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| Photo by Deidra King |
Terry Butler is one of the death metal bassists who has held it the fuck down since the eighties. His resume is a roadmap through Florida's most horrific death metal misadventures. He played on and co-wrote the classic Death albums Leprosy (1988) and Spiritual Healing (1990) - both Necrosexual favorites - then rejoined Massacre for their albums From Beyond (1991) and The Inhuman Condition (1992). In the mid-nineties, Butler joined Six Feet Under, with barbaric stoner Chris Barnes, where he remained for fifteen years. Butler has since played with Obituary since their 2014 album Inked In Blood.
His newest project, Inhuman Condition is a throwback to Massacre, in everything from the logo to the album title, and justly so - his Inhuman Condition bandmates are recently expatriated Massacre members Jeremy Kling and Taylor Nordberg. Their new album Rat God looks and sounds like vintage Massacre in all the ways that are sure to thrill old school death metal maniacs.
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| Artwork by Dan Goldsworthy |
HELL-O Terry. New album sounds GRIM! What's your favorite song on the new album and why?
That's a tough one, and thank you. I really like "Gravebound." "Killing Pace," it's killer!
What was the creative process like for Rat God?
Actually, Jeremy and Taylor had the songs already written, probably in late 2019 or so. 14 of these songs were written while they were in Massacre, so they had that in mind when they wrote them. That's why it sounds like Massacre, classic Death. Long story short, they let MAssacre, and they asked if I would record bass for the songs, and I said 'Absolutely.'
Did you or your band mates bond over being in a band with Cam Lee over the years?
Let's just say Cam was fortunate to have been in a band with us. When I heard that Jeremy joined Massacre in the back of my mind, I thought "Oh boy, we'll see how this works out." And as usual, it didn't. But that's not a knock of Jeremy. The whole...all this was done intentionally, as far as using the font from Massacre, using the name "Inhuman Condition." I actually wrote that song back in the day. There's a real good connection there, and it all sort of fit like a puzzle. The artist [Dan Goldsworthy] created an album cover that looks like something Ed Repka might have done.
Who is one of your bass heroes?
Geezer Butler, obviously. Bob Daisley. Steve Harris. Phil Lynott. Thin Lizzy is one of my favorite bands.
Is there a song you've written over the years you're most proud of?
I've wrote some stuff for Six Feet Under that's pretty cool as well. I helped write half the Spiritual Healing album with Chuck, so all those. I'm definitely super proud of the stuff I did with Death.
I just spoke with Steve DiGiorgio the other month about his time playing in Death with Gene Hoglan. What was it like playing with Chuck?
It was great. Chuck is obviously a talented musician and started a new genre basically. At the time, none of us thought "Oh my god, we're in this groundbreaking band that's gonna get bigger and bigger and bigger and get legendary." It was just cool to be in a band and play music, heavy music. It's a natural progression for artists, the more you play, the better you get, and that's kind of what it was with Death. We were always big fans of Watchtower and some of the French progressive early metal and that's kind of what happened on Spiritual Healing. Sort of a natural evolution. It's a step between the more brutal stuff with the more progressive stuff in Human.
Was there a point when you decided you wanted to be a lifer as a musician?
Yeah, pretty much on the first tour I ever did. When I was in Massacre first, like in early 87, we had a little tour set up to go on the east coast. Most of them fell through. I think we payed four. But I loved it. That condition only got worse. We did the Scream Bloody Gore tour and Leprosy tour. This was so much fun playing music and travelling and I want to do this forever.
What's one album that holds a special place in your heart?
Probably Hell Awaits by Slayer. All their stuff is good. but their album for me really kicked in the whole extreme music as far as how good it can be and being evil sounding and aggressive. It was 1985 and that's the year I graduated out of high school. I remember blasting that album continuously. So that's definitely one that holds a special place in my heart.
Hell Awaits is their most evil sounding album, in my opinion.
Show No Mercy and Haunting The Chapel are brutal, but that one just went up a notch. For me, at that time in my life, everything was fresh and new, and just cruising around, blasting that music, knowing that only two people in the whole city are doing that felt great.
What is your recipe for bass playing success?
You have different thoughts when you're playing it. Some people want to be the best bass player in the world, play 17,000 notes a second, flip the bass around play it backwards with my teeth, all that sort of stuff, or you can just be a solid bass player in a killer band and have fun. And that's the way I've chosen. I've been fortunate in some real popular bands. I've always approached it like first get in tight, second play the rhythm tight. but that's just my approach. I have respect for all styles of bass playing, but my approach was first learn the song, know the song. I never took lessons, I just grabbed a bass. Bill Andrews, the drummer from Massacre, he was like "you wanna be the bass player?"
Is there one record you feel is underrated?
I would have to say, maybe Six Feet Under Maximum Violence or Bringer of Blood. Those are some pretty good records. I was in Six Feet Under for 16 years. We had a lot of records. Some are better than others. Haunted is a classic, that got a lot of play, but Maximum Violence and Bringer Of Blood are underrated.
Actually, now that I think about it, I was in a band called Denial Fiend, and we put out two records. It was on a small label, John McEntee's label from Incantation, but those are definitely underrated. I wish it had more of a push to get out there more, but maybe in the future more people will listen to it.
Geezer Butler, obviously. Bob Daisley. Steve Harris. Phil Lynott. Thin Lizzy is one of my favorite bands.
Is there a song you've written over the years you're most proud of?
I've wrote some stuff for Six Feet Under that's pretty cool as well. I helped write half the Spiritual Healing album with Chuck, so all those. I'm definitely super proud of the stuff I did with Death.
I just spoke with Steve DiGiorgio the other month about his time playing in Death with Gene Hoglan. What was it like playing with Chuck?
It was great. Chuck is obviously a talented musician and started a new genre basically. At the time, none of us thought "Oh my god, we're in this groundbreaking band that's gonna get bigger and bigger and bigger and get legendary." It was just cool to be in a band and play music, heavy music. It's a natural progression for artists, the more you play, the better you get, and that's kind of what it was with Death. We were always big fans of Watchtower and some of the French progressive early metal and that's kind of what happened on Spiritual Healing. Sort of a natural evolution. It's a step between the more brutal stuff with the more progressive stuff in Human.
Was there a point when you decided you wanted to be a lifer as a musician?
Yeah, pretty much on the first tour I ever did. When I was in Massacre first, like in early 87, we had a little tour set up to go on the east coast. Most of them fell through. I think we payed four. But I loved it. That condition only got worse. We did the Scream Bloody Gore tour and Leprosy tour. This was so much fun playing music and travelling and I want to do this forever.
What's one album that holds a special place in your heart?
Probably Hell Awaits by Slayer. All their stuff is good. but their album for me really kicked in the whole extreme music as far as how good it can be and being evil sounding and aggressive. It was 1985 and that's the year I graduated out of high school. I remember blasting that album continuously. So that's definitely one that holds a special place in my heart.
Hell Awaits is their most evil sounding album, in my opinion.
Show No Mercy and Haunting The Chapel are brutal, but that one just went up a notch. For me, at that time in my life, everything was fresh and new, and just cruising around, blasting that music, knowing that only two people in the whole city are doing that felt great.
What is your recipe for bass playing success?
You have different thoughts when you're playing it. Some people want to be the best bass player in the world, play 17,000 notes a second, flip the bass around play it backwards with my teeth, all that sort of stuff, or you can just be a solid bass player in a killer band and have fun. And that's the way I've chosen. I've been fortunate in some real popular bands. I've always approached it like first get in tight, second play the rhythm tight. but that's just my approach. I have respect for all styles of bass playing, but my approach was first learn the song, know the song. I never took lessons, I just grabbed a bass. Bill Andrews, the drummer from Massacre, he was like "you wanna be the bass player?"
Is there one record you feel is underrated?
I would have to say, maybe Six Feet Under Maximum Violence or Bringer of Blood. Those are some pretty good records. I was in Six Feet Under for 16 years. We had a lot of records. Some are better than others. Haunted is a classic, that got a lot of play, but Maximum Violence and Bringer Of Blood are underrated.
Actually, now that I think about it, I was in a band called Denial Fiend, and we put out two records. It was on a small label, John McEntee's label from Incantation, but those are definitely underrated. I wish it had more of a push to get out there more, but maybe in the future more people will listen to it.
Do you still stay in touch with Chris Barnes?
No. Me and the drummer Greg quit the same day in 2011. We haven't had any contact with him. To each his own. He's doing his own thing and I'm doing mine.
What's the most un-metal thing you're listening to?
I'm a child of the seventies, so there's a lot of seventies rock I grew up on I really like. Pink Floyd, Allen Parsons Project, Yes. I'm a big fan of the AOR mid-eighties, early eighties radio rock like Sammy Hagar, Journey, these kind of bands I really like. There were tons of them from that time that had one or two hits.
I'm huge into 70s classic rock like Rainbow, UFO, Scorpions, Uriah Heap.
Is there one band you want to play with in the future?
I'd love to do another tour with Carcass. They're so awesome. Cool dudes. We have so many friends from other bands that are always fun to hang with. The guys from Grave are always awesome. To be honest, any band right now would be great to party with because that means we're at a show.
We've got another Inhuman Condition show coming up July 10 at the Brass Monkey in Tampa with Gruesome and Intoxicated. So we're looking forward to that. There's a lot of touring in Obituary scheduled so we're excited for that.
What do you want to say to all the Necrosexual freaks out there reading this?
Stay safe, and I hope to see you out on the road soon.
Listen to Inhuman Condition at their bandcamp.
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