Chris Barnes (vocalist, Cannibal Corpse, 1988-95, and Six Feet Under): [Cannibal Corpse's] demo cassette had the title A Skull Full of Maggots. [Slagel] thought that was the sickest title ever, and two weeks later we had a contract.
Slagel: People were really surprised when we released Cannibal Corpse's Butchered at Birth. People went, "We can't believe you released that!" And when I saw that artwork [depicting skeletons in butcher's smocks, using cutlery to perform a C-section on a corpse], I said, "That's awesome. Let's do it, this is great!"
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Barnes: There was a lot of controversy that my lyrics caused. Metal Blade had our backs every step of the way. There was a big lawsuit against a bunch of death-metal bands and a few labels [filed in 1997 by an Oregon convenience-store clerk who was assaulted by four teenage Cannibal Corpse fans], but Metal Blade always stood behind the artists' creative visions and stood behind the bands' music.
THE WARNER BROS. ERA, 1988-1993
Slagel: For Metal Blade's first five or six years, we didn't have the resources to compete with what a major label had to offer. I was just a dumb kid with no money. Sometimes an offer came up [and I had to say] "That's an amazing deal, you should take it."
But after a while, we had lost so many bands to the majors, and many of them didn't get as much success as we had hoped. So we decided to seek out a distribution deal with a major label so these bands would hopefully not get their careers messed up by leaving us and signing with the majors.
Vera: [Armored Saint's moving to Chrysalis] was a gigantic adjustment. We went from a small, independent label to a major label that was willing to spend $300,000 on our first record. We didn't know we had to pay them back! This was how young and naive we were. We found [being on a major label] really disturbing, and we didn't enjoy it. Suddenly, there were a thousand people making decisions for you. A lot of people meddled in what you wanted to do musically, artistically, creatively and visually.
Slagel: When we first got there, Warner Bros. was ... a perfect fit for us. It was a major but still very artist-oriented. The first couple of years went great, we had a really good relationship and it was very fun. Unfortunately, what happened though, when CDs and the music industry became big business, all of these labels got bought by large corporations. Warner Bros. got bought out by Time. At the time that happened, the whole Body Count "Cop Killer" thing happened. That record was through Warner Bros., and was a huge controversy.
Dave Brockie (aka Oderus Urungus, leader of Gwar): Warner Bros. wanted certain bands to clean up their act if they were going to put their stamp on the records. We had a song called "Baby Dick Fuck." It's a horrible song. Warner Bros. told Metal Blade that if they take this song off the record [This Toilet Earth], that would increase the chances of us getting the same push that the Goo Goo Dolls got, who broke out on Warner Bros. while being a Metal Blade act.
Slagel: When we signed The Goo Goo Dolls, they were a really cool punk band from New York. They evolved into this pop band. Unbeknownst to everyone including themselves, they wrote a ballad that became massively huge. ... By the time their first huge record (Superstar Car Wash) came out and exploded, it was more of a Warner product.
Brockie: We asked Brian, "What should we do?" We didn't want to fuck up the Warner deal for them, but at the same time we wanted to stay true to ourselves. Brian just said, "Whatever you guys want to do, I'll back it 100 percent." Right there, that is the reason I love that man. He's always about letting his artists do what they want to do, even if it's to the detriment of his own company.
Slagel: There's no way that I'm going to tell a band that they have to change what they are doing. So I said, "If this is the way the deal is going to be, I don't think we can do this anymore."
The good thing [about the Warner era] is that I definitely learned an incredible amount about how the business part of the industry was run. There are a lot of lessons to be learned when dealing with a large behemoth corporation ... lessons learned in what you can and cannot do.
THE FUTURE
Slagel: The whole thing with the label is that we just sign bands that I like and want to work with. Anything that comes out on the label is something I really like.
Vera: Brian has always been first and foremost a fan of music — he just wants to put out music he likes. With Armored Saint, he doesn't have to put out new records from us. To be honest, we're not selling tons of records or competing with his bigger bands, like As I Lay Dying and Amon Amarth. He just does it because he's a fan.
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