Cattle Decapitation is one of those bands who seems to just get better with time. They started out as a high quality deathgrind that imnitially stayed close to the genre’s traditions but expanded their sound with every release. In 2012, that expansion took a major turn with the release of Monolith of Inhumanity. The band added more melody, more grooves and the songs were catchier but still as brutal as ever and it resulted in it being their most well received album yet. Three years later, they went even further on The Anthropocene Extinction, expanding on the elements that worked so well on the previous album and, once again, people were claiming that it was their strongest album yet (including the editors her at The Thanks List), even considering how much love Monolith of Humanity had received. Cattle Decapitation is a rare example of a band reaching their prime more than 20 years ater coming into existence. They’re on a run! Needless to say that we have every reason to be excited for their upcoming record, Death Atlas, which comes out November 29th on Metal Blade Records. We met with guitarist Josh Elmore before their set at Heavy Montreal this summer to talk about good music!
Can you tell us a bit about five of your favorite albums of all time and what makes them so important to you?
As I think most people in the same situation of being ravenous music people, it’s so hard. There’s almost a top 3 and then the rotating others. I’ll just throw out five that are extremely important to me and will always be in the top 10. Let’s see. I would say 16 HORSEPOWER’s Secret South album, which came out in maybe 2000 or something like that, which is frightening to think about. If people aren’t familiar with the band, I’ve heard it described as Southern Gothic mixed L.A. Post-Punk, like GUN CLUB or something like that. It’s one of the most important album. Just amazing, pick it up. It’s very swampy and very kind of creepy sounding. The main guy – and I’m sorry to the other two fellows in the band-, is extremely religious, in a very early American, colonial way, almost agnostic Christianity, whereas the other guys are just regular heathen, you know? So it’s this push-pull between these Heaven and Hell worlds, both in the lyrical content and the music, and it’s just phenomenal. It’s a more Rockier album of theirs, a little more amplified. Some of the earlier stuff is almost more Americana, not in the singer/ songwriter way but more Folk, Appalachian sort of instrumentation. I’m not a religious person myself but regardless of that, it just transcends anyone’s beliefs and it’s such an emotional and hard hitting album. I could still listen to it today and be just as affected by it as when I started getting into it.
To continue with this same person from 16 Horsepower, David Eugene Edwards, after that band dissolved in 2005, he formed another band called WOVENHAND, which is now just him and other players and he can be that much more focused on his beliefs. Songs called Oh, Father, that sort of thing but it’s not Christian music; in interviews, he’s like, “I cannot stand that garbage.” He’s this outsider, sort of left of center kind of character, but he’s got a family and everything like that. He’s just this character. But the Wovenhand album from 2006, called Mosaic, is another one that is extremely important to me. A little more sparse than 16 Horsepower, a little more apocalyptic and depressive but Droney. It’s another great album that, if people like heavy music, they can put that on and go, “this is not my normal thing but it’s impactful and I enjoy it.” And people who have no exposure to heavy music can be very brought in by the vocals and some of the sad pretty moments and everything. So that’s another one of mine. I would say that he puts out great content, back to front, his catalogue from 16 Horsepower and Wovenhand, and the cameos he does with other people are just fantastic.
In the more Metal area, I would say EMPEROR, Anthems to the Welkin at Dusk, that’s one of my most important albums. Came out in ’97 and it’s everything Black Metal should be. It’s a little more grandiose than some of the stripped down stuff. There’s kind of synth-y orchestral stuff here and there, but it’s just ripping. By today’s standards, it sounds relatively noisy, but not at the time, it was this big masterpiece. It’s the perfect amount of ripping brutality with emotion and musical depth. It’s a very typical album so it’s not like I’m going to turn anyone onto it, I mean, I hope I do but it’s something…that album’s a motherfucker! I love it.
What else? I could say stuff that I grew up listening to. That first CHRISTOPHER CROSS album, with Ride like the wind and all that stuff on it. My mom listened to that. When I was eight, I asked for a boombox for my birthday, so I could listen to music on my own radio and buy tapes and everything. My mom acted like, “Oh, I don’t know what music you like”, so she could buy something she wanted to hear. So I got my little cheesy General Electric boombox, and she bought me -well, bought her- that Christopher Cross one with the Flamingo on cover and all the hits on it. Even though I wanted my VAN HALEN, and my whatever Hard Rock, like RATT and stuff, I can’t argue with that songwriting man. Those tones and everything, it’s just great, you know? So that’s another one, I think that was more of the personal history for me, making it more impactful.
Other than that, probably Van Halen I. I bought 1984 first, that was my first cassette I ever bought but man, I listened to Van Halen I until that tape snapped. 1984 was what was on the radio but then I went backwards bought all the records and that one, that early energy explosion. I love that record. Oh, it’s making me remember, Garage days Revisited, 1987. That record is my favorite METALLICA record! *Haha* The recording is amazing, the songs are compact and energetic and it just sounds great. It’s off the cuff but it’s impeccably well played. I love that record. That’s another thing, along with that Van Halen, that I’d listen on the school bus in the mornings, and play over and over and probably caused a bunch of hearing loss from a relatively early age! *Haha*
What have you been listening to the most lately?
I’ve been thinking, this past year, I haven’t been able to listen to too much. We just finished recording our record at the beginning of July so I’ve been so engrossed in doing that, that I haven’t had a lot of time to listen to new music. My favorites of the past couple years were NIGHTBRINGER, I mean, they put out their last record a few years ago, but AORATOS, the project from their singer, that actually just came out a couple months ago? Fantastic record. Same guy who produced our last record did that one, great record. I haven’t heard the newest DEATHSPELL OMEGA yet, I’d really like to hear that. Something to make time for, I just haven’t been able to do that. I’m a Black Metal guy so you know, stuff of that genre…all the Icelandic Black Metal stuff right now is really good. I’ve just been continuously impressed with that output, it’s just all high quality and it’s the same, like 20 people in every one of those bands. So I don’t know, that’s as much as I could say. Whatever most recent record the CULT just put out, and that means forever, I’m listening to that too. I’m a huge Billy Duffy fan.
What would be some of the most memorable shows that you’ve seen in your life?
Going back to WOVENHAND, I saw them in Portland in 2007 and it was on that Mosaic tour, for that album and I was talking about. We were playing there so we get to town and I’m looking through their little free weekly and I’m like, “Oh my gosh, they’re playing tonight!” Same night as us so I’m like, “Oh, please, please, please” you know, because they were headlining, and we were earlier on. So I ran to the record store, got tickets and the second we were done, I threw the stuff in the van, got to the venue just in time during the changeover between whatever the previous band and them. They played a ton of songs off that record and…I wept like a baby! *Haha* Not really, but it was sooo good. Seeing him, he’s almost in this altered state -I don’t mean like chemically, but just this different state he gets in when he plays live-. He is one of the most underrated, not on the radar as much as he should be, incredible performer out there. It’s just so insanely emotional and focused, it’s kind of off putting and I don’t mean in a bad way. This guy’s for real.
Going way back, what would be other memorable shows?
Well, the first real concert that wasn’t a Hard Rock band playing on a tennis court in our small town, was ANTHRAX, EXODUS and HELLOWEEN, Headbangers ball tour ’89 or ’88. I was 13 or something and for whatever reason -thanks to my mom’s terrible judgment, I still can’t believe to this day that I actually was able to do this-, she dropped me off in town, because we lived 30 minutes away from any town- and it’s like, “okay, you can go.” You okay? You got a fever? But I went and it was awesome, super cool. At the time, I’m this skinny little kid wearing a Anthrax shirt, Caught in a mosh or whatever, and I was mesmerized by everything. It was a good place to be and that really stuck with me and put me on this terrible, terrible path I’m on now! *Haha*
What would be the one band that you toured with that impressed you the most? One that you had to watch their set, night after night?
We’ve toured SUFFOCATION a bunch, and I love watching them every night. They’re so tight, they’re so heavy. It’s just this bulldozer. I’ve told them that, “I watch you guys every night.” I mean, maybe not beginning to end but in between doing what we do, loading or whatever, I will sit and watch a huge chunk of their set. They’re an amazingly fun, not fun band. That’s not their aim but they’re just so fun to watch and so powerful. We toured with MAYHEM, watching them was fantastic. It’s this absorbing experience, this wall of intensity.
Do you have any sort of hidden gem? Something where everybody is about this one album, or song but to you, it’s all about that other, more obscure thing?
You know what, actually it’s less of an album and more within a genre but the whole Swedish Death Metal from 10-12 years ago was so huge that a lot of American band were aping that. For bands to look up to in that scene, I always thought the CROWN got criminally overlooked. They didn’t sound like AT THE GATES, didn’t sound like ENTOMBED or DISMEMBER and stuff. They were almost like a MOTÖRHEAD with blast beats, a shreddier version of Motörhead. Songwriting is incredible, the playing is great, and they sound awesome. I thought that band was kind of totally overlooked and they’re back now actually. They had some time where someone got married and someone had children or whatever, having adult time off kind of thing but they’re back now, operating in a lesser schedule than they were. I think they’re a great band and one of the ones that for whatever reason, doesn’t get appreciated as they should, for the quality of stuff.
Can you name a few songs that you consider perfect in every way and say what makes them so special to you?
Probably have to be some off the favorite albums thing. I would say Splinters, a song off Secret South, by 16 HORSEPOWER. It’s about a tornado coming and destroying his house. I’m sure there’s all sort of metaphor and analogy and stuff like that, but it’s this emotional plateau, you know, and…it kills me. It doesn’t have the traditional structure, verse-chorus-bridge-lead, but it’s just this flawless build up. It’s wonderful. It’s kind of like Woman in chains, the TEARS FOR FEARS song. It has more of a chorus proper than Woman in chains does but it has that sort of tense, constant build to this cathartic thing. That song’s near perfection for what it’s trying to achieve, outside a traditional structure.
I think the EMPEROR song Ye entrancemperium, along with the intro to that record (Anthems to the Welkin at Dusk) is some of the best Metal ever. There’s this big build up that has all the horns and marching, sort of war drums and stuff. At the beginning, there’s even this sound, like someone had a pad for an owl sound. “hoo-hoo” *Haha* It’s barely there. Then during the song, the singer goes “come on!”, and I love that because it’s so grim but he’s like, “come on!” *Hahaha* I love that shit. That’s one thing I was always thinking, Metal needs to have more Rock and Roll elements. I’m not saying the cheesy stuff, I mean, Metal does that enough on its own, but just, there needs to be more Rock and Roll. There’s a Jeff Beck quote, something like, “regardless of how you gussied up and posture and pretentiousness or whatever, it’s all hooligan Rock and Roll”. I think to a certain extent, it could be very basic, just dirtbag music, and that’s fine. Gussied up maybe, but I think it’s more fun that way at times. You know, we’re not all like silk shirt minstrels, sweating over but busted beer bottles over someone’s head. Filthy, loud, amplified noise. It’s fun. Let’s play the tightest, sloppy way we can.
What’s the first thing that strikes you when you listen to new music?
I was never a super Tech Death person by any means but in the early 2000’s, it had to be busy and whatever. I still do like a lot of the chaotic stuff, a lot of the Black Metal almost bordering on “what the hell is going on?” I really like that. This swirling muddy glass. But now, it’s just the atmosphere, vibe and emotion. It’s not something where you have to act like you’re evolving too but I think at least for me personally, that’s where I’ve kind of come to, as far as that becoming more at the forefront of me appreciating music. What type of impact is happening.
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