I don’t think kids today could understand the power that MTV’s Headbanger’s Ball had over young metalheads back in the late 80’s and early 90’s. Back before YouTube and streaming services where you can pull up music from any artist on demand, Headbanger’s Ball was one of the very few places where one could discover new metal bands. And there are countless bands that I’m still into to this day that I can trace back to first hearing on Headbanger’s Ball. One such time was in 1989 when I saw the music video for the song “Inner Self” by a Brazilian thrash metal band that I’d never heard of called Sepultura. It was one of those “Holy shit!” moments, and I remember going to the mall and buying their Beneath the Remains album on cassette the next day, and I’ve been a fan of Max Cavalera and his bands ever since.
Formed by brothers Max (guitar/vocals) and Igor Cavalera (drums – who later changed the spelling to Iggor) in Belo Horizonte in 1984, Sepultura went on to achieve worldwide success in the early 1990’s with critically-acclaimed albums like Arise, Chaos A.D., and Roots. It was during this time thatMax Cavalera married their manager Gloria Bujnowski. So when the rest of Sepultura announced their intention to fire Bujnowski and seek new management, Max quit and Sepultura carried on with a new singer. This caused a riff that lasted between Max and Iggor for 10 years until Iggor himself quit Sepultura in 2006 and reconciled with his brother.
After leaving Sepultura, Max Cavalera went on to start the band Soulfly in 1997, (which his sons Zyon and Igor – who was named after Max’s brother – later joined). He and his brother Iggor then formed Cavalera Conspiracy in 2007. The band was later joined by Max’s son Igor on bass and Travis Stone (of the grindcore band Pig Destroyer) on guitar, dropped the Conspiracy part, and is now known only as Cavalera. In addition, he joined Go Ahead and Die, (also with his son Igor), the metal supergroup Killer Be Killed, and while he was still a member of Sepultura, did a one-off project with Alex Newport (then of the alt-metal band Fudge Tunnel) called Nailbomb.
So I was quite happy to see Cavalera on the bill for this year’s Louder Than Life. Not only that, but that they will be playing the landmark 1993 Sepultura album Chaos A.D. live. And when the opportunity arose to interview Max prior to the upcoming Cavalera tour, (which kicks off with their set at Louder Than Life on Thursday, September 18th at 3:50 p.m. on Main Stage 1), I was most certainly excited! And it turned into an almost 45-minute conversation with a guy I found to be funny, honest, down-to-earth, no-bullshit, unpretentious, cool, and 100% dedicated to the music he creates. This was easily one of my favorite interviews I’ve ever done.
LEO Weekly: It’s well known what drove you and Iggor apart, but I don’t think I’ve ever read how you all made amends?
Max Cavalera: Yeah, so that actually came from Iggor. We did not speak for about 10 years, and then he called one day out of the blue and he just wanted to be part of my life again, and for me to be part of his and his family’s life. That was awesome because we’re brothers and nothing should separate us like that. And, you know, you do dumb shit when you’re young, [laughs]. We all did our share of it. But yeah, it was great once we got back together. We started making music kind of like right away. We did the Cavalera Conspiracy stuff, then we started playing the old Sepultura records, and then we did the re-recordings [of the first three Sepultura records: Bestial Devastation, Morbid Visions, and Schizophrenia]. But yeah, I’m super pumped for Chaos A.D.! I love all the records, but there’s definitely a soft spot in my heart for Chaos A.D. That record is just a little extra special.
What brought about this short tour celebrating Chaos A.D.?
We just thought it was a good time right now. It’s been about 30 years since this album came out. We made a run of the other ones: Schizophrenia combined with Morbid Visions and Bestial Devastation. But we were always looking forward to Chaos A.D. And it’s cool because we get to do them in a couple of festival settings. You know, Aftershock, Louder Than Life, and some other festivals with Lamb of God and Sanguisugabogg, so it’s cool. I think regardless if you’re gonna see us in a festival or in a headlining show, we’re gonna try to put on our best show possible and pay homage to this record that we really love so much.
So the lyrics on Chaos A.D.; to me, they still resonate today, especially with a lot of what’s going on in the world right now? Do you feel the same way?
I do, yeah. I think it’s kind of cool. Not cool in the way the world has gone, but cool in that the record is a bit prophetic, you know? And you can look at stuff like “Territory,” with what’s going on in Gaza right now, and Russia and Ukraine. “Refuse/Resist,” you got all the riots and all that. “Amen” is still like religion trying to oppress people. “Propaganda,” I think social media is a big part of propaganda now; we can definitely apply it to that. When I wrote “Propaganda” we didn’t have social media, so I was mostly talking about people in general. But you can definitely apply that to social media. And then you have some other stuff like “Biotech is Godzilla,” you can even make the argument that COVID was created in a laboratory, just like the lyrics of “Biotech” suggest. Which was great that Jello [Biafra] wrote those lyrics. Actually I was asking for “Nazi Punks Fuck Off” part 2 and he’s like, no, I’m not doing that, but I’m going to give you something that is going to be called “Biotech is Godzilla.” And I was like, fuck yeah, that sounds great! It’s like, I’m not arguing with you, you’re the writer, man! [Laughs].
Is there any chance that you all will re-record Chaos A.D., or any of the other Sepultura albums?
We’re just going to see how it goes. From a musician standpoint, I feel that Beneath the Remains and Arise could be better sonically. Beneath was done in Brazil, not the best gear, but we did have Scott Burns producing. Arise was done in Florida. I think Chaos sounds better how we play them now. And you could even challenge us and say that you could re-record Chaos A.D., even though it is an Andy Wallace production, which is pretty freaking special. But at the moment I’m not thinking about that; I’m all in on the tour. We actually made some cool things for the tour that people are gonna see. I don’t want to spoil the surprise, but there are some stage surprises that people get to see when they come to the show. But we’re playing the whole record, even stuff like “The Hunt,” “Clenched Fist,” “Nomad,” we’re playing the whole damn thing, and some other stuff, some covers from that time. So it should be really cool for people that love that record. They’ll really get to enjoy something special.
It worries me because at Louder Than Life, you’ve only got a half-hour set. So you might have to cut a few songs.
We’ll squeeze the best ones in there and try to sneak in a couple of deep cuts, or play real fast so we can try to play all of them, [laughs].
So the day you are playing, [Thursday, September 18], that is the unofficial Ozzy/Black Sabbath Memorial Day. So do you think you all will break out “Symptom of the Universe”?
There’s a big chance for that. We did that back in the studio when we were doing Chaos. In fact, when we were recording Chaos, Black Sabbath was recording something one mile down the road from us. We went there one afternoon. They weren’t there, but we got to go around the studio and I stole some Tony Iommi picks. Please don’t tell Tony that! [Laughs]. But yeah, it was bizarre that we were both in the same area at the same time recording. And of course, I was always a big Black Sabbath fan, and none of us would be here without Sabbath or Ozzy. So yeah, it would be cool if we can sneak in “Symptom” for that show. That’d be pretty special.
That’s my favorite Sabbath song, and I think Sepultura’s cover of it was amazing! It’s probably the best Black Sabbath cover I’ve ever heard.
It was so crazy because I was terrified to touch that. It’s almost like the blood of Christ that’s in the altar. Like, don’t touch it, you know? You’re not allowed to touch that. And we’re like, we want to touch it, you know? [Laughs]. Kind of like young punks, you know, we can do it! I was actually looking at it the other way. I was like, fuck, I don’t care! It’s my favorite riff of all time. I just wanna play my favorite riff. Regardless of what happens to this cover, that’s the riff I wish I would have written and I wanna play it for a cover, you know? So I just went with that kind of attitude.
You were you pretty close with Ozzy back in the 90s, weren’t you?
Yeah, we did a bunch of Ozzfests together and our families actually got pretty close. Gloria was friends with Sharon [Osbourne], and our kids played together with their kids. We got to go to their house a bunch of times. In fact, one of my favorite memories was during Ozzfest when both of my kids, Igor and Zyon, were really little and they were sleeping in the guitar cases, and Ozzy is singing in the background. I have a bottle of wine I’m drinking, my kids are sleeping in the guitar cases, and I’m watching Ozzy, like, life was good, you know? [Laughs].
That had to be surreal.
It doesn’t get much better than that.
Did you have any crazy stories with him, or was that after he had kind of slowed down a bit on the partying?
No, no, it was cool. The beginning of Soulfly was actually cool because he’s involved with that. I knew he got booted from Sabbath, so I knew from experience he knew what I was going through with Sepultura. Of course they didn’t fire me, I quit on my own. But it’s the same thing, I was no longer with them, and Ozzy was the one to say “Fuck it, man! Get back on the horse. Just dust off and go to war.” I think he said those words, “Go to war.” I was like fuck yeah! Ozzy is down for me to go to war! I’m your man! I’m your soldier! Let’s go, you know? [Laughs]. I think I made Soulfly right after I heard those words from him.
I got some other really funny stories; one time we were playing Ozzfest somewhere in Florida, and it was the first day of the tour. He came by to say he was there for us, and he walked from his dressing room to our bus, and I think he was barefoot too. It was like wild, you know? It’s cool, Ozzy shit.
And they helped us a lot when our son Dana [Wells – Max’s stepson] died in 96. They just wanted to make sure we were OK. And he was talking to Gloria lot about that, so that was really cool. Really showed a human side to the person, you know? Which to me has always been the greatest, coolest thing about meeting my heroes is that a lot of them that I have met have real hearts, and they’re great people. They say never meet your heroes because they can be pieces of shit, but that was not the case. Such a great guy. Great heart. Just a funny, awesome, inspirational guy.
One of my favorite memories of him is actually sitting in his kitchen one night, me and Gloria and him and Sharon, and they’re telling all of their crazy stories first hand to us. It was like we had our own private session with them and telling stories about like; Sharon didn’t want Ozzy to drink anymore, so she took all his clothes out of the hotel room, left a woman’s dress, and told him if you want to go drink, you’re gonna wear that. And he fucking did it! He put on the dress and went to the bar. And I just love those stories, man. That’s like, it’s so rock ‘n’ roll, it’s awesome! And to get to hear that from them was really cool. Like, I didn’t read that in a magazine, I heard it from them. It was fucking cool! Because he was funny. He was real, you know? There’s a thing about him, around him, like an aura.
One of my favorite stories is the one that I think Zakk Wylde told me. Ozzy was watching Sepultura, like a long time ago, and we were blasting like “Arise,” and there’s like flames coming out of my guitar, I’m going 1,000 miles an hour, and Ozzy looks at Zakk and goes “I heard they like Black Sabbath, that we really influenced them, but I don’t hear it in the music.” Like, “I’m not responsible for any of this.” [Laughs]. And Zakk was like “You are directly responsible for them doing this!” And I just love that story. It’s cool Ozzy doesn’t hear the Black Sabbath influence in Sepultura, but it’s there, it’s just really hidden behind all the madness, behind all the energy and riffs. But yeah, I thought that story was fucking hilarious.
With you and Igor doing Cavalera, to me that’s the real Sepultura. So is there really any point in you joining the Andreas Kisser-led Sepultura for a show on their last tour?
I don’t want to be a part of the thing they are doing now, the retirement or whatever. I don’t understand the whole thing. No, I don’t want any part of that. To me, when we play these songs with these new guys, Igor and Travis, it’s so cool because they’re young and super excited. They’re not bored with the music, they are fired up. And to me, that’s what I wanted to show the fans about Sepultura. There is such a thing as the spirit of the thing, you know? And I think me and Iggor, we carry the spirit of it even if it is not under the name Sepultura. It’s with us, and the fans know. So we’re playing these records right now, and I just really enjoy it, especially the new generation of fans and never got to see that. A lot of people got to see me play with Sepultura, but there’s a ton of people, young kids, that never got to see that. The only way they can see that is on YouTube. And they now they have a chance to see the closest thing to that, so I think it’s cool as hell that we give them this opportunity. It’s similar with what Phil is doing with Pantera. Of course it’s not Pantera because there’s no Dimebag and Vinnie, but it’s the songs and its Phil singing, and it’s fucking great, people love it. So I don’t feel that I need to go back to those guys in order to be real. I can do that with whoever I want, and the guys we have right now are great.
I was at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame a couple months ago and saw where two of your teenage notebooks were on display. How’d that come about?
Yeah, so my mom saved that book, thank God. She collected a lot of my stuff from when I was a kid. And that one actually, a lot of the songs are in Portuguese, and it’s a different line up. It’s me, Iggor, I think Rob and Wagner. And I think we didn’t know how to play anything yet, but we had the name and we had some lyrics. We were in the early stages of figuring out riffs, like let’s find some riffs for these things, you know? [Laughs]. But I was always drawing, so I drew that real fucked up skull on the cover. Which I’m still drawing those skulls today. We sell canvas at the shows and drum heads with that fucked up skull style of art. It’s still following me to this day, [laughs]. But I’m so glad my mom saved that. That book is a real gem. I believe that book was actually created right after I named the band Sepultura, like a couple months afterwards. And it was, of course, from the Motorhead song “Dancing on Your Grave.” And it’s all handwritten. It’s all my handwriting on everything and artwork, and it’s on loan to them at the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. I’ve talked to a lot of people that see that and they always get freaked out when they see that. It’s one of those things that’s cool that somebody treasured it and saved that. Like, I wish I had my very first guitar. I don’t have it, some guy in Brazil has it and will not sell it back to me. It’s one of those kind of situations.
The new Soulfly album, Chama, [pronounced “Shama”], is about to be released. What can you tell me about the writing and recording of it?
Yeah it was a really cool, low-key record. Nobody knew we were in the studio, and that’s kind of the way I like it. But yeah, the record is a trip to me because I think it bridges the old with the modern. So you have a vibe of the early Soulfly tribal grooves connected with modern noise music. Between Zyon [Cavalera] producing the record and Arthur [Rizk] mixing, both of them add a lot of noise to the record, a lot of crazy effects, and the final result is what I call it tribal technology. So it’s kind of a merge of tribal vibes with technological things. It’s cool, it’s quite different, and I think it’s gonna surprise a lot of people. We’ve got one single out, “Storm the Gates,” that’s full of drums and tribal grooves. But the rest of the record has some really cool deep surprises. I feel a lot of people are going to be pretty stoked about it. I think it’s a very unique Soulfly record. It’s one of those that has something that feels a bit special, that the last one didn’t have. And it’s cool; it’s our 13th record. After doing this music thing for 40 years, it gets harder and harder to be truly inspired, but I think I found the source of inspiration for Chama. It was cool, I found myself in love with what I loved about Soulfly in the first place and I put it all in this record, and I think people that really like Soulfly are gonna really lose their mind on this record. It drops on October 24th, so still got a little ways to go, but we’re really excited for it.
So with having two of your sons in Soulfly, and one of your sons in Cavalera and Go Ahead and Die with you, do you find it hard to be a parent and a bandmate? Can you be critical towards them?
Well, yeah, kind of. I’m closing in on 10 years with Zyon, and I’m starting to really figure him out. But I treat them more like band members than my sons. I mean, I talk to them. There’s no bullshitting between us. If they’re not playing good, I’m gonna tear them a new asshole. I can be a big asshole, and I will be; then it’s not like being a dad, I’m being a musician, [laughs]. But the other thing about being a dad that I want them to learn is about life. It’s about enjoying the things in life and not taking it for granted. And so when we have a kick ass show, I always tell them enjoy this moment because this is so killer and you never know when you’re gonna feel like this again, so really enjoy this to the fullest. So I want to pass that down to them so that they understand. And they remind me a lot of myself when I was their age. There’s this hunger and inspiration. They wanna go get things on their own, and I think that’s great. Even though I get to share that with them, I feel a little bit like, you know, how football players that have sons that play football; sometimes they play together, and sometimes they just coach their kids. But I love that they decided to go in this direction. I tell them it’s a hard life; it’s not an easy life. You gotta have thick skin, but don’t let the shit fuck with you. If you love what you do and believe in what you’re doing, then just go ahead and do it, you know? And that’s kind of the main things that I do with them. But overall, I’m mostly really proud of them and very proud of our family in general for creating a really cool, organic, metal family. You know, the whole family works for metal. It’s cool here, man. The other day we just posted video of me and Igor jamming for Chaos A.D. in my living room and it looks like two kids doing their school project when they’re 15, except it’s me and my son jamming and getting ready for Chaos A.D., because we do that here. So the house is always full of excitement and stuff like that going on. I love the fact that our life is like that; which is kind of like the whole Soulfly Tribe thing. You know, it’s like the tribe starts with me and my family and then eventually it goes out to the crew, the workers, the friends, and then the fans, and it all becomes just like one big fucking tribe. And I love that we get to do that together, I think that’s pretty amazing.
Yeah, absolutely. There are a lot of families that don’t have that kind of bond together.
No, and I don’t think a lot of them would even like to do that. I mean, it’s a wild lifestyle. It’s a lot of crazy flying and crazy schedules. But at the end of the day, this is what we decided to do, me and Gloria. And she’s cool; she’s one of the few managers that goes on tour and travels, so we have a manager on tour with us all the time. And I think that’s awesome because if a problem ever arises in the middle of the day on tour, she fixes it right away. It’s almost like we get a little bit too comfortable, we get spoiled. But yeah, it’s great that we all work together for the same goal, you know?
Yeah. And you all have been married for upwards of 30 years now, right?
Yeah, 34.
That is awesome that you all are still together and able to tour together.
Yeah, we all like the same stuff. And of course I don’t butt in on her managing, and she doesn’t butt in on my song writing and art direction. We respect our borders and we respect our feelings like that, which is cool. She doesn’t tell me how to write a song, and I don’t tell her how to manage a band. Because I don’t know shit about how to manage a band; I’d be an idiot telling her what to do. So it’s cool, like, I know my gig and she knows her gig, and let’s just make that work.
With the recent and the upcoming Nailbomb shows, do you think you’ll revisit that any further as far as possibly another album or a full tour?
Not an album. I think the only way I’ll do that would be with Alex [Newport, co-creator of Nailbomb]. But more touring for sure. In fact we have one show in January in Australia, it’s gonna be both Soulfly and Nailbomb. Yeah, double duty. It’ll be crazy playing two shows in one night, but I’m up for it. I loved this last Nailbomb tour we did! It was so much fun. We played those fast ones and we just set the place on fire. We came in with like, the most punk rock fuck you attitude of all, [laughs]. We came in with that vibe like, we’re Nailbomb, nobody’s fucking with us! It was great. It was really fun.
Point Blank [Nailbomb’s only studio album] is such a great record. It doesn’t sound like what you were doing in Sepultura at the time, or what you ended up doing in Soulfly. It’s got its own vibe and attitude to it. It’s its own thing.
As far as that record, we just didn’t care, man. We didn’t care if one person liked it or if nobody liked it. We were out to please ourselves, you know. Very selfish kind of record. But it turned out a lot of people like the same shit that we do, [laughs]. It is really cool and it sounds great even today. That was definitely a fun record to make.
Do you think Alex will ever be up for it again?
Probably not. Alex is producing records right now and very happy doing that. But it’s cool we have the one record, people love it, and we get to play it live.
It seems like you’re putting out an album almost every year. If it’s not Soulfly, it’s with Cavalera Conspiracy, Go Ahead and Die, or Killer Be Killed. How do you still find inspiration to write that much material?
Well, yeah, sometimes you gotta dig deep. But the way I look at it, man, look at Ozzy, when it’s over, it’s over. I cannot make any more music. So while I’m here, I want to continue. It’s not that I hate vacation, I don’t. I like vacation, I like off time. But I don’t like the idea of retirement. I think they say retirement is the death of purpose. The Hatebreed album Satisfaction is the Death of Desire, same type of analogy. So when you don’t have anything to do, you’ve got no purpose and your life becomes an empty void. I don’t wanna do that. So I want to keep doing, and sometimes I’m a little busier than others. I’m probably gonna slow down in the next couple of years. But at the same time, I really freaking love what I do, man. It’s one of the few things in life that gives me full-on goosebumps, energy, excitement. I’m not good at anything else, so I enjoy this. I really love touring, I love making records, I love making new music, and I love going on tour and playing them for the fans. I was put on this planet to do this; I don’t wanna waste my time on anything else.
I’m glad that you look at it that way. There are a lot of musicians that are just going through the motions just to pay the rent.
To me, it’s also gotta feel real, you know? But I understand what you’re saying; there are guys that are burned out and they are just doing it because they have to do it. I don’t look at it like that. I look at it more like I challenge myself with these projects, but I also get a lot of really cool feedback from the fans. You know, moments that are hard to put in words, how it feels. But when you get like 2,000 people screaming the chorus of “Territory” with you, or the chorus of “Eye for an Eye,” it’s fucking mind-blowing, man! It’s better than drugs. Fuck, it’s insane! And you wanna feel that more and more and more, and there’s only one way to get it is to go play live. And so that’s the thrill of the whole thing, and I love it, man, I love it. And actually I’m feeling better than I’ve felt in a long time. So I’m excited for the tour, for the records, for next year. It’s cool to be busy, to be excited for things, and knowing that the fans are gonna be there and they’re gonna be excited with you, it’s great, I love that. And like I said, everybody’s time will come. So while I’m here, I’m gonna fuck some shit up!
Cavalera plays Louder Than Life on Thursday, September 18, 2025 at 3:50 p.m. on Main Stage 1. For more information on Cavalera, visit cavaleraconspiracy.net. For more information on Louder Than Life, visit louderthanlifefestival.com
Soulfly’s album Chama will be released on October 24, 2025 on Nuclear Blast Records. For more information, visit soulfly.com
This article appears in Sep 1-30, 2025.
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