It’s showtime for Gutrectomy!

Eager to strike out on their own, Dennis Schuler (vocals), Philip Dahlenburg (guitar), Louis Weber (bass), and Julien Kuny (drums) are releasing a new EP, Slamdown Is Not a Phase, Mom, to celebrate their 15th anniversary.

We kick things off with the very short and groovy Stepdad Slamfight, the first track that confirms the band’s ongoing evolution toward deathcore, but also toward fun, with samples and devastating sub-bass that already propels us into Sledgehammer Dismemberment, a slightly longer second track with solid riffs. The rhythm section and vocals literally pound our minds, granting us a comical break before coming back even harder to strike all the way through to Forklift Facelift, where they’re joined by Danish musician Alexander Kristensen (Guttural Slug), who lends Dennis a hand. The track is simply monstrous, both in its unstoppable rhythm and its wild roars, and only the samples break up the intensity, but the band immediately follows up with Cardio Kills Gains, which is indeed the perfect track for pumping iron at the gym, riding on waves of pure aggression. Another onslaught with Chainsaw Vasectomy, the EP’s most serious track (if that’s even possible), where explosive riffs not only house the vocalist’s screams but also those of Matt Yakesh (No Face No Case) and Damian Brown (Nekropisser) for a triple dose of brutality spanning Slam, hardcore, and even rap, then we wrap up with Eating 6 Humans by Daylight, the band’s last chance to make us bang our heads in time with their syncopated riffs that are sure to hit the mark.

Gutrectomy may have mentally regressed, but Slamdown Is Not a Phase, Mom is a true work of pure violence! The riffs are simple but ultra-effective, and only the samples could pull us out of the frenzy they provoke!

90/100

Version Française ?

A few questions to Gutrectomy’s vocalist Dennis Schuler and bass player Louis Weber about the release of their new EP, Slamdown Is Not a Phase, Mom.

So first question, thank you for taking the time to talk with me. How do you guys feel?
Louis Weber (bass): We feel great, I guess. Just coming out of work, at least me. How about you, Dennis?
Dennis Schuler (vocals): I’m a little bit tired, but that’s okay. I’m always tired, so it’s cool.

The first question is a tricky one. How would you describe Gutrectomy’s music without using the words Slam Death, Deathcore, Death Metal, or any other subgenre?
Dennis: I would say like a fucking comedy show and hard comedy show and the entertainment, pure. Louis, what would you say?
Louis: Sorry, I just lost connection. Let me reach out with a hotspot.
Dennis: My internet is fine. (laughs)
Mine too!
Louis: So, here I am, now it should work! I guess that Dennis already said the right answers but… party? Mosh pit, crowdkill? No, not crowdkill, but… How about you? I guess you already answered, right?
Dennis: Yeah, I answered it like a fucking comedy show and entertaining. So it’s all about entertaining the people in the crowd.

Do you remember why you picked the name Gutrectomy when you started the band and how do you still link it to the music you play now?
Louis: Dennis needs to answer that I wasn’t in a band back then.
Dennis: The answer’s easy because in this time, all the Slam bands ended like with an ‘ectomy’, like Epicardiectomy and all this stuff. We thought about it and it was fucking mainstream, it’s like “okay, we’re doing Slam, so we need a name with the ‘ectomy’”. And that’s all.

You’re about to release your new EP called Slamdown Is Not a Phase, Mom. How do you feel about it?
Louis: We do feel great about it. It’s been a lot of work. Like we really put our hearts into it. We removed lyrics, went back to the roots, full Slam, no bullshit, no melodies, no nothing. We just tried to bring out the hardest records that we’ve ever made and I guess, we kind of succeeded in that. We’re pretty satisfied with the outcome.
Dennis: Yeah, we fucking loved it and we brought back the fucking inhale stuff. So that’s fucking great. I think we’ll get a lot of hate for that, but it sounds fucking great.

How would you sum up the Slamdown Is Not a Phase, Mom EP in only 3 words?
Dennis: The first word I would say is macarena. And it’s good! That’s great. You will see! First word is Macarena. I think the second word is Slam. The third word is brutality. I think brutality, fast drums.
Okay, and what about you, Louis?
Louis: Do I have to pick three other words?
Yes!
Louis: Party Done. What’s the stum.
Dennis: You have to call Macarena. It’s Macarena!
Louis: Let me look up the word in English, blunt or dull. And then,the last one would be… “no lyrics”.
Dennis: Can I say one warm word?
Yeah, sure!
Dennis: One will be dumb. Dumb is the word we needed.
Louis: Yeah, it’s really like caveman music.

Slamdown Is Not a Phase, Mom only comes one year after the latest album Angst. How did the composition process happen, and maybe you noticed any changes ?
Louis: We basically wrote a lot of the EP in our tourbus. And while we were on tour, because we really wanted to make a new, really Slammy Deathcore, and then we really did it more together than in the past because in the past, we did it more via Zoom calls and for example, I brought up an idea and then we worked on it, and now we really did it together and everybody put their brain cells in it… and maybe also removed their brain cells to write it.

Angst was somehow a pretty serious album, whether it’s about the title, the lyrics, and Slamdown Is Not a Phase, Mom is definitely a funny one. What did inspire you to create it and what does inspire you to create music in general?
Louis: At the beginning, Philip, our guitarist, wanted to make a concept EP about diseases and stuff like that. And then once we started writing the songs, we really figured out that the band is funny. Like we don’t take it too serious at all, so we decided that it should also be reflected in the title and in the title of the songs, like “Why should you call a song without lyrics something serious if you can also make it funny”, I guess.
Dennis: I think Slamdown Is Not a Phase, Mom is… The music you ever want to write because we are not that serious guys, we take it seriously on stage and all the things, but I think we are a very funny group. And I think with Slamdown Is Not a Phase, Mom is our masterpiece still yet.

So what is your personal favorite song on the EP or maybe the hardest one to achieve?
Louis: On the track, Chainsaw Vasectomy, we have a feature from No Face, No Case, but also from Nekropisser. I don’t know if you’re familiar with the band, but it’s a really young guy and he did great work and I think this is close to one of the hardest songs we’ve ever written. And also the single which just brought out, Eating 6 Humans by Daylight is also really hard in my opinion. That’s why I really like it.
Dennis: I love um Stepdad Slamfight because I fucking love the title, it’s so fucking funny. And it’s short, it’s just hard. So, I love it. OK.

Do you guys think you improved yourselves as musicians with this new record?
Louis: Oh yeah. Let’s say instrument-wise, from guitars and bass, it’s not really a step up, but we also didn’t want to make that step up. But in my personal opinion, what Dennis did on vocals is really a new step for him. He really improved within months. We told him to make some… how does Philip call it, “rubbing stones on each other”, that sound, and then, that came with the sample and we were like “holy shit, dude, this is exactly what we wanted”.
Dennis: Yeah, vocal wise there was a lot of new stuff like, the frog noises and the stuff. I don’t know, I trained hard and I… Succeed?
Yeah, definitely!

Slamdown Is Not a Phase, Mom is an independent release. How did you decide to release it without a label?
Louis: It’s not really independent. We have a digital distributor, which is Arson Theory. They do all the digital stuff for us and then I guess the step to release it independently without a label giving us any CDs and vinyl was not too big for us. But also, we’re coming out of a long period of playing shows and Angst was quite a success, so it was also really in the scope for us where we could do it independently, you first gotta get into the position where you can do it, and then I think it’s pretty nice.

On this new EP you welcome three guests, Alexander Christensen from Guttural Slug, Matt Yakesh from No Face, No Case, and Damian Brown from Nekropisser. How did you guys get in touch with them and ask them to participate in the EP?
Dennis: No Face, No Case are good friends of ours. So there was no doubt that we wanted to have them on the new record. And I guess we’re just fans of Nekropisser. We’re so fucking hyped for these guys and they’re so fucking cute in a special way because when you get on their live streams on Instagram, they always talk to you like “sir”, so it’s always like “oh sir Dennis from Gutrectomy”, and that’s so fucking funny we fucking love them, we fucking love them.
Louis: Yeah, definitely. And then back in October last year, we played a show with Guttural Slug, and they were just amazing, so we were like “we need this guy on the EP”.
So it was really simple?
Louis: Yeah. Basically, yes.

And what about the cover of the new EP? How did you decide to use the drawing to illustrate it?
Louis: Our drummer Julien is really artistic and he came up with the idea with Phillip together, our guitarist, and then drew it. It was just great. It was always the same shit, they came up with the idea and we’re like, “Holy shit, that’s fucking Slam EP come on, what the fuck is this?”. And then we saw it and “Yeah, that’s the thing we need for the EP”. So they’re fucking creative. That’s fucking cool.

Gutrectomy is also about to embark for a European tour with Immortal Disfigurement. How do you feel about the tour and how did you work to get in shape for this tour?
Louis: Dennis and I are hitting the gym all the time. Like we go to the gym every day. No just kidding. (laughs) We’re not. We’re preparing and drinking a lot of faffy (unsure, ed.). I don’t know, Dennis, what do we do for preparation? We’re really trying to revamp our live set, and we’ll bring some new samples, we will bring the new songs, we rehearse a lot. And then we’re really excited for the tour. The pre-sale are going great from what we heard, and I think it’s gonna be an unforgettable experience for us. Like, we’ve never had a tour in this size. The venues are way bigger than the ones we had before, so pretty stoked.
What about you, Dennis? Any special preparation?
Dennis: No, we’re doing some funny, cool playlists on Spotify, I need a lot of music and podcasts and stuff for the travel time, but then it goes. 

I personally have never seen Gutrectomy on stage, how does a live show happen for you?
Dennis: Boooooo (laughs).
Yeah, I know, I’m sorry!
Louis: Have you been to Palma de Mallorca?
No, never!
Louis: That is where you can tell about the live show.
Dennis: Our live shows, I would say are entertaining. So it’s like we’re going on stage, then every time we play, we are from another country. It’s like “we are Gutrectomy from Brazil”, next time it’s  “we are Gutrectomy from France”, and I think we do a lot of party. A fucking lot of party. We always have stuff with us where the people can fight with. It’s… I don’t know the English word, but in Germany we say “swim noodle”.
Louis: Yeah, like pool noodles. They can fight with that swim noodle, that awesome swim noodle. And we have a lot of samples and we have some hard tech parts, so it’s a fucking party. We understand ourselves rather as performers than only as a band.
So you guys really feel happy to be on stage?
Louis: Yeah!

What will come next for Gutrectomy in the future?
Dennis: Fucking Wacken. Hopefully, Wacken one day, on the mainstage.
Louis: No, this year we’re pretty full with the tour and the EP release. And next year we’re working on getting abroad, probably flying to another continent if everything works out as planned. That’s the goal and then we don’t really have those long-term goals for now. We had to play bigger tours and play bigger shows, and that’s what we kinda achieved so far. So now we are kind of settled and the next step would be to go abroad.

And I also noticed a Gutrectomy just reached its 15th anniversary. Maybe you prepared something special for it?
Dennis: I would say yes.
But you can’t tell more?
Dennis: We can’t tell more, one thing is on tour, we are playing with Immortal Disfigurement. We play our first song we’ve ever written, so it’s like 15 years old. So that’s fucking funny.
Louis: It’s older than Dennis.
Dennis: It’s older than me. Holy shit.

Maybe you guys ever heard about the French Metal and Slam scene? Are there any bands you like?
Louis: Kanine is great and Embrace Your Punishment.
Dennis: Yeah, we fucking love them. And I’m an Old School fan of Benighted and Gojira. I fucking love them too.
Louis: And I think our guitarist really likes Landmvrks. So do I. Great band.
Dennis: It’s a great scene, but Kanine, Kanine are the goats. We fucking love the goats.
I know them too.
Dennis: That is crazy. Jay (Kanine’s singer, ed.), it just goes out to you! Alex (Kanine’s guitarist, ed.), yeah!

So I have two more questions for you. This will be some funny questions. Are there any bands you would like to play to celebrate the release of the EP? You can also give me some unrealistic answers.
Louis: I’m a big AC/DC fan. That would be cool to have them on the EP release tour, yeah. Maybe Angus Young doing some Heavy Metal solos would be cool. How about you, Dennis?
Dennis: I would love to have Bring Me the Horizon, that would be cool. And the super funny thing is… I think HammerFall. I think I got the vibe with HammerFall.
Interesting!
Dennis: HammerFall would be a dream. We fucking love HammerFall in the tour bus. It would be always singing like in two octaves HammerFall all the time. It would be cool to have AC/DC us and then as headliner HammerFall. That would be nice, HammerFall as headliner.

Okay, I wasn’t expecting this! So the last question is the most annoying and funny one with which dish would you compare Gutrectomy’s music with?
Dennis: Oh, it was a good call, bye (laughs). Which dish… I guess I would say a foot-long Subway sandwich. I don’t know.
Louis: Yeah, or maybe currywurst, but vegan. Do you know currywurst?
Yeah.
Louis: Do you have it?
We don’t have some, but we know what it is and if you come close to Germany, you can maybe have some.
Louis: Where are you from, by the way, in France?
I’m in the south of Paris.
Dennis: Oh, okay! We really want to come to Paris one day, and have some baguettes.
If you guys come to Paris, I will bring the baguette! (Dennis extends his pinkie). Yeah, pinkie promise!

So that was my last question for you guys, thank you very much and the last words are yours!
Dennis: Thank you so much for having us. It was great talking to you. It was fucking funny.
Louis: Thank you very much and stay Metal!