ANDREAS KISSER Says SEPULTURA Went Through 'A Chaotic, Hellish Time' Before Splitting With MAX CAVALERA

Andreas Kisser says that SEPULTURA went through "a chaotic, hellish time" before splitting with frontman Max Cavalera more than two decades ago.

SEPULTURA's most commercially successful period ended in 1996 with the exit of Max after the rest of the band fired his wife Gloria as their manager. His brother, drummer Igor Cavalera, stuck around with the group for another 10 years before leaving SEPULTURA and re-teaming with Max in CAVALERA CONSPIRACY.

With only Kisser and bassist Paulo Xisto Pinto Jr. remaining from the classic SEPULTURA lineup, the band has continued making albums and touring the world amid constant calls from fans for a reunion with the Cavalera brothers.

Although things with Max ended badly, SEPULTURA's 1996 album "Roots" was the peak of the band's success. Asked by Eonmusic if he looks back at that period as a golden time, despite the difficulties, Kisser responded: "In a sense, yes; in the other sense, it was a chaotic, hellish time. SEPULTURA was chaos backstage. Max was not a part of the band anymore, basically. He had his own bus, and after the show he disappeared. We couldn't have the kind of conversation which is so healthy after the show — you know: 'Hey, change here, there. Fucking great show,' you know? [Something that would have taken] five minutes — but so important for us, at least for myself, to keep the show improving, and not take it for granted."

Pressed about whether he thinks SEPULTURA perhaps got too big too fast, Kisser said: "I think it was big the way it was supposed to be, I guess.

"['Roots' is] a great album, [but] we were not prepared to be that big, especially our structure, our management structure," he continued. "That's why we fired our manager; because she couldn't do it. She couldn't organize things, she was only thinking about the singer, and putting him in the most important position, and we were just the back-up band, and that was not SEPULTURA. On stage, and on practice, nobody was there but us, so we could deal with ourselves and play and did what we did.

"'Roots' is a great album, and I'm very proud of it. Working on it was very difficult, but at the same time, we achieved something fantastic there. But it was impossible to deal with anything — to make business, to discuss simple things — and we couldn't really go much further than that."

The current SEPULTURA lineup released its latest studio album, "Machine Messiah", in January 2017 via Nuclear Blast.

Igor and Max have spent much of the last two years celebrating the 20th anniversary of "Roots" by performing the LP in its entirety all over the world.