Dethklok: Inside Metalocalypse

Brendon Small isn't only the creator of the hugely successful Adult Swim series Metalocalypse, he does the voices for the show's animated metal band Dethklok. Small often does interviews in character, but this unfortunately wasn't one of those times. So I actually talked to "Brendon Small," which is nowhere nearly as awesome as talking to guitarist Skwisgaar Skwigelf. But it turns out Small's actually a pretty cool dude, so we'll take it.

ChartAttack: Is there anything you wanted to do with the band live that you can't because of budget or logistical reasons?
Brendon Small: Our only thing is that we can't do daytime outdoor shows unless there's some kind of big glow screen. That's the only thing we have to consider. We've got a couple of those shows coming up so we're getting creative with that stuff now. So that's the only issue. In fact, we were asked to do the Gigantour, and they wanted us to open and I certainly don't mind, but there just wasn't enough money to support what needs to go into the show. And a lot of those venues were outdoors and we'd go on at 7:30 p.m. with flooding daylight, and it just wouldn't happen.

You said that you have no intentions of bringing Dethklok to life. But just for fun, who would you like to see play the different characters in the band?
OK... Bill Cosby for Nathan Explosion. I'll do that. Skwisgaar... Martha Plimpton from The Goonies. Let's see Toki... Al Pacino. Pickles would be the very young and beautiful Mia Farrow from Rosemary's Baby and Murderface would be comedy legend Charlie Chaplin. That's the ultimate live version right there.

How does it feel to have written a better metal record than most metal bands?
I don't know if it is. All I know is that I wanted to write something that I like. I didn't think about what other people would think about it, I just thought that it's cool and I like it and that's it. It's selling well, but a lot of the things are because of unfair advantages in that we have a TV show and a lot of bands don't. In fact, I can't think of any death metal bands that have their own TV show.

I know people are supposed to have fun with the show, but how seriously do you take the music?
Lyrically I didn't take it too seriously, but musically I took it as seriously as I could. The way I see it, I finally have an opportunity to put out a record and I'm going to try and make it as cool as I can possibly make it. I'm not going to make that stuff a joke. But I don't know if these lyrics are any stupider than any other bands out there right now. Take it as seriously as you want to. I took the recording of it rather seriously.

How did you hook up with the legendary Gene Hoglan?
I was talking to people at Century Media and I said I programmed these drums on the show and I'm a terrible drum programmer. [On the album] I wanted a really drummer, I wanted a bad-ass drummer. They said "Gene Hoglan," and I go "No?!" They said, "We'll give him a call and put you in touch with him and let him answer that." And luckily he was into it. When we got together on the first day we recorded the entire song "Hatredcopter" and we kind of clicked and it all worked out great.

Do you have the entire Metalocalypse series planned or are you just writing as you go?
I know what the ending of the entire thing is and I'm trying to just not bring the show to that constantly. The second season takes more shape story-wise and arc-wise over the 20 episodes. I think you'll find if you watch them all back-to-back, you'll watch a bigger story unfold than the one you got to see in the first season. The first season does follow a timeline, but this one I think is a little more articulate.

Any plans of making the show longer than the usual 11-minute episodes?
Actually, yes. We have a couple of episodes in the second season that are half-hours. I think the show can exist in a half-hour format no problem and we're just making sure that the network sees this, too. Sometimes an animated story will make more sense in an 11-minute 30-second format than half-hour, so maybe only a couple of those will show up once in a while, but we're still experimenting.

The DVD extras for season one are hilarious, especially because they're not censored. Does catering to network censors frustrate you or limit your overall vision for Metalocalypse?
Absolutely not. Without showing tits constantly, we pretty much get to do whatever we want. If we can show tits and pussies all the time, I don't know if that would make it a better show, but I think our ratings would be higher (laughs). That's the only thing that gets restricted — anything sexual. We have a lot of murder going on. We have a lot of gore going on, and we say a lot of things and those things need to be censored and that's why we have those guitar pinch harmonics happening. Sometimes you take those away and sometimes it's less funny when you hear "fucking cocksucker" without those things. Sometimes it sounds better with that in there. That little percussive thing adds one extra beat of comedy in there. Adult Swim has been very cool about letting us do stuff. Again, the only thing they don't allow is people fucking. Anything that's remotely sexual they'll make us get rid of it. But we can kill a child and eat it on the show, but we can't show consensual lovemaking or a dildo strapped outside your pants.