Sepultura - still grinding the axe

By Louisa Cleave

Brazilian heavy metal band Sepultura are eager to show fans their sound hasn't changed with the departure of front man Max Cavalera - the reason they pulled out of the Big Day Out in 1997.

The hard rock group, who perform in Auckland tomorrow, had been together since 1983, but parted ways with the founding vocalist after a falling-out with his wife.

Sepultura fired Gloria Bujnowski after her management contract with the band expired in December 1996.

"She put Max in a situation where he had to leave with her," said Igor Cavalera, Sepultura's drummer and Max's brother.

"He's my brother but we don't talk because of his wife. We've totally lost touch."

Sepultura arose from obscure existence in a small Brazilian city where the Cavalera brothers lived.

With Paulo Pinto and Andreas Kisser they combined tribal chants with heavy metal aggression to snag an underground network of fans.

It took five years to jump the difficult border into the American music scene and work their way towards becoming one of the biggest heavy metal bands around.

The dream ride didn't so much hit a wall as come to a crossroads with the split with Max, who formed his own band, Soulfly.

"We didn't even know if we would use the name Sepultura," said Cavalera. "We decided that we would write a few songs first and if it didn't sound like anything resembling Sepultura then we would stop using the name right away. But once we had a few songs we saw that we were justified in keeping the name.

"Our only relief during this whole time was playing music."

The band found a replacement singer in Derrick Green, an American who joined the hard rock group just over a year ago.

"He's a person who grows really fast, which is what we needed," Cavalera says of the man they call The Predator. "Derek puts a lot of his own ideas into the band and a new injection of energy."

With their new front man, Sepultura released a new album, Against, last year and fans and critics responded positively.

"Real fans, they just understand what's going on," Cavalera says. "That has made it a lot easier for us."

Who: Sepultura

Where: Powerstation

When: Tomorrow