Canadian thrash metal legends, Razor, have returned with Cycle Of Contempt, their first new full-length album in 25 years and guitar legend Dave Carlo talks about it this weekend (Saturday, October 15th at 3:33 PM EST) on BraveWords' Streaming For Vengeance. Alongside fellow Canuckleheads like Anvil, Exciter, Sacrifice, Voivod and Annihilator, Razor ushered in a new ferocity into the ‘80s metal scene. In an excerpt from the BraveWords interview, we ask Dave Carlo where did the need for speed come from?
"You know what, it was the evolution of where metal was going as it came up to the ‘70s,” he begins. “Bands came and pushed the envelope, right? And, not the way we do it, but, you know, we're a product of what happened there. And it you think about it, and this is just off the top of my head, so I may not be completely accurate, but I think about bands that started to play faster, and it started with, like, Black Sabbath having songs in the early days, songs that had faster parts, like Into The Void, and songs like stuff on Vol. 4 such as ‘Supernaut’ and what's the last song, ‘Under The Sun’ It's a wonderful song. But anyway, Sabbath did that a fair bit. I found Paranoid like that, too. Then Priest started pushing things when they put out Stained Class and Sin After Sin, especially. We started seeing songs like ‘Exciter’ off of Stained Class, ‘Rapid Fire’ and ‘Steeler’, off of British Steel, and then you know Motörhead happened. Even the name Motörhead means speed freak, you know? Motörhead. So there's kind of a dual meaning there for Motörhead. When they put Ace Of Spades out, it just kind of moved in that direction. Then, look what Metallica and Slayer did. And Razor was born out of bands like Motörhead, Raven, and Slayer.”
BraveWords: Did you feel a camaraderie with Anvil and Exciter, that Canada had its own extreme scene?
"Well, we were all cutting-edge metal fans,” Carlo adds. “And what I mean by that is we were the kid of guys who would be at the record store looking at imports, and learning about what the newest, heaviest bands were out there. Just trying to find something that was good and heavy. Speed itself wasn't always the first thing on our mind, but I would say that we never really looked at it from any Canadian standpoint. I mean, there might have been some pride that there were some Canadian bands doing it, but honestly the first real metal band from Canada would probably have to be Anvil, because I wouldn't put Triumph and Rush into that category. So, I'd say Anvil was the first Canadian band that was just playing metal, so to speak. So there was some pride when Anvil came out, and those first couple of Anvil albums, I loved those albums. And I also loved Heavy Metal Maniac, but Exciter came out just shortly before Razor with Armed And Dangerous. But yeah, I would say that we just liked all metal from all parts of the world, and a lot of it came from the US. But like I say, my three influences that always come to my mind when I was putting Razor's material together in the early days would be Motörhead, Raven, and Slayer. They played a big role toward 1985 because we'd done a bunch of shows with them, and they rubbed off on us.”
Tune in for more this Saturday, October 15th at 3:33 PM EST on BraveWords' Streaming For Vengeance. You can watch/listen on the BraveWords Facebook page or the BraveWords YouTube channel. For more information about Streaming For Vengeance, visit this location.
As energetic and exciting as Evil Invaders and as urgent and powerful as Razor’s 1989 speed-fest Violent Restitution, Cycle Of Contempt showcases a band that never stopped spewing venom.
“I tried to write songs that everybody could listen to and say, “Yeah, I know a guy who's done that to me or done this, or I know that situation. I can relate to that,” band founder Dave Carlo says. “And I didn’t want to make everything specifically about me because when you do that, you exclude people. I wanted to include everyone that’s ever felt pissed off about anything.”
An unrelenting slab of old-school thrash that showcases Razor's encyclopedic knowledge of the past along with Carlo’s growth as a songwriter, player, and lyricist, Cycle Of Contempt is here to show that Razor are as dominating as ever.
Cycle Of Contempt is available on LP/CD/CS/digital. Physical orders are available via Relapse.com here, digital downloads/streaming here.
Album stream:
"Flames Of Hatred" lyric video:
