OBITUARY Frontman Talks About Split With ROADRUNNER RECORDS

Zach Palmer of DoomsdayMusic.com recently conducted an interview with OBITUARY frontman John Tardy. A couple of excerpts from the chat follow:

Doomsday Music: Now, this album ["Frozen In Time"], if I'm not mistaken, this was the final album on the Roadrunner contract, is that correct?

John Tardy: "Yeah, we are all done with Roadrunner."

Doomsday Music: OK. Are there any plans to re-sign with Roadrunner, or are you going to look elsewhere? Or is there even going to be another album?

John Tardy: "Oh, there's definitely [going to be another]. We've already got some songs written as a matter of fact. We're kind of working on some new stuff, poking around here, so we definitely plan on next year doing another record, but it will not be with Roadrunner, no."

Doomsday Music: Now, I know you probably can't talk about too much specifics if it has even gotten that far, but as far as your preference, what kind of label are you looking for? Are you looking for the size of Roadrunner or bigger like Warner Brothers or are you going for more Nuclear Blast or Century Media size?

John Tardy: "Well, we've gotten some contact from some of those record companies, and we're really just approaching it like all options are open. We've even half-kicked around the fact that we might just do it on our own. So it just all depends here, there's going to be a lot that happens. I think people are just well aware of the fact that we won't be back with Roadrunner. It just all depends on what's next for us and that's the way we're going to approach it. We're so relieved, we just got off the record deal, we got all our merchandising back, and everything is just in our own laps to do what we want with it, and it's just so nice not to have those ropes tying you down like we had being with Roadrunner for so long and just some of the stuff that they did, we're just so happy to be free of that. So we're leaving all our options open and we'll see what happens."

Doomsday Music: OBITUARY is one of those very rare bands where, for example, whenever you have an article on Blabbermouth, which is known for people trashing bands recklessly, OBITUARY tends to not get that that much. There seems to be a lot of respect for the band and not a lot of people just trying to be assholes about it. What do you attribute that to?

John Tardy: "You know, it's funny because one of the band members, Frank [Watkins, bass], is the one who most of the time, I'm well aware of Blabbermouth and go there from time to time, but Frank checks in there quite a bit and he was the one that told me that exact same thing that you just said. He was like, 'I go in there and even bands like SLIPKNOT, who are just huge and awesome, they get people saying all kinds of crazy stuff,' and when you have a forum like that, you're allowed to do it. So I don't know what to attribute that to other than the fact that we pretty much get along with everyone that we come across. There hasn't been a band that we've toured with that we didn't get along with and at the end of the tour we didn't remain good friends with since then. It's good to hear and I run into the same thing on my website, there's a message board that you don't have to sign up for or log into or anything. You just log on there and just say anything you want, and there's just been very, very few things that I would go in there and erase just for someone going in there and saying something stupid and unproductive. If you don't like [the band], you can tell me that and I can live with that, but literally once or twice in the year and a half since it's been up, I've even edited anything off of that. I thought for sure there'd be all kinds of, 'Oh, you guys suck!' and this and that, but it's been really cool. It's really good to see people just… I mean if you don't like us, that's fine but, it makes you feel good. At least there's not people out there ragging you to no end."

Doomsday Music: It's just one of those things that seems like you guys have achieved something few bands have in getting respected [by the general metal scene].

John Tardy: "It's interesting that you noticed the same thing because Frank, just a few months ago he was telling me, before the U.S. tour I think, he was like, 'I go on this thing all the time and there's always something bad about somebody, but it seems like they never want to rag on us.' Which is good I guess."

Doomsday Music: Definitely [Laughs]

John Tardy: "It's kind of a baffling thing, really. I don't expect a lot out of our band, we just like to do what we like to do and we just go about our business and that's how it is. Just over the years, it seems like there is something about OBITUARY that is different, there's something different about it when we play live or something. It just seems like we could do a lot more in terms of the overall size of the band. It seems like over the years, Roadrunner just doesn't acknowledge… they don't seem to think about or care about it and they just have done as little as they possibly can to help us out through the years. They literally have done nothing at all for us, which is why we were like, if we have done what we have done with them doing nothing, if we did it ourselves and at least put some effort into it, maybe we could achieve something a little bit bigger, but it's just one of those things."

Read the entire interview at DoomsdayMusic.com.