OBITUARY Guitarist: 'It's Always A Beautiful Thing To Bring The Music To The People'

Claudia of Austria's We Don't Care conducted an interview with guitarist Trevor Peres of Florida death metal legends OBITUARY at this year's MetalDays festival, which took place last month in Tomlin, Slovenia. You can watch the entire chat below. A few excerpts follow (transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET).

On why the band's latest studio album was a self-titled effort:

Trevor: "Actually, it was never planned. It was totally spontaneous. We were trying to figure out — we wrote the album, all this music and recorded it. We had the artwork, we're like 'What are we going to name it? What's going to be the name?' We usually name it after a song title. We're looking at all the songtitles and we're, like, 'How about this? How about that?' I was like, 'Damn. Look at the artwork. It's just our logo. It's our name.' Everybody thought, Donald [Tardy, drums], John [Tardy, vocals] and myself, 'Why don't we call it 'Obituary'?" Who cares. Fuck it. Donald was like, 'I was thinking the same thing.' Let's just call it 'Obituary'. Fuck it. It is what it is. It's us. No special meaning. Just there you have it. Some people ask, 'Oh my God. Does it mean the end?' No. It has nothing to do with nothing, it's just our album title now. Tenth album? Whatever, so it's cool."

On what's the most important thing for him, besides gear, while playing live:

Trevor: "Other than equipment, I mean, I don't know. Just to enjoy the show. We love to play. I love to play. Whether there's ten thousand people or a hundred people, it's always a beautiful thing to bring the music to the people. That's why I enjoy it. If I don't physically feel good onstage because I'm tired or something, that sucks."

On how he remembers and keeps track of his musical ideas:

Trevor: "I don't write musical tablature. I've never done that. I took that in school years ago, but I don't practice it. Usually, most of the time I write a rhythm or rhythmic thing and I'll remember it. Nowadays that I have a cell phone that's so technical, I'll literally, if I have an idea, I'll go, 'Oh cool!' I'll hit record and I'll play it to the phone just so I remember it for an idea for later, then I'll go back and go, 'Okay, cool.' I'll figure it out. I got a few on my phone right now. [Laughs] The phone is beautiful for this. The new phones are so fucking advanced. Usually, it happens maybe on tour during soundcheck. Like, if I smoked weed before soundcheck and it sounds really good onstage maybe, like an extra special monitor sound, usually a good rhythm comes out and Terry [Butler, bass] will look at me and go, 'What is that, dude?' I'll go, 'I don't know. I just made it up!' Then he'll say, 'That's badass.' Either he'll record it or I'll record it with my phone. We do that a lot now. It's pretty funny."

On whether he considers himself to be an "artist":

Trevor: "I guess. I don't know — I don't paint. [Laughs] I create music. I guess that's art. Music's art. If you create music or paint or make sculptures or make a house… people who are architects are artists, even. I think everybody's got a little bit of that in them. I think every human being has that, especially when you're a child, just coloring in a crayon book, you're an artist. I think everybody can be an artist. At the end of the day, what you're perceived is how you present yourself. Definitely every musician here who creates their music is somewhat of an artist, I think, for sure. Even creating a webzine is an artform, really."

OBITUARY will embark on a U.S. tour next month. The headlining East Coast run, with support from EXMORTUS, begins September 1 in Carrboro, North Carolina and ends September 16 in Ocala, Florida.

OBITUARY will head to Europe in November to perform with SLAYER, LAMB OF GOD and ANTHRAX on a 24-date tour.

OBITUARY's second Relapse release — the aforementioned self-titled tenth studio album — came out in March 2017.