{"id":12520,"date":"2013-03-19T00:00:41","date_gmt":"2013-03-19T00:00:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/?p=12520"},"modified":"2013-06-13T00:16:44","modified_gmt":"2013-06-13T00:16:44","slug":"feature-six-feet-under-03-13-pt2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/feature-six-feet-under-03-13-pt2\/","title":{"rendered":"SIX FEET UNDER – A Sinister Craving, Part Two (March 2013) | Features \/ Interviews @ Metal Forces Magazine"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Undead<\/em> and Unborn<\/em> are collectively the first studio full-lengths to be issued since the pair\u2019s departure. \u201cI think these are kind of stand-out albums, and are kind of connected for sure \u2013 musically, lyrically, story-wise, and the album covers, the artwork and everything,\u201d the frontman critiques. \u201cI think they\u2019re definitely more of those ones that stand out in our discography. Undead<\/em> has more of a straightforward, sheer death metal approach, is faster paced, and has little more detailed time changes and stuff like that. Unborn<\/em> is more I suppose atmospheric and rhythmic, and maybe more dynamic as well. As a package, it\u2019s all really kind of interwoven together. It was all meant to be very dynamic and across the board as a whole.<\/p>\n

\u201cThey kind of stand alone to me right now, but my point of view kind of changes on those things as time goes on. I\u2019m sure I\u2019ll look at them in a different light in a few years. I think both Undead<\/em> and Unborn<\/em> are pretty special albums though, for sure.\u201d<\/p>\n

Much of Unborn<\/em>\u2019s material was recorded within the same timeframe as its predecessor\u2019s material. \u201cA lot of it was written at the same time but we came back to it after Undead<\/em> was released, re-tracking a lot of things and adding a couple of more songs,\u201d Chris informs. \u201cSo yeah, it was kind of an ongoing process. I finished the bonus material in early February \u2013 we\u2019ve still been in the studio working on things for this album. It\u2019s been a really cool way to record. I learnt a lot in these sessions, because there was such a large amount of material written and recorded. It was a learning process, once again. You never stop learning, as they say.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is really the way that I feel the most comfortable recording, actually writing a song and going in and recording it the next day or the same day. There\u2019s an energy from that by doing that, but sometimes something comes back to the room to work on more. It was more of a laid-back pace than just being in the studio for one week and having to get something done instantly, and really being under the gun. It was a different way to work. I learnt a lot about myself and things like that by doing these past two albums like we have. I\u2019ll work any way I can to get the best performance out of myself though, and the people in the band. If that\u2019s gonna get us to lay down some cool songs that sound really good, I\u2019m all for continuing like this, but there\u2019s a lot to be said for being under the gun. Sometimes that sparks a little bit of a different product (laughs).\u201d<\/p>\n

Although self-produced, Unborn<\/em> was recorded with a lot of assistance from Chris \u2018Zeuss\u2019 Harris, who mixed both Undead<\/em> and Unborn<\/em>. \u201cZeuss really did a great job of bringing it all together, putting it together, and finding common ground with all of the different songwriters, musicians, tunings and everything that he had to decipher on his side of things,\u201d the singer reckons. \u201cHe just did a wonderful job; I give him a lot of the credit for this album sounding so tight and excellent. I really wanted to use him on Undead<\/em> too, but it just didn\u2019t come to be for some reason. We\u2019d been in contact though. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we\u2019d play a gig up in his neighbourhood in the north east, we\u2019d just meet up and come to listen to some of the songs that we had been working on. He just critiqued things, and told us what he thought. When it was time to do this album he was the obvious choice, and I had really wanted to work with him for awhile. We asked him to do it, and he agreed. It was just wonderful working with him, because he really wanted the album to sound how we wanted it to sound. How you envision your album to sound as an artist, he builds upon that. He doesn\u2019t come into it blindly. <\/p>\n

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\u201cHe just wanted to share his perspective on the whole thing, not just \u2018This is what I do, and I\u2019m gonna do it like this.\u2019 He really gets into the personality of each song, and really tries to understand what you want to accomplish with the album. He really is a patient person too, and very, very knowledge in the art of audio engineering. It\u2019s an interesting job being an audio engineer, because you really have a lot of different elements to work with. You have to have what I like to call the zen of recording, where you have to be at one with the artist, the music, and the whole craft. You have to be able to let all of that breathe and live on its own, and be aware of that. Zeuss really has all of those techniques in place, and like I said, he\u2019s a very patient guy that pulls off magic in the studio.\u201d<\/p>\n

Chris wasn\u2019t alerted to Zeuss\u2019 talent through past records the man has been associated with, per se. \u201cProbably just the first Whitechapel album that he did, but that\u2019s probably about it,\u201d he thinks. \u201cI just knew how good he was, and I knew that he worked with a lot of bands exclusively. That makes me feel as though he\u2019s one of those guys like Scott Burns, where once you work with him you don\u2019t wanna work with anyone else. That\u2019s kind of the feeling I got from working with him. Instead of from listening to stuff that he\u2019s done though, I really wanted to work with him through meeting him and hanging out with him as a person. I enjoy his company, and I really feel like we\u2019re on the same wavelength. Sometimes you meet someone for the first time, and you\u2019re like \u2018He\u2019s not one of us. I don\u2019t think I could really handle hanging out with that guy too much, maybe five or ten minutes (laughs).\u2019 <\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s the type of guy where I met him though and felt comfortable, and felt a real camaraderie with him. That really is important I feel when you\u2019re giving up something that you consider almost to be a child, an album that you\u2019ve worked on and nurtured along. It\u2019s like giving your little kid to a babysitter for the first time, letting a stranger watch your child. It\u2019s probably not as severe as that, but it still feels like some kind of violation in a way (laughs). That\u2019s definitely more important to me than the stuff he\u2019s done, because working with Six Feet Under never sounds like anyone else or any other type of production. I don\u2019t think he\u2019s the type of guy that really attacks the production side of things and the mix to where he has to put his signature on it, or anything like that. I really think mostly all of his mixes are different. I know he\u2019s good. It\u2019s more like \u2018Yeah, let\u2019s work together. You\u2019re cool.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

Vocally speaking, \u201cthere are a multitude of emotions in each song on Undead<\/em> and Unborn<\/em>, but it\u2019s really specific to each lyric. There\u2019s anger, fear, just a lot of sorrow, joy as well, and thoughts of dreams I guess. Dreams (laughs).\u201d<\/p>\n

Engineer Chris Carroll formerly aided the Six Feet Under mainman in the cutting of his vocals, but that hasn\u2019t been the case since November 2008\u2019s Death Rituals<\/em>. \u201cIt\u2019s more effective cost-wise to do it here locally in Tampa than to go all the way down to Miami, or bring Chris all the way here up to Tampa,\u201d he reasons. \u201cHe\u2019s an awesome guy, and I worked with him for many years in the studio. I never really liked anyone else to record my vocals, but another really good friend of mine has a home studio (DOI Digital Audio). He lives about 12 minutes down the road from me, and he\u2019s got a really, really nice studio. He\u2019s one of my best friends too, and he\u2019s really great to work with. His name is Chaz Najjar, and he\u2019s just a great, great guy. He\u2019s always ready to record at the drop of a hat, and get some tracks together. That\u2019s really important to me, to be able to get my ideas out when I need to. I\u2019ll probably record with Chris again one day though, because he\u2019s an awesome engineer and I just love him to death.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Six Feet Under (l-r): Kevin Talley, Steve Swanson, Chris Barnes, Jeff Hughell
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Engineers supply feedback concerning respective vocal takes. \u201cIf I\u2019m unsure of something or if I just heard something in particular, then we\u2019ll come back to it,\u201d Chris reveals. \u201cThey\u2019re like \u2018I think you can do that better.\u2019 I\u2019m always up for critique \u2013 I\u2019m not difficult in the studio about that. That\u2019s why I like to be surrounded by engineers that record my vocals who I respect as people, and whose opinions I respect. I want someone to be on the same wavelength as me, and understands what I\u2019m trying to get done. If someone just has ulterior ideas about something and just doesn\u2019t see the whole picture of it, I can\u2019t really understand and communicate with someone like that.\u201d<\/p>\n

The cover artworks for both Unborn<\/em> and Undead<\/em> were designed by Seattle, Washington-based artist Dusty Peterson. \u201cThey\u2019re really interconnected, because the albums are interconnected with the writing and the storyline within the lyrics,\u201d the lyricist observes. \u201cI\u2019ve been working with Dusty Peterson for awhile now, and he really gets it man. He gets the whole thing. He focuses on the music and the lyrics when he\u2019s coming up with his designs. I had an idea in my head of what they both should look like, and he definitely nailed each one of them down to a tee.\u201d<\/p>\n

The composition \u2018Illusions\u2019 comprises bonus material for Unborn<\/em>. \u201cIt\u2019s a song actually that myself and my nephew put together,\u201d Chris tells. \u201cHis name is Ryley Dipaola; he\u2019s 18-years-old, and an amazing drummer. I\u2019m really proud of him; I think he\u2019s gonna be an amazing musician in the future. He\u2019s an awesome drummer, and technically amazing. He plays guitar as well, and he came up with a couple of really cool songs. This one song was really interesting to me. It\u2019s super-raw, but it\u2019s just a bonus track. It\u2019s called \u2018Illusions\u2019. It\u2019s more of a demo, but it sounds really, really dark and interesting from my perspective. It\u2019s kind of a special track for all of the fans that search out material from us. I like doing those little bonus tracks that are kind of off the wall. We did a track years ago called \u2018Dead And Buried\u2019, and that one was picked up by the fans. They were like \u2018Oh man. Where did that one come from?\u2019 That was cool. I remember that one going over big.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tampa, Florida-based death metal outfit Cannibal Corpse will celebrate its 25th anniversary in December 2013, a faction the vocalist was a member of from December 1988 until late 1995. \u201cIt\u2019s just another day to me, man,\u201d he muses. \u201cIt\u2019s really no big deal. I\u2019m always really happy that they\u2019ve continued this long, and that I\u2019ve been able to continue this long based off of those first four albums. I\u2019m really proud of that. It\u2019s just been a wild ride man, for all of us. We just had a lot of fun, and I shared a lot of good times with those guys. I learnt my craft and what I do through all of those intense hours of rehearsals that we used to have \u2013 I just really learnt a lot from those days. Things to do and things not to do, I guess.\u201d<\/p>\n

Of the four Cannibal Corpse outings Chris lent his voice to, his favourite is a choice between two. \u201cIt\u2019s a toss up between Butchered At Birth<\/em> (July 1991) and Tomb Of The Mutilated<\/em> (September 1992), I guess,\u201d he considers. \u201cIt\u2019s hard to pick. The cover album for Butchered At Birth<\/em> really got it all started for us, and drew a lot of attention towards us \u2013 good attention and bad attention. It really did a lot for the death metal genre of music, did that album cover. I think that that album\u2019s really important to me. My vocals on that I\u2019m super-proud of, and also as far as Tomb Of The Mutilated<\/em>. It\u2019s hard to pick between the two, because Tomb Of The Mutilated<\/em> has \u2018Hammer Smashed Face\u2019 on it, and that song really kind of… I guess it\u2019s the best-selling death metal song of all time. It was in a movie (1994\u2019s Ace Ventura: Pet Detective<\/em>), and was just really, really strong. It\u2019s probably one of the best death metal songs ever written, I would say. We play that in the Six Feet Under setlist. We play that song, and we play \u2018Stripped, Raped And Strangled\u2019 (from April 1994\u2019s The Bleeding<\/em>).<\/p>\n

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\u201cWe\u2019ve played those two songs for the past couple of years now, now that I have players in my band that are able to play songs like that. I have a drummer that\u2019s obviously the best drummer in death metal, and have a bass player that is an equal of amazing bass players like Alex Webster (Cannibal Corpse) and stuff, and two guitarists in the band… So yeah, that\u2019s definitely the reason why. I wanted to be able to have the freedom to play those types of songs, or be able to revisit songs like that and give the fans something that they\u2019ve been craving for awhile \u2013 to hear those songs sung by me. I\u2019m really enjoying doing that, and really enjoying seeing the fans enjoy it.\u201d<\/p>\n

To date, all of Cannibal Corpse\u2019s recorded output has featured the artwork services of Michigan-based designer Vince Locke. \u201cVince is great, man,\u201d the frontman praises. \u201cC\u2019mon. I was really the guy that got hold of him. I kind of stalked him down, because I had always loved his artwork from the Deadworld<\/em> comics back in… I don\u2019t know when it was, but probably 1990. I started looking his information up. This was before the internet, obviously. It was just \u2018How do you find someone, talk to them, and ask them about doing an album cover?\u2019 I looked him up in the phone book, basically (laughs). He lived somewhere in Michigan; he really wanted to work with us, and loved the imagery we were trying to portray. He\u2019s been with them ever since. His artwork is still really interesting, and is really stand-alone. He\u2019s a very talented guy. He worked on A History Of Violence<\/em> (1997, with John Wagner), which was adapted into a movie starring Viggo Mortensen (2005). He\u2019s a very imaginative person. I think it takes someone like that to do the artwork for Cannibal Corpse for 25 years, and the stuff that he came up with for the new special edition is really, really cool, man. I think it\u2019s some of his best stuff.\u201d<\/p>\n

Metal Blade mail Chris reissued versions of early Cannibal Corpse endeavours. \u201cI have a collection of them somewhere,\u201d he chuckles. \u201cI haven\u2019t got anything for the 2013 picture disc reissues yet, but I\u2019m sure I\u2019ll get a box of goodies here pretty soon (laughs). That\u2019s gonna be really cool with the picture discs, man. I didn\u2019t know that they were doing that. I\u2019ve kind of been in my own world as of late. They don\u2019t tell me anything though, bro (laughs). I had no idea that that\u2019s how they were doing it. I guess they had no reason to tell me, other than getting me to sign something to say that it\u2019s okay to put the songs I did with them on it. But yeah, that should be fun.\u201d<\/p>\n

During a 2007 interview, the singer expressed his desire to perform \u2018Hammer Smashed Face\u2019 as a live duet with current Cannibal Corpse vocalist George \u2018Corpsegrinder\u2019 Fisher. \u201cI would love to get onstage and do that with those guys, and do something like that,\u201d he reaffirms. \u201cMan, it would be fun. I don\u2019t think those guys share my opinion on that, but I think it would be fun (laughs).\u201d<\/p>\n

Bassist Alex Webster confirmed that he was receptive towards the idea during a 2013 interview<\/a> with Metal Forces<\/em>. \u201cWow, that\u2019s really cool man,\u201d Chris esteems. \u201cAlex is such an awesome guy. Man, it\u2019s funny. I get along with him better now I think that I\u2019m out of the band, and he probably shares the same view (laughs). We actually reconnected a little bit in 2012; we hung out at a few shows and stuff, and shared a few laughs and stuff. He\u2019s always been a cool guy, man. That\u2019s great. I would do it in a second, man. I\u2019d fly myself in to anywhere that they asked me to, and do something like that… for free, even (laughs). All they\u2019d have to do is ask, man. That\u2019s all they\u2019d have to do. I\u2019m there. It\u2019s a song that I still remember how to sing. I will definitely do it. I know how to sing those two, at least (laughs).\u201d<\/p>\n

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The Six Feet Under mainman should broach the possibility with Alex. \u201cI don\u2019t ever wanna overstep, or bother them about stuff,\u201d he cautions. \u201cI put things out there, and… I can only ask once or twice, and then I kind of feel like I\u2019m being annoying. I don\u2019t really wanna do that. I was annoying enough when I was in the band (laughs).\u201d<\/p>\n

The release of further Six Feet Under studio content, meanwhile, is in the pipeline. \u201cAfter 2013 is over, there\u2019ll probably be a short break from touring,\u201d Chris assumes. \u201cI\u2019ll just think about what I\u2019m gonna do with these other 12 songs I have (laughs). You know man, I never stop working on stuff so I am always in the studio demoing stuff out once or twice a month, or three times a month maybe. So yeah (laughs). It never ends, man. I love writing and exploring music like this, and coming up with cool stuff that we haven\u2019t done. It\u2019s really fun, man. It\u2019s just like working on a car, or something. You learn something every day. You just keep plugging away at it until it\u2019s finished. This is a big project, so I have to keep working on it and making music (laughs).\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a lot of stuff that me and Ola have been working on. There\u2019s just some stuff that\u2019s pretty interesting. There\u2019s a couple of things we have that are just maybe an outline of stuff. There was something that me and my nephew are working on, but we ended up using that as a bonus track. There\u2019s all sorts of stuff, man. Jari\u2019s actually working on some stuff too, so we have a few things that are outlined, a few things that have been completed as far as being demoed out and stuff.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Undead Chronicles<\/em> have reached a conclusion. \u201cThis was all written as one thing, so this is pretty much the whole package right here,\u201d the wordsmith corroborates. \u201cThe next album will be something different. We always try to keep it fresh and exciting for ourselves, and keep progressing as far as we can musically I guess.\u201d<\/p>\n

Further instalments in the Graveyard Classics<\/em> cover album series \u2013 of which three were issued in October 2000, October 2004, and January 2010 respectively \u2013 aren\u2019t planned. \u201cI always just thought of that right from the beginning as a three-part series,\u201d Chris notes. \u201cIt just felt right to end it right there. They\u2019re three really different cover albums from each other, so I just feel as though it\u2019s complete as it is.\u201d<\/p>\n

Unborn<\/em> was released in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland on March 15th, 2013, in the rest of Europe on the 18th, and subsequently on the 19th in North America, all via Metal Blade Records.<\/p>\n

Interview published in March 2013. All promotional photographs by Stephanie Cabral.<\/em><\/p>\n

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Chris Barnes Undead and Unborn are collectively the first studio full-lengths to be issued since the pair\u2019s departure. \u201cI think these are kind of stand-out albums, and are kind of connected for sure \u2013 musically, lyrically, story-wise, and the album covers, the artwork and everything,\u201d the frontman critiques. \u201cI think they\u2019re definitely more of those […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[402],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-12520","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-six-feet-under"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12520","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12520"}],"version-history":[{"count":16,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12520\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12550,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12520\/revisions\/12550"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12520"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12520"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12520"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}