Alright this Interview was done at the Earth Crisis /
Ignite / Shelter show in Schweinfurt. As everybody knows Earth Crisis returned
to Victory Records with an amazing album called Slither which is said to be
the best and most controversial record of this year...reason enough for me to
ask them some questions..



Plödi:

The current CD "Slither" has some major changes in style. What
were the reasons for changing the style so dramatically?

Karl:

Basically what we did with this new album is a return to the vocal ideas
of our early recordings. Like the spoken word style, the natural singing. The
intent when we sat down was to make the music more dynamic and we had a lot
of melody and harmony so when it's time for the break to hit it has much more
agression. Earth Crisis will alway play aggressive music.

Plödi:

Why is there no explanation in the booklet?

Karl:

Because we've done that and we don't like to say the same thing twice.

Plödi:

Who did the layout for this CD? Lot's of fans really like it...

Karl:

Dave McKean...he already did some stuff for Tori Amos and Fear Factory. Our
drummer Dennis got in touch with him and he was into us so he did four original
pieces of artwork and he also did the layout design for Slither

Plödi:

How do you feel about the upcoming presidential elections in the USA?

Karl:

To be honest, I haven't been following as we've been pushing with 5th gear
with the album recording it, we've gone down to South America last fall, we
did Canada this winter we did some East Coast, Midwest and West Coast dates
just before this tour and now we're doing this tour here and after that we'll
gonna do a 7 weeks long tour through the USA with Skinlab and In Flames then
we're coming back to Europe for another tour and then we're going to Japan.
So we've been very busy creating the music, recording the music, organizing
the tour because we do it all ourselves, we don't have any guitar taxer, stage
hands or anything like that.

Plödi:

How do you feel about the American Dream?

Karl:

I love living in the states. The fact is that we live a lot better that
other people in certain parts of the world as there is a higher standard of
living and a lot more freedoms. Unfortunately a lot of people in my country
are taking that for an advantage. They are not apreciating the things that they
should, there is a lot of corruption and a huge crime wave in the States.

Plödi:

Talking about Breed the Killers. You included Rob Flynn from Machine Head...how
come?

Karl:

He actually asked to sing on our record. He was a big fan of us for
a couple of years and we were into Machine Head since their first album so he
contacted us and we were really stolked on the idea. He spent a full day doing
the vocals. We actually did that song live with him when when we were on tour
with Sepultura and played in San Francisco he came on the stage.

Plödi:

How do all the Metal fans react on Earth Crisis?

Karl:

With this new album I've been doing two or three interviews a day with Terrorizer,
Kerrang, Metal Hammer, Pitreport all of them. You know Kerrang gave us four
K's and we made it on K-Rock in central NY, Nemesis the Radio Single was on
number one for two days over like Korn, Limp Bizkit and all that stuff, so we'll
definitely gonna reach a lot of new people with this album.

Plödi:

How were the reactions towards the ideas behing Earth Crisis?

Karl:

In in the Mid West you actually will see guys with hair down to
the ass with Obituary T-Shirts X-ed up. I don't think it's really like that
here in Europe. But there have been people who accepted out message but for
the most part I think that the people who are not Vegan Straight Edge or who
are not into Hardcore the people that are into our music that are coming to
our shows just for the agressive music are into us mainly because they like
our sound and that's fine. We played the Ozzfest with Ozzy Osbourne, Slayer
and Biohazard we did a tour with Sepultura another one with the Misfits another
one with Downset. We like to play to all kinds of different people.

Plödi:

How came the label change? Have you been dropped from Roadrunner?

Karl:

It was a mutual thing between us and them. It wasn't working out and the
day the deal with Roadrunner was done actually four labels stepped up with interest
in signing us. Three of them were actually chording us and we went with Victory
because they offered a serious Radio push and a high quality video which has
always been the missing ingridient for our success.

Plödi:

What is your greatest concern about the world right now?

Karl:

The theme of the new album is about how cloning, genetic engineering, mind
control experiences on animals and robotic machinery are going to change the
world. And you can see it starting already. There is fewer banks, people go
to ATM machines there is no more workers in a lot of factories in Detroit because
robotic machinery builds the cars there is no station attendant at the gas station
anymore, you swap your credit card through it to pay for the fuel. And the world's
population is going to rise and double in some decades to come and there are
fewer jobs because multi national corporations are going to be using high technology
to make more money, it's a very scary situation. And if the researchers in Texas
and a pharmaceutical company in Scottland get their way I think that soon animals
will be specifically designed to human needs and that's totally gonna change
farming and that disgusts me.

Plödi:

Do you fear this machinery especially the computers behind them?

Karl:

You know I'm all for cellphones and advances in medicine or high technology
that helps humanity but a lot of technology right now is being used by the wealthy
elite against the workers.

Plödi:

Talking about computers...the internet. How do you feel about the difference
between the western world with their huge information advantage in comparison
to coutries in Afrika. Do you think this will make the difference bigger?

Karl:

Basically all the chatrooms where people were talking trash on bands really
put me off from it and I thought it was pretty much negative but over the years
I saw how our own website alone has helped to get thousands and thousands of
kids into our band and a lot of them are now Vegan and a lot of them are now
poisonfree some Straight Edge so that's terrific, for me it's a tool to help.

Plödi:

How about the future of Earth Crisis?

Karl:

If you had asked me this question a year ago I would have said less touring
and concentrating on putting out records. But now that we have written Slither
I'm totally into touring. And I'm excited what's going to happen with Radio
stuff and we'll make three videos for this album and so we'll still go out and
play shows and we will continue doing so.

Plödi:

Some final words?

Karl:

Thank you very much for the opportunity to be in your webzine and thanks
to everyone who read this interview.