Few names in heavy metal carry as much weight as Max Cavalera. From founding Sepultura and changing the face of Brazilian metal, to reinventing himself with Soulfly, Cavalera Conspiracy, and Killer Be Killed, Max has built a legacy of uncompromising sound and relentless touring.

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When Todd Owens caught up with Max before Soulfly’s show at The Fillmore in San Francisco, they talked about life on the road, collaborating with metal’s biggest names, raising a new generation of heavy musicians, and the chaos that inspired his latest record, Pandemonium.

What follows is a raw, unfiltered conversation with one of metal’s most enduring icons — a man who’s still hungry, still furious, and still living for the riff.

We’re here at the legendary Fillmore tonight in San Francisco with Max from Soulfly, Cavalera Conspiracy, and Killer Be Killed. How you doing tonight, Max? No Nailbomb or anything else? Obviously, you’ve had a lot of bands. I was listening to your current bands — maybe I missed one, right?

Max Cavalera: Well, I had a band in the early Sepultura days called Guerrilla — it was in Portuguese, pure punk rock. That’s about it. That’s all the bands I’ve had. But right now, I’m focused mostly on Soulfly, which is on tour right now. Cavalera Conspiracy’s album drops in October, and of course, Killer Be Killed just came out and people are still digging it.

Let’s step into a little Soulfly stuff. When did this leg of the tour start? You’ve been on the Savages tour for about 10 months now, right?

Max: This American tour started two days ago. We had one show in Ramona, which is by San Diego, and we played the House of Blues yesterday in L.A. It was awesome. We did a song with the kids called “Revengeance,” which we’ll do tonight. We had Greg from The Dillinger Escape Plan doing “Rise of the Fallen,” and Dino from Fear Factory doing “Eye for an Eye.” So it was a full-on guest-packed show — but it was awesome. I’m very excited for tonight and for the whole tour.

How is it being on tour with Lody Kong as your opener — and having a couple of your sons with you? That must be pretty awesome.

Max: It is cool. We’ve got local opening bands, which is great — I love to check those guys out, love new music, and keep my eyes and ears open.
But yeah, it’s fun to have Lody Kong too. They’re good, getting better and tighter. The more they play, the tighter they get. They’ve actually recorded a full record and are looking for a label to release it, so hopefully things start happening for them.

My son Zyon is doing double duty — he’s young, he’s got the energy. When you’re young, everything is possible, you know? He’s doing great, really kicking ass. The shows are great. Lody Kong is awesome, and with Soulfly, it’s a big mix — our setlist has everything, kind of like the best hits from nine records and 16 years of career. Quite a lot of music.

It must be getting more and more difficult to come up with a setlist now that you’ve got nine studio albums just with Soulfly.

Max: Yeah, I wanted to make a faster setlist for this tour. I think I’m gonna revamp a bunch of fast songs I haven’t played in a long time — like “Frontlines,” “Last of the Mohicans,” “Carving Side,” “Terrorist” (which was done with Tom from Slayer). I’m trying to make it a fast, awesome metal set. I haven’t done one of those in a long time, and it feels like a good time to do that now.

You’re going through August 15th on this Western U.S. and Canadian leg — what’s next for the rest of 2014?

Max: We have a big festival in Colombia called Rock al Parque — 100,000 people, downtown, free show. Then I go with Cavalera Conspiracy to South America because the new album is coming out, and we’ll do a South American tour. After that, I’ll come back with Soulfly — we’re looking at a tour hopefully with Full of Hell and Noisem, some of the bands we like to take with us. There’s also a rumor of maybe getting on a GWAR tour. I hope that happens — I love touring with those guys.

I love the road, man — I’m born for the road. My house is cool, but if I had to choose between home and the road? The road, all the time.

What about writing material? Do you write on the road, or do you wait until you’re off tour?

Max: It’s better to write at home. You don’t have to carry all that stuff, and on tour you don’t really have time — it’s packed with interviews, soundchecks, and travel. I like to check out the city when I can — I walked about 20 blocks today. I leave the writing for when I’m home. My next writing phase will be the new Soulfly — probably start around December.

Through your history with Soulfly, you’ve had a lot of collaborations and guest appearances. Do you usually write with someone in mind, or do you find someone and then write something for them?

Max: It’s a mix — it happens all kinds of ways. Some songs were written with a person in mind. A perfect example was “Ayatollah of Rock ’n’ Rolla.” I wrote that riff — I called it the “Clutch riff” — and I thought it’d be cool to get Neil from Clutch to sing on it. I called him, and he did a great job.

Other times it just happens — like Mitch from Napalm Death. He was in the studio with a day off from the Cannibal Corpse tour, came to visit, and I couldn’t resist — I just gave him the mic. Same with Slipknot — when I did “Jump the F*** Up,” I found out they were in town in Phoenix while I was recording Primitive. I drove to their show and kidnapped Corey from soundcheck! [laughs]

That’s definitely one of my all-time favorite Soulfly songs — “Jump the F*** Up.” Do you have a favorite guest appearance or collaboration?

Max: So many, man. I love the Tom Araya one on “Terrorist” — that was great because I love Slayer. I like the weird ones too — Sean Lennon was really fun and different. David Vincent from Morbid Angel on “Blood Fire War Hate” was really cool. Tommy from Prong was great. Chino from Deftones and Mike Patton on Roots were awesome. Those are some of my favorites.

You mentioned the Cavalera Conspiracy album coming out in October 2014 — Pandemonium. What’s up with that?

Max: Yeah, it was originally called Babylonian Pandemonium, but they thought it was too long, so we cut it to Pandemonium. I like the name — it reflects the world right now. The world is in pandemonium: chaos, wars, disasters, plane crashes — it’s unreal.

The album is brutal — I think it’s my favorite of the three Cavalera records. The cover was done by a Brazilian guy named Stephan — it’s a tank with a skull on top, very metal. The music is pure metal. I wanted Igor to play like he did on Arise — that was my plan. I treated every song like it was Arise ten times over.

There’s also a bit of grindcore influence — I was listening to Nails, All Pigs Must Die, Pig Destroyer — that kind of stuff. Some of that grindcore energy definitely filtered into the record.

Definitely looking forward to that. One more thing — this October marks 25 years since your first U.S. show with Sepultura, Halloween ’89, opening for King Diamond. Does that sound about right?

Max: Yeah, man — crazy how time flies!

After more than three decades of crushing riffs, relentless touring, and global metal domination, Max Cavalera shows no signs of slowing down. Whether it’s Soulfly, Cavalera Conspiracy, or whatever chaos he creates next — one thing’s certain: the road still calls his name.

Categories: Interviews, soulfly, Todd Owens

Tags: Max Cavalera, soulfly, Todd Owens