BUTCHER BABIES' HEIDI SHEPHERD On Upcoming Album: 'We're Angry Again'

BUTCHER BABIES vocalist Heidi Shepherd and guitarist Henry Flury spoke to the "BREWtally Speaking" podcast about the band's upcoming fourth studio album which was recently completed with producer Josh Schroeder (LORNA SHORE, KING 810).

Heidi said about BUTCHER BABIES' musical evolution: "We've been a band for nearly 15 years, so when we started we were angry kids — very angry. We had a lot to be angry about. And as success started coming around and we started leaving our families and leaving our friends behind, our second more [about] loneliness and emotion in that, and then the third album was just kind of a culmination of all that. And then, all of a sudden, we're angry again, because our shit was taken away from us for years [because of the coronavirus pandemic]. We're angry again. We go to Michigan in the middle of the winter. And I feel almost like we reverted to our first album — those emotions you can really hear on our fourth album because we're kind of going through those same emotions.

"That's what's awesome about bands putting out albums," she continued. "It's a snapshot of time. It's a snapshot of what they were going through at the time, or what they felt like they wanted to explore."

Heidi went on to say that "evolution is necessary as an artist." She added: "We need to evolve; we need to try out all these different things. We don't do it for our fans; we do it for us. Of course we love when they like it and they wanna hear certain things, but I need to be able to put my emotions on to an album as well. This is my therapy. [Laughs] This is my very expensive therapy. So it's important for us."

Circling back to the upcoming BUTCHER BABIES LP, Heidi said: "I'm so excited for people to be able to hear this because a lot of this stuff was written right in the studio, so you're gonna hear a lot of what we were going through in those six weeks that we wrote and recorded this album. Weird emotions within the band 'cause some of us hadn't seen each other in over a year. Weird emotions about not being able to tour, not being able to go play these songs. Weird emotions about everything. And I think that we were all going through those type of emotions. So it's gonna be really awesome for people to hear that from us."

Added Henry: "I think it's gonna be really shocking when people hear the other songs compared to our first single, because they're gonna these expectations of, like, 'Oh, it's gonna be this kind of album.' Get ready for a curveball, because it's coming."

Last October, BUTCHER BABIES shared the official music video for their cover version of rapper Saweetie's chart-topping single "Best Friend". The clip was directed by Dale "Rage" Resteghini and was filmed at the Bare Den adult entertainment club in Newton, New Jersey.

BUTCHER BABIES have been performing their cover of "Best Friend" at their recent live shows.

Speaking to Spain's EMP about BUTCHER BABIES decision to cover "Best Friend", Shepherd said: "It's basically a song about [me and fellow BUTCHER BABIES singer Carla Harvey]. 'Cause we've been best friends for so long. We were a band together prior to BUTCHER BABIES. It's a cover, and we figured we can't think of two better people to cover this song besides us. So it's fun."

Asked by Metalshop why it's better to release singles than a full-length album in 2022, Carla said: "I think we live in a time where people want things right now; they want new stuff all the time. And I also think that when you release a single, people have a chance to digest that song, fall in love with that song before they skip to the next one and the next one and the next one. We really like developing a song on its own, making a video for that song, telling the story of that song, because every song is special to us."

Added Heidi: "We put our heart and soul into every single song that goes on the album. We don't just half-ass any of the songs, and so we want to make sure that it gets the life and the attention it deserves. And so I think we're just gonna continue this way and just leak it a little bit at a time and keep it going."

In a separate interview with Bloodstock TV, Carla stated about the recording process for the new BUTCHER BABIES LP: "It was a really cool experience. We got to sit together for about six weeks in the middle of nowhere — a very, very small town in Michigan — and just create together. And we had an Airbnb with animal skulls all over the place. And we just sat there in the snow and created probably our best album to date. So it was a great bonding experience."

When Oran O'Beirne of Bloodstock TV suggested that some BUTCHER BABIES fans might object to such a diverse combination of musical styles, Carla said: "We haven't changed at all, because some of our earliest songs were similar. We've always run the gamut throughout our music; we've never stayed with one style. Most people love about BUTCHER BABIES that we have a death metal song and a thrash metal song and then a poppy radio song, and whatever mood they're in, we've got a song for them."

Added Heidi: "What I love about being in a band like this and being around musicians that we all see eye to eye is that we can do different things; we're not pigeonholed to one certain sound. Sometimes we wanna get up and we wanna scream and we wanna be angry bitches, and then sometimes we wanna sing and we want people to hear what we feel from our hearts. And I think that that's important as an artist, to be able to do both."

Carla continued: "And judging by the audience reaction when we go from one very, very heavy song to one lighter song, they love it. They have literally the same energy for both kinds of music. They want it too. People want the freedom to be able to like different types of music."

BUTCHER BABIES' latest album, 2017's "Lilith", was produced by Steve Evetts (THE DILLINGER ESCAPE PLAN, SEPULTURA, SUICIDE SILENCE) and marked the band's recording debut with drummer Chase Brickenden, who replaced Chris Warner in 2016.

In July 2019, longtime BUTCHER BABIES bassist Jason Klein announced his departure from the band. He has since been replaced by Ricky Bonazza.

In 2021, BUTCHER BABIES embarked on a headlining tour, "Butcher Babies Vs. Goliath", which saw the band performing its debut album, "Goliath" — released in 2013 via Century Media Records — in its entirety along with recent hit singles and new material.

Hailing from the City of Angels, BUTCHER BABIES have released two Eps and three albums to date, with "Lilith", debuting at #1 on iTunes Metal chart and #7 on iTunes Rock chart. The band kicked off 2021 by independently releasing a handful of newly energized singles produced and co-written by Matt Good (FROM FIRST TO LAST),including "Bottom Of A Bottle", "Sleeping With The Enemy", "Yorktown", "Last Dance" and "It's Killin' Time, Baby!" The latter was inspired by the DC Comics character Lobo, a heavy metal bounty hunter.