, so I wasn’t looking to try and be Eddie Van Halen, I would have much rathered to try and be Michael Anthony. I was happy to take on a supportive role, because it seemed like it’d be a little more reasonable of a goal.

Also, I just like the sound of the bass. The bass sounds really good in a band if it’s sitting in the right place of a mix, I love how it sounds. A big influence for me at that time and to this day is Peter Baltes from Accept. He doesn’t play the world’s most technical bass parts, but they just fit with the drums and the guitar parts so well. So I’ve always liked the way that the bass can kind of pull together the drums and the guitar into one big rhythm machine.

Metal Obsession: You said in an interview that you initially started playing guitar but switched to bass because it was easier to master. Did you eventually master guitar?

Alex: No man. The period of time between when I played bass and when I played guitar was about 7 years. I played guitar when I was 6 years old for about 4 months, and then stopped, and I didn’t pick up an instrument again. The next instrument I did pick up and actually tried to learn was bass. I do have an electric guitar, an old one that I haven’t even touched in many years, and I had it around. When I was first playing bass I would also strum on the guitar a little bit.

But yeah, I never got around to mastering any instrument except for bass. And y’know, even that’s a work-in-progress of course, I’m still learning other things on bass that I used to do better than I can now. Bass is the only instrument I’m good enough at to play professionally. Guitar I’ve messed around with, I think everybody messes around with drums. When the drummer isn’t looking, they’ll go sit behind the kid and beat on them [laughs]. Bass is really the only instrument I’ve seriously pursued.

Metal Obsession: Do you still get pestered by religious and family first groups about your music?

Alex: Um, a little bit in Germany. Germany for some reason has been the trouble spot for us. They are very strict in certain parts of Germany, particularly Bavaria.  We’ve had situations where we weren’t allowed to play certain songs at some concerts, and there are certain albums that we aren’t allowed to sell to anyone under the age of 18. So those kinds of things are still happening there, it hasn’t been a big problem anywhere else.

As far as free and open societies are concerned, obviously certain places in the Middle-East where they’re very strict and religiously conservative, well we’re not going to be available there what-so-ever. But that’s not to say we don’t have fans there by the way, there are plenty of death metal fans in Iran and Saudi Arabia, they just have to keep it kind of low key so they don’t get in trouble. But yeah, in the more open Western societies, the only country we really have problems in is Germany. For the rest of them, it’s eased up a bit.

Metal Obsession: What are your thoughts on how the death metal genre is stereotyped?

Alex: I think that like any stereotype, it’s generally based on ignorance and just somebody summing something up very quickly without studying it. Like people who think that death metal musicians are a bunch of idiots that don’t know how to play or something like that, and that they’re all promoting violence. They just haven’t taken a look at what it’s actually about and how serious the musicians are in this kind of scene, or in this genre as I should say. A lot of the criticism of death metal I hear is created on a base of ignorance. And it’s unfortunate; I think that a lot of the people who criticize death metal wouldn’t do it if they took a closer look at it.

Metal Obsession: Before your 2009 tour in Australia where politicians tried to ban the tour, someone off the Australian comedy show Chasers: War on Everything did a lounge music cover of Rancid Amputation on national TV, quoting “It’s not the lyrics that are the problem, it’s the music.” Have you seen this cover on YouTube? If so, what do you think of it?

Alex: Yeah I have, and it’s fantastic! I love it! The guy who did it proves a point, he said our lyrics on TV and there were no problems, so it is the music. And quite frankly, to add to his point, I’d like to remind people that the movies like Saw, Hostile, any of the modern horror movies that feature real graphic violence and scenes of torture and murder, these movies are very, very popular and they earn millions and millions of dollars. Not only that, but they are far more popular than even the biggest death metal bands.

So I think it’s fair to say that violence and horror/entertainment like horror movies or novels that feature violence, are actually a lot more mainstream than death metal music. And the lyrics of death metal, as graphic as they might be for a band like us who focuses on the gorier side of horror, those lyrics are not really the underground part of the band. The underground part is the music. Horror lyrics are apparently mainstream if you judge by the success of some of these horrifying movies at the box office.

Metal Obsession: I’m sure every Cannibal Corpse fan from down under wants to know, when will you be coming back to Australia?

Alex: We’re working on setting up a tour for October. At the moment, it’s not completely confirmed to this point, but we hope to have it confirmed within a week or two, and then there should be an announcement within a month. There should be a full on press release and an announcement to let you guys know when we’re coming. But we’re hoping to come in October of this year, twenty-twelve, so we can’t wait and play some stuff off of Torture for you guys.

Metal Obsession: What bands are you hoping to bring along for the tour?

Alex: We don’t usually have very much to say about that. It’s usually the choice of the local tour company. But the last time we had bands travel with us I believe it was Psycroptic, and of course we think they’re an incredible band. So we’d love to do shows with them again, but I suspect that since we’ve already been on tour with them, that the tour company will add some different bands. Sometimes we just play with local support, meaning bands from the various cities that we’re in, like if we play Sydney we’ll play with bands from Sydney.

But it would be interesting to do a “tour” tour down there, and like I said we have done that. There was some talk about Cerebral Bore being with us, but I don’t know if that’s true or not. That would be a nice bill though, Cannibal Corpse and Cerebral Bore.

Metal Obsession: Prior touring countries, do you ever check out some of the local acts in each city just to see what’s going on and what bands are big?

Alex: Not as much as I used to, and I probably should do that, but it’s something that I haven’t done as much as I used to. We would definitely do that in the old days, there were a lot less bands back then too, and we were going to a lot less places, so it was easier to keep track of everything. At this point, we don’t do that as much, but if you have any recommendations, I’ll try and check some of them out before we get down there.

Metal Obsession: I recommend The Ophidian Ascension from Melbourne, and Empires Fall from Geelong, about an hour from Melbourne. Since we’re doing this interview over Skype, I’ll send you their Facebook page after this call.

Alex: Cool, I’ll check them out! There’s a band that I like a lot, they’re sort of like a Brain Drill/Origin kind of band from Perth, and they’re called Entrails Eradicated. I don’t know if you’ve heard of them, but they’re from Perth and I think they’re killer. Obviously I like Psycroptic from Tasmania, and then of course all the old classics too like Sadistic Execution. Obviously Australia has had a long history of really savage metal; Slaughter Lord, y’know, bands like that.

Metal Obsession: Tell me a bit about the last time you played Australia.

Alex: We had a great time! It’s always a challenging tour because there is so much flying involved. Y’know, you have to fly from city to city, but yeah we had a great time. We played with a band called Ouruboros in Sydney and they were cool. The place in Sydney I remember really well, because it was this big round place. We always have a great time when we play in Australia; Soundworks, the company that brings us there always does a great job, and the fans there are great.

We had a lot of fun hanging out there with everybody. Obviously there is no language barrier, so it’s just an easy, instant hangout. Just like being in America or whatever, it’s very, very easy to hang out with people because we all speak in the same language and what-not. Not that people don’t speak English in Europe, it’s their second language so it’s easy. We love to play Australia; it’s very relaxed and a great environment for us to play in. The crowds always go totally mental, they love it. So it’s one of our favourite places to play.

Metal Obsession: Do you ever think Jim Carrey will try and get you in one of his movies again?

Alex: I doubt it! [laughs] When we did the first movie and met him, he seemed to be quite interested in what we were doing and said that he owned a couple of albums. But I’ve heard recently that he isn’t actually that interested in this kind of music and it was just something that he was into for a very brief period of time. So I kind of doubt that we’re on his radar anymore [laughs]. But you never know, I mean, I would certainly be open to the idea.

Metal Obsession: So what was it like being in Ace Ventura?

Alex: It was cool, y’know. I mean, gosh it’s been 19 years now since we did that movie! We shot it way back in the spring of 1993, so it’s been a long, long time. I still remember it pretty well, it was fun and we learned about the movie industry a bit by doing it. Just watching how they film a movie and how they have to film each scene so many times to get a useable take.  And they filmed each scene from different angles, so we learned a bit about how something like that was made and it was pretty interesting. We were down there for two days filming; they actually filmed a lot more footage than they ended up using. There were other scenes they filmed that didn’t make it into the movie. But yeah, it was an interesting experience, something we’d be happy to do again. It’s been ages since we did it, so I’m not holding my breath for that next movie opportunity, after 19 years that’s been the only one [laughs].

Metal Obsession: Last question, what is the most influential horror film or story to you?

Alex: I would say The Exorcist. That movie and The Shining are my two favourite horror movies. Neither of them is gory really, they’re just frightening. I particularly like The Exorcist because it was the best movie that featured an Anti-Christ or satanic kind of figure, the best movie that features the devil. There have been a lot of imitators since then, but I think that the original is the best one. I can still watch it and be creeped out by it to this day.

Metal Obsession: Any famous last words?

Alex: I’d just like to say thanks to everyone who supports Cannibal Corpse, and especially thanks to our fans down in Australia. We hope to see you before the end of the year!