You guys are touring with Decrepit Birth and Broken Hope among other bands, in North America. How has it been so far?
Good. We had a couple of smaller shows, in smaller markets that we probably shouldn’t have played. But other than that, the shows have been great. We played “Frisco” [San Francisco] last night; it must have been close to 500 people at the show… it was raging! Those kids went nuts. NY was off the hook too, Chicago… all the major markets have been slamming.

You have been touring almost non-stop for the last couple of years…
Humm… last year, during the summer, we took off because we were writing. But, other than that, yeah, we’ve been on the road a lot. We try to keep no more than 4 weeks at a time, then get home and then [after that] go do another run somewhere. [We do that] because we all have families, so…

By doing these little breaks, do you still need time for a big break or do they help you guys keep on going without “vacation time”?
Yeah, that helps. Like I said, we are pushing to go home and see our families. But, we always rehearse… we get home and within a week or two we are back in the studio rehearsing, trying to create stuff.

You guys are no longer with Candlelight Records and there were some talks about you guys having some conversations with Century media about a possible “relationship”. Is this still going on?
Oh yeah. In fact, I think someone was supposed to be here today with a paper for us to give the power attorney to our lawyer.

They gave us a short form of the contract, we’ve adjusted it and they agreed to everything that we wanted to do so it looks like we are probably going to sign it.

What was cool about it is that we’ve known Robert Kampf (he is “the” dude for Century Media, German guy) since 1990. So, it is like we are almost joining a family, because we know some of the people there, and our band is like a family too so it’s a warm fuzzy feeling.

Now that you know that this will probably happen, do you have any idea of when you will release new material?
We’ve got a 3 song EP and we are going to put it on 7 inch vinyl only, picture disk. We will have it for download too but there will not be a CD. People are probably upset about it but, we are going to go hardcore traditional, something cool, to make it special. We’ve got the songs ready. We started recording them before the summer but then we went on tour for 6 weeks in Europe and then now we are doing this [North American tour]. Right when we get home, I hope that in within two weeks, we will get that stuff finished so we can turn it in to Century Media so they can hopefully, by the end of the year, head that out.

And then, finish up writing we have another dozen songs we want to finish…

get those done. Hopefully, no later than next spring, we will have a full length done and recorded.



How hard it is for a band NOT to have a label?
Humm… it’s a lot of work. In fact, before this whole Century Media thing came up, we were talking to a guy who was going to given us a whole chunk of money to start our label… ourselves. We thought: “We can do this ourselves because, we have been in this industry long enough to know the ends and outs”.

But mainly, you need distribution so you have to hook up with a distribution company at least, so they can put it in stores. To do it right, there is a lot of labor you got to take care of, you know? The marketing side, getting interviews done, make sure everybody do their part, following up… so, it is a lot of work. You almost have to have one person hired, who is not in the band, to maybe administrate the label for you.

It’s a lot of work but, I think that maybe in the future, it’s going to be even easier with the whole digital “thing”… at least get your music out there. It is easier today, with the Internet, than it has ever been. That helps but the whole management side of it is a lot of work. For a young man to try to tackle it, without the experience, it would be difficult to be successful at it, I think.

I heard that even with a label, the distribution may not even be that good…
Oh yeah, like Candlelight! Kids didn’t even know that our last album, “Darkest Day”, was out in the market. It was terrible! Whatever…

Was that one of the reasons that made you guys decide to leave the label?
We had a two album licensing agreement with them. The first album, they seemed to do ok on it but on the second, it is like they didn’t even care. Literally, it was so bad that we were in London, with the home offices [Candlelight’s main office is located in London], touring for the new album that had just came out three months prior but no one from the label came to the show, they set up no interview or nothing [like that]. Think about that!

So, now, we hired our own PR person because, no matter what, we are sure that stuff is taken care of, from that end of things. Because we couldn’t believe it! We were blown away. And when that happened, we were like: “We’re done! This is not right!” Even at the hometown of the label, the reps don’t even show up and do a photo shoot or anything… pretty weird.

It was funny because the guy [from Candlelight] was upset because I said something to a magazine about how “they dropped the ball”. He was like: “Why are you talking crap…” [making a really weird voice]. Well, I’m just talking the truth! That’s all! You “is” what you “is” (laughs).

I don’t understand anyway: why you want to be a label and put money into an album and not try to push it? Makes no sense… wha

t’s the point “Beaves”?? (laughs) Anyway… enough with that crap (laughs).

Now, with Century Media, do you have any plans to go to places you guys haven’t been yet?
Maybe China… That will happen and stuff like that, hopefully. And maybe get back down to Australia which always seems difficult to get to. We’ve been there a couple of times but…

Any ideas of the direction that the new album will take?
Musically? It is just pure, heavy freaking death metal like everyone expects from Obituary. Nothing new… (I’m not going to say it is, because it isn’t). It’s just brutal, groovy, catchy hooks left and right, just fun old school death metal. Every Obituary fan will be satisfied.

Talking about the death metal scene: do you see any space for growth?
Musically, you mean? Humm…without something new like putting saxophones and violins… I don’t know. I mean, you can’t really get heavier, I don’t think. You can’t get any faster either. Actually, I think it loses its heaviness when it goes too fast. When it gets technical the heaviness is lost, I think.

I mean, I don’t know… hopefully somebody comes up with something fresh and new that makes me happy. I still listen to “Hell Awaits” and “Morbid Tales” and Sabbath, you know? The old stuff… I mean, Hail of Bullets is bad ass but those guys are old too, they are playing old school death metal.

We were just in Europe and I couldn’t wait because Savatage was going to play. That’s what I wanted to hear. Well, it was actually Jon Oliva’s Pain; they play the whole “Hall of the Mountain King” album. It was amazing! It was so killer I had a tear rolling down my face when they were playing.

Talking about the people we have lost in the metal scene: which one do you miss the most?
I could only imagine what Randy Rhoads would be doing today because what he was doing then was insane, you know? And no one plays like him. Still to this day… no one plays like Randy Rhoads, you know? Pretty unique character… I miss him.

And Criss Oliva too, from Savatage! Died so young, created this beautiful thing and it was taken quick from us.

Going back to Obituary now: any plans for next year? What is in the agenda?
Hopefully we will get the new album done. No shows are booked. Hopefully the album will come out at spring time and then we will go over do the big festivals in the summer in Europe. I hope we can do the Wacken fest again; we haven’t played there for 4 or 5 years. I don’t know what happened…. Why we haven’t been back? It’s kind of freaking me out… I’m like: “Come on!” I love that festival.

Any messages to the SOM readers?
Horns up baby!!! Keep metal alive!!!