CANNIBAL CORPSE Drummer: 'We Are Still Writing Records That The Fans Continue To Love'

Mark Morton of the Heavy Metal Examiner recently conducted an interview with drummer Paul Mazurkiewicz of Florida death metal veterans CANNIBAL CORPSE. A couple of excerpts from the chat follow below.

Heavy Metal Examiner: When I first listened to "Torture", I was floored by how youthful and energized the band sounds. Can you explain to me how CANNIBAL CORPSE is retaining its freshness after all these years?

Paul: It's a tough one to figure out, man. I think it has something to do that we've always loved what we do; the music is always aggressive, of course. But I know exactly what you mean. When we started writing these songs, they just came together so well. And these old-school tempos, which we haven't really used much lately, we also started to bring back. I don't know if it was a conscious effort beyond our desire to write some really great songs. First and foremost, it's about having a catchy, brutal song. But the more I think about it, I think that Rob [Barrett, guitar] and Pat [O'Brien, guitar] really contributed moreso than they have in a while; especially Rob, who wrote three songs for this new record (every record he's been on prior to this, he'd only written one per album). I think he really came into his own as a CANNIBAL songwriter with these three songs. And with Pat, who has contributed and collaborated a lot over the years, the four songs he wrote for "Torture" I think are arguably the best songs he's ever written. The things these guys came up with really helped us create a more diverse record. I'm just glad it's happening, and I think CANNIBAL fans will be really happy with it.

Heavy Metal Examiner: At what point did you notice that the game had changed for you? What I mean is, CANNIBAL CORPSE was on the vanguard of the whole gore/death metal genre, but there came a point where the infatuation with gore became almost comical and less menacing. And somewhere along the line, you recognized that and seemed to mature musically.

Paul: I know exactly what you're talking about. I think really, ever since "The Bleeding", we've began to evolve into what is now the "modern CANNIBAL sound." Even though all our CDs are CANNIBAL CDs and you can tell them all apart, I don't think it was until "The Bleeding" that we began to refine our songwriting and our musicianship. And we decided to keep moving up from that point on. There have been bands that have come and gone, and trends and fads, and certain styles that have come and gone, and we actually really try to stay true to where we started — as a brutal death metal band. We've been lucky that the older we got, the more attention we paid to what we were doing, and even more luckily, we are still writing records that the fans continue to love.

Read the entire interview from Heavy Metal Examiner.