Without wishing to disparage this band or anyone involved with it, I think anyone who has been around for a while knows the feeling of having a certain fondness for a particular CD without really having a good reason for it. It’s not the best album, but it still appeals to a certain feeling. This often stems from the simple fact that you had it and there was no way to listen to everything you wanted with just three clicks. So, you listened to what you had. Just like you watched the same VHS tapes over and over again, simply because you had them. For me, Exploding Zombies is one of those bands: nice enough, but certainly not the best that American brutal/Grindcore-oriented death metal had to offer; but I had the CD, so I enjoyed listening to it.
I was therefore delighted to see that Hells Headbangers Records, perhaps for the same reasons, decided to put this somewhat underrated band in the spotlight with a reissue of their best album, ‘Several Severed Heads’. After so many years, I still knew the songs by heart and felt like a teenager again. Now, more than twenty-five years later, I am so happy to have a piece of Death Metal history. Life can be that simple. I asked guitarist Jeff Stepanski, the band member who has been with the band the longest, a few questions. The answers may be shorter than my questions in some cases, but it was more than worth it, if only to give something back and help bring some attention back to this band. And there was quite a bit to talk about, as it seems that after 2000’s ‘Several Severed Heads’, new material is finally on the way…
Usually I am aiming for bands from other musical territories and I wouldn’t normally be inclined to interview a band like Exploding Zombies, but I’m happy to make an exception for you since Exploding has been with me basically with me ever since I took my first steps in Extreme Metal. And, after all, variety is the spice of life. So, let’s go! Let’s start with something general: which (brutal) Death Metal records have caught your attention in recent months?
I would not say they are brutal, but their sense of timing is killer. Psycroptic from Australia. I saw them live and the guitarist and drummer, who are brothers, were by far the best of the night. Just a different style in a good way. I try not to listen to any Death Metal when I am writing new material. I don’t want any influences. I am doing that currently.
Although I am not entirely sure where I picked up my copy of ‘Several Severed Heads’, but it was at a metal market on a festival, could very well have been at Dynamo Open Air. I had never heard of the band before, but I loved the band name, the title and artwork: “this has to be good!”. I personally have very fond memories of these days, randomly picking things up hoping it will be good. How do you yourself generally look back at those bygone days?
Looking back on the old days. Well the 90’s were killer for us, show wise anyway. The scene was thriving and we played some crazy killer shows. I remember most of them through old flyers I saved.
I am explicitly asking about the earlier days of the band as I love the nostalgic vibe of your Facebook page. Lots of great pictures of old shirts, old show flyers, photos and whatnot. You apparently have shared the stage with Meatshits, Anal Cunt, Napalm Death, Internal Bleeding, Deicide, Morbid Angel, Amorphis and more recently Death Angel and Exodus. Obviously you cherish all of these memories. Care to share a couple special ones with me?
Some old favourites of mine. Cannibal Corpse in the 90’s, Morbid Angel of the same era. The first time we played with Dying Fetus was killer also.
At the time of the release of ‘Several Severed Heads’, the internet wasn’t a big thing yet, communication was slower and the global metal community wasn’t as connected as it is now. I always thought this was the main reason that I never met anyone here in The Netherlands who was familiar with Exploding Zombies. But at the forums I was reading, things seemed different over in the USA. I was never fully sure, were you indeed more popular on your home turf than anywhere else at the time?
As far as popularity goes, we sold more of ‘Several Severed Heads’ in Germany for a time. Not sure how that would total now after this many years later.
I remember being on the lookout for new material from you guys, but while I kept checking every now and then for many years, nothing ever happened. In fact at some point I found out the band folded in 2007. But even though Exploding Zombies got reactivated in 2012, still nothing happened in the past 13 years. Will we ever get to hear the follow-up of ‘Several Severed Heads’?
Hells Headbangers re-releasing this and our ‘Devour The Village’-album along with the demos. This should help with USA sales. As far as a follow up to ‘Several Severed Heads’, we are currently recording that now. I could not be more happy about it.
One thing that can’t be left untouched is the death of Brent Simstad in 2019. With only 48 he obviously went way too soon. Besides losing a friend, his death must have impacted the chemistry within the band as well. I wasn’t fully able to reconstruct the line-up and the changes around these years, but how did Brent’s death effect the band at the time?
Brent had left the band about a year before he passed. His death was a shock. We had a new singer and bass player by that time. During all the band member changes for different reasons over the years we just kept rebuilding. We love playing Death Metal, it’s that simple.
With Hells Headbangers Records’ current frenzy of reissuing lots of great Brutal Death Metal and Death/Grind records like Burial, Rotting, Desecration, Malignancy, Mortal Decay and so many more, it might not be as surprising to see them picking up ‘Several Severed Heads’ for a reissue too. Especially Justin Horval seem to have a knack for this sort of music. How did this reissue come about? Have you been in contact before?
The re-issue was in the works because someone got us in contact with Justin Horval of Hells Headbangers. We heard he was thinking of the release and I contacted him. No, we were never in contact before. The universe has plans sometimes.
It actually took a good while before I found out that ‘Several Severed Heads’ was your second album, the follow-up of ‘Devour The Village’ from 1996. I never saw a physical copy of it and it was only fairly recently that I actually heard it on YouTube. Now that Hells Headbangers Records has reissued ‘Several Severed Heads’, are there any plans of giving your older recordings a reissue as well?
We are re-releasing everything. I just finished gathering everything I could find from 31 years ago. The best thing I found was the original art for ‘Devour The Village’. That album was actually never meant to be released in large numbers. It was recorded as a capture in time and done knowing our singer/bass player Tom was leaving. We needed it recorded to give it to his replacement. This ended up being Brent. That’s why most of the songs ended up on ‘Several Severed Heads’ also.
I was somewhere in my late teens when I discovered Exploding Zombies and I instantly liked it. Later on I obviously discovered more bands and went all different directions, and, honestly, I found out that Exploding Zombies wasn’t exactly the best band in the genre. But I always found ‘Several Severed Heads’ a thoroughly enjoyable album to which I regularly returned all those years. In the end, for me the album and the band in general embodies the “fun”-factor in Death Metal. Not in the Anthrax or Municipal Waste kind of way, but just that having a good time with music is sometimes more important than a flawless, technical proficient album. What is your view on this?
I still believe that playing Death Metal because you love it, rather than because you want to beat it, is what I enjoy. Grooves are more important to me than the number of notes or a constant speed. We all try to perfect our craft, whatever that may be, and playing flawlessly is part of that. We recorded each album in one or two takes at most. We didn’t care about absolute perfection.
Because I am usually covering more bands in the old school type of Death Metal I have never been able to ask the following to any of the insider bands in the Brutal Death Metal camp. So, here we go: I always wondered why many of the Brutal Death Metal bands from, say 1995 to 2000, sounded rather faint and flat. Brutal Death Metal, in my opinion and as the name suggests, should sound heavy as fuck, but instead the first albums of bands like Lividity, Fleshgrind or Dying Fetus sound almost weak. If ‘Several Severed Heads’ would be recorded today I’m sure it would sound quite differently. Can you take me back to that time and explain how this worked? Or am I completely off base?
I really don’t know why the flatness in some recordings of those years happened. Probably the loudness wars and over compressing to make it sound brutal I guess. Takes away dynamics and feeling in the music. It was a trade for power versus clarity and separation.
We’ve already talked about the inactivity of the band, but most of the other bands that some of you guys are also involved in have befallen the same fate. I assume that the reasons for that are largely the same, but I am still keen to hear whether there is anything new to report on that account. Are these bands still around and is there anything coming up?
None of the bands that members of the band were involved in are not around anymore. We have always been involved in the local scene.
As already stated, you have shared the stage with lots of bands, both the bigger one as those I already mentioned, but lots of locals as well. What you often see is that many bands help each other out by playing in each other’s bands, but that seems to be less the case with Exploding Zombies. How much were or are you intertwined in the local scene? And more generally, how do you see your role in today’s local scene?
We play small to large shows. It really doesn’t matter. We play to play and try to perfect our art. Local bands have come and gone over the years. Many killer ones at that. We are still here doing our thing. We have definitely been going the longest at this point, in Michigan anyway. Repulsion are still doing it as well. The city of Flint in Michigan always has killer musicians.
Now that we’ve discussed basically everything from the start of the band until the current stage, I am wondering in what regards you are a different person from when you started Exploding Zombies three decades ago. How did aging effect your view on the band in Extreme Metal in general? And, even more retrospective, is there anything you would do differently with the knowledge and experience you have now?
I really am the same person all these years later. Playing Death Metal is still my passion. Sure we would do things differently. All of us can be dumbasses in life from time to time.
Just one more thing before we close off the interview. Before Exploding Zombies you were in a band called Frigid Bitch, a band about which little is known. In the ranks was also Mike Hirzel who played drums on Lucifer’s Hammer’s debut album, ‘The Mists Of Time’. Can you tell anything about the when/where/what/who of this band and period?
I will give you the details of Mike and me and Frigid Bitch. Frigid Bitch 1987-1993. It was a completely different type of music. We are both from a small town in upper Michigan, Alpena. A no-scene area. We both left our home town in our teens and joined Frigid Bitch in the Detroit area, the big city kind of thing. Many local shows and complete craziness followed. We eventually went on tour, sold everything we owned to do it, failed surviving and broke up. Mike joined Lucifer’s Hammer and I joined the Zombies 1993ish. Lucifer’s Hammer and Exploding Zombies played many show together back in the day. Later during the Exploding Zombies slow down, Greg (other guitarist for the Zombies at that point), Mike and me had a band we were jamming together in.
That was it for now. Thank you Jeff, it was a pleasure to talk about Exploding Zombies with you. The last words are yours…
Stay brutal and support the underground!
