Heavy Metal Musicians

"There should be a law that prevents you from getting married until after you’re 38! When we’re young, especially men, it’s in our blood to fuck up, and that means that when you get older you start to look back and go, ‘What the fuck was I thinking?"

"Years ago I had a fight with a redneck, and we were going until we were both basically so beat up that we couldn’t stand up any more. It was like nobody could win; we just kept beating each other until we both hobbled off! I’d just moved down to South Georgia from New York, and the biggest redneck in the bar decided to pick a fight – he was digging and digging at me until he could get a response, and he got one!"

""Dead by Dawn," as quoted by Jon Wiederhorn of"

"Glen Benton is a fucking character, and his unwavering dedication to shitting all over Christianity and everything its iron grip has wrought upon the world is not always the smartest or most nuanced approach, but you can’t argue he gets his point across."

"Chuck Shuldiner was a once-in-a-generation type of musician. He filtered his genius through his band, Death, which was, and in many ways, still is the standard bearer for Technical Death Metal. Unlike their peers, Cannibal Corpse, Morbid Angel, Deicide, and Obituary, Death wasn’t defined by their brutality. There was an elegant regard for precision and sinewy melody that lived in harmonic minor bliss. His playing was so clean and impressive, yet he never came off as a showboat. Without Chuck Shuldiner, there wouldn’t be bands like The Faceless, Obscura, Arsis, or Necrophagist. The metal world would is much worse place without his presence. RIP."

"His music is timeless. It still sounds as fresh as it did when it came out. Plus, Chuck’s style on guitar is unmatched: it’s the perfect mix of melody, technicality and brutality. I’m extremely lucky to have been not just part of the band but also a close friend of Chuck’s. He inspired me, and he continues to inspire me, every day."

"Schuldiner broadened death metal’s horizons, dragging it out of the fetid gore and unworked thrash into something more sophisticated, programming intelligence into its necro physiology, and in the process recruiting some of the most technically gifted musicians the scene has had."

"Extreme music, more specifically the death metal sub-genre, would cease to exist without the musical brilliance of Chuck Schuldiner. [...] Within metal, there are few musicians who’ve shown such a profound prowess for technical and melodic guitar playing, all while playing music as extreme as death metal. Chuck Schuldiner was the epitome of this."

"It's difficult trying to articulate what it is about this instrumental Death song off Human — essentially arranged and written in the studio — that speaks to me. It doesn't have Chuck's voice in the literal sense, but it contains all the vital harmonic, melodic and rhythmic components that branded Death's sound. But it also has something else. It's reaching for truth, and it holds a majestic beauty that gave Death's songs their greatest potency. What I'm remembering is the beginner mind approach in which this song took shape in the studio. It was driven by instinct and spontaneous creative freedom. Our collective energies united and we swam into the 'Cosmic Sea,' trusting we wouldn't need a life raft. Chuck's story was liberated without words. 'Cosmic Sea' is a journey straight into the heart of Death and, for me, an auditory memory of what an old friend felt like at his best."

"After losing Frank, he worried so about what it would do to the three of us - Beth, Christopher and myself - to lose him. I promised him we would do the best we could if he were to lose that fight and that is what we are trying to do, keep that promise. Chuck was the one who never gave up, who instilled hope and love in those all around him and he never cursed fate. Chuck’s steadfast hope for the future and his family, friends, and the many fans who wrote to him sustained him."

"Frank and Chuck were very close. That closeness is surely why the devastation Chuck felt at the tragic death of his brother, and the consequences following it, were so great that he never really came to terms with it. He always missed Frank. The death of Frank brought this family very close together and that closeness has continued always. There is always fear involved when a child dies and I watched diligently, afraid it could happen again. Chuck’s father worked and had tennis and other hobbies, so I was more involved with Chuck and his interests, as I was with my other children. As Chuck grew older he would go with me antiquing and he would frequently call me to just go out for a cup of coffee, or to lunch, or the doorbell would ring and there he would be for a visit. He never forgot my birthday or any other special occasion. He was a wonderful son and friend and we were close, as were his sister and nephew. He took us to the beach on weekends when he was home and met his nephew at the bus stop after school to take him to the mall or to play basketball. His sister fought for his life for three years and he acknowledged that in an interview, saying that his sister was a warrior. They were really close friends as well as brother and sister. Is it any wonder that we infinitely love and miss him in so many ways?"

"It blew my mind how Chuck was so talented a guitar player and also so talented at structuring a song. We had rehearsed the music to The Sound of Perseverance so much without vocals and I had no idea how to structure vocals around music that was so complex. When we did the demos and I finally heard Chuck's lyrics and the way he structured them within the music I was just blown away. It was so genius, so creative, and so catchy. He took words and just blended them perfectly with really complex crazy music. Then before we would go on tour he would have to learn to sing along with playing guitar, which was incredible because those guitar riffs are so crazy. Chuck never wrote riffs thinking 'I gotta make this so I can sing it and play it at the same time.' He would just do the lyrics and sing over the demos, and then later figure out how to do it all together at once. He always did it perfectly, it always belw my mind, it was always just like the record."

"Chuck Schuldiner’s legendary perfectionism elevated the genre from dumb-guy heavy metal to truly progressive and inventive art, and the legacy his all-too-early passing left solidified Death’s status among the absolute greats of the genre."

"I think he was a perfectionist. He really had a high standard and maybe that made it harder for some people to work with him and meet those demands. And as the band went on, the music just got more complex. It was easy to play that kind of music poorly, but it was very hard to keep up with someone like Chuck."

"Chuck came to the studio knowing exactly what he wanted to do. His "vision" was fully formed and complete, as he intended to recreate the sound he had in mind for Death. The recording process required no experimenting or trying things out; Chuck's plan was to just get this sound he created on tape. Chuck was an eager and dedicated teenager of 19. Throughpout the project there was just Chuck and his drummer Chris in the studio. The two of them worked hard and were very well-prepared and efficient. My engineer Casey and I watched Chuck and Chris realize their vision. What I find incredible is that what Chuck and Chris accomplished with [Scream Bloody Gore] became the prototype for much of what followed in extreme metal for the next three decades."

"Schuldiner’s guitar playing and ability as a song writer grew immensely since the band formed in the early 1980s in Florida. His stamina and precision in guitar playing was impeccable. But by the late ’80s/early ’90s the primitive, zombie, blood and gore obsessed death metal had evolved to a more progressive style with lyrics delving into the dark side of human nature and suffering. [...] Schuldiner is often included in lists of the best metal guitarists for his innovative and passionate approach to playing death metal music."

"Naming your band Death is either tongue-in-cheek insolence or a proclamation of utter sincerity, and Chuck Schuldiner was not given to flippancy where his music was concerned. Next to his family, music was most important to him, and this clarity drove him. To call his band Death was to equate his life’s purpose with the most unimaginable end to which we all will go: it was predestined and non-negotiable. With Death, Chuck affirmed his life."

"[Schuldiner] opened the door for many guitarists to rip open their aggression and put it all into this relentless and chaotic form of metal. Perhaps most impressive, Schuldiner essentially taught himself to play guitar."

"I celebrate a faggot’s death, human disgrace"

"A hook right through your tits [...] Pathetic rancid cunt [...] Trying to escape They torture you by cutting off your cock"

"Ram an axe into your mound [...] Shit onto your guts [...] A stupid cunt we sacrifice"

"Decapitated head licking your cunt"

"Seizure now sets in Torture will begin Example made from those to see Your freedom turned to misery"

"Cannibals practicing the art of butchery Emotions don't exist, pain you can't resist"

"Life will never be the same Death can never be explained It's their time to go beyond Empty feeling when they're gone"

"You will not return alive -- left to die Suffering until the end -- left to die"

"Pull the plug -- let me pass away Pull the plug -- don't want to live this way"

"Bodies deformed way beyond belief Cast out from their concerned society"

"Sharing both pleasure and pain Two hearts, two minds, one soul Seperating mentally An illusion of privacy Together -- they absorb eachother's lies As one -- they will live and they will die A living hell has begun"

"Trapped Inside a life which is not yours Spirits within causing terror, fear and darkness."

"Won’t you join me on the perennial quest Reaching into the dark, retrieving light Search for answers on the perennial quest Where dreams are followed, and time is a test"

"I don’t mean to dwell but I can’t help myself [...] Do you remember when Things seemed so eternal?"

"I’m glad to see that a lot of these metal bands today are incorporating more traditional elements into their music because that’s where it all comes from. I never lost touch with that through the years, but I was very much crucified for it a while back. And I guess it’s good to know that I was doing the right thing."

"I got fed up with writing about crap monsters. What’s horrific about that sort of thing? The real evil in this world goes on in society. I’d just reached a time in my life as a person and as a musician when I felt angry enough to write about it."

"There were loads of people in the local area up for it, and I could have settled for someone who was OK, but not brilliant. That wasn’t what I wanted. To make Death as good as I believed we could be, I had to have a line-up that kicked ass on all fronts."

"Did we set out to do something that was so unusual? No. [...] This was very much my concept, which may have helped. Apart from Chris, it was a one-man show. And when you’re virtually working on your own, it can sharpen the vision."

"I don’t want people to think I’m the maniac that people think I am, think all of us are. We’re five guys in a band, touring, living our dreams, playing metal. We could sing about politics, but we’d get into way more fights and arguments way more than we do now. We could be a Satanic evil band, you know, or a super religious band, you know, really getting both sides of the coin there. Metalheads don’t give a fuck, we accept everybody."

"It's art, just look at it as art. Yeah, it's disgusting, but that's never gonna happen. Go to the Vatican and look at some of the artwork there. Woah! That's real, representing something that could happen. Monsters are never gonna come ripping out of your body."

"It’s a pain in the ass [...] A woman saw someone wearing one of our shirts, I think she is a schoolteacher, and she just caused this big stink about it. So [now] we can't play anything from the first three records. And it really sucks because kids come up and they want us to play all the old songs — and we would — but they know the deal. We can't play 'Born in a Casket' but can play 'Dismembered and Molested.' Talk about getting lucky, because I can’t see why they wouldn’t want to ban that."

"The music’s brutal and some of the lyrics reflect that, but we’re not trying to make people aware of anything. All you have to do is watch the news if you want to be aware of all the violence in the world."

"Kiss the ass of metal, you fucking jerk-offs!"

"I guess a [crucial] part of our popularity is that you don’t go in there worrying about listening to me preach that Hillary’s right and Trump’s wrong, or Trump’s right and she’s wrong, because we don’t care about that. As far as our music goes, on stage, we’re just singing about what we sing about. Hopefully everybody’s having a good time, hopefully everybody gets to the show safe, leaves the show safe, and comes back for more. [...] If people can escape with us, then, yeah, you know? And I wouldn’t say don’t listen to bands who are political, like Napalm Death is; there’s definitely those bands, and that’s good. That’s what’s in his heart, and he should do that. If I would make a band that’s talking about politics, I would do a side band. That’s not going to be in Cannibal. This whole world should just start thinking, “Just because you stand a little this way, or stand a little that way, that doesn’t mean we can’t all come together and try to compromise.” Don’t let politics and religion divide you. I don’t want to be conspiracy-esque, but I’m going to say this and it’s going to be conspiracy-esque, but [division is] what I think some people want."

"I’ve never voted in my life. I’ve never registered to vote, and I’m not going to. You know what, I pay my taxes. I work my ass off and I give my money to things that I don’t agree with. [...] OK, then they would say, “You can change that by voting.” No, because I’m just one vote. What if I don’t agree with all they do? I’m legally bound to pay taxes, I have to do that, so I do. There’s my contribution to politics. Other than that, leave me and my family alone, we’re not hurting anybody. Just that simple. I don’t need to be in it. I have my views on things I’ve seen, and if ever I was that compelled by any candidate, maybe I would register to vote and vote. [...] I just want to go and play music and come home to my kids and my wife. I don’t want to sit here and be in the picket line because they’re being untreated fairly, then you got the other guys on the other side saying, ‘No they’re not.’ You’ve always got the conservative people there, you always have the left-wing people there, and people in the middle, just trying to walk down the street and they can’t, because there’s people blocking the way."

"I saw [the album cover for '] and was like, 'oh my -- damn. That has got to piss some people off.' [...] It's one to have people dying in your [albums], well you start messing with children, and people start getting pissed off."

"I thought Barnes was irreplaceable. I had no idea who could take his place, but occasionally, amid the drama and confusion, Rob Barrett would speak up and say, "Let's bring in George." Rob was the easiest to get on board with the decision. I'll stress this: The decision to remove Barnes was ultimately the band's. Alex and the guys knew I didn't think Barnes's performance was up to par, but kicking out a band member was not my territory. I wasn't thinking about George at the time. I worried about getting the album done and didn't see how we would do it without Barnes. I remember the Cannibal guys saying they didn't care if Metal Blade dropped them. They wanted to make one record where they were as happy with the vocals as the music. It took a lot of courage to make that call."

"I’m the Corpsegrinder, bro! I ain’t scared of shit. What scares me is old age, ’cause there ain’t no escapin’ that. And you know what scares me? An empty bottle of beer and an empty bottle of whiskey. That’s scary. It’s the only thing I can say and still be tough."

"I’m not going to get on Instagram to bitch about politics. In this day and age you’re either with Trump or against Trump, you’re either with Hillary or against her, you can’t be in the middle, it’s ridiculous to me. I might like tacos but I don’t like pizza,; maybe I like pizza only with pepperoni but no other kind of pizza, but no, that’s not allowed. In politics it seems like it’s like that, and they’re all so negative anyway. In Cannibal Corpse, most people want to paint us as being negative anyway, and we’re not—we’re just five guys in a band who’re into horror movie stuff. We don’t sing about politics; we might all have our own views, we probably all have our own religious views as well, but we just don’t let that creep into this band. It’s not about that. it’s about horror movie stuff. You wanna talk about it on an individual basis, I’m not that well informed. I don’t think that far into that kind of stuff."

"We’re a death metal band. I got two daughters now, and we’ve got songs like “Fucked with a Knife” and “Stripped, Raped and Strangled.” It’s pretty heavy stuff, and I think a lot of people think we’re insensitive to stuff like that, especially in this day and age when you’re supposed to apologize for everything you do because of someone’s feelings. Look, we’re a death metal band; it’s horror-movie-type stuff. It’s fiction. It’s not real. We’re like Stephen King with music. Sometimes people point to some of the things I say, and sometimes I’m a little harsh with the things I say on stage, but I just hope they put it together that I would never condone anything like that. I have two daughters and I would protect them with my life."

"I don’t have a problem singing our lyrics with two daughters at home. [...] If one of my daughters went to college and was raped or something, first off, rape songs wouldn’t even be what I was thinking of. I’d be thinking of our other songs. Because I’d be going there to find who did it, and make them pay. But would I then want to play those songs on stage? I don’t know. I’d have to cross that bridge. I can understand how some people would be like, “If it’s happening with you and your daughters, you should feel that uncomfortable with everybody,” and I don’t have a problem with at least listening to people’s opinions about it."

"[When I wrote], I'd be expanding on an idea and then I'd go back and I'd review it. So a lot of it you can hear train wrecks as you're playing through the song -- I'm just working and trying stuff. Then I'd come back, as you say, and extract what appeared to be the shining bits, if you like, as opposed to the bits, and then I'd lace them together. That's how the sequence of the song would arrive."