NAILBITER Interview 2009

VP-Well..first i have to say that i was many happy and curious in the first time i hear about NAILBITER some years ago...since the band was formed by 2 old brazilian guys ...
How born the first ideas to form the band?
CARLOS=when I arrived in london in 1999 I already had the idea of forming a band over here,since my whole life in brazil was spent playing in several groups. The problem was to find the right people to get it started.That was solved when marcelo came over after a few months later. we had a drummer. osmani who was already living in london for some years told me about a portuguese guy called nuno who could be our perfect match. the guy ,like myself and marcelo had a passion for all things swedish or scandinavian. we found a bass player but our sound was yet to be defined. then one day nuno came over to the squatt i was living and brought an lp with him for us to listen. that was the breakthrough point !!!! that record was ANTI-CIMEX Scandinavian Jawbreaker!!!! man, did my life and idea of punk hardcore change at that moment!!! it was a revelation.... the metallic sound, at the same time the rawness and anger of jonsson's voice, the obvious MOTORHEAD influences, fuck!!!! it was the best punk hardcore album I had listen and we all agreed that that was going to be the blueprint for all our songs, heheheheh no shame on that!!!


VP=The name is obviously a reference to ANTI-CIMEX,i´m right?
so,why "NAILBITER"??
CARLOS= well, continuing from the question number 1, we needed a name, nuno looking throug the song names on the cover of SCANDINAVIAN JAWBREAKER saw a potential killer name for the band in the last track of side B, NAILBITER. the rest is history, hehehe

VP=About the line up...i saw that Marcelo left the band in some moment and back to the band again...i´m right??
CARLOS=-No, marcelo never left the band, but nuno did after a few months with us to be replaced by an italian friend , Gianlucca, who in the end left to be replace by Piotrek.

VP=So...the band broke up?? ...what was the reason??...do you have some others works/projects?? i know that Marcelo is playing in another band too,etc...
CARLOS=yeah, the band broke up when marcelo got deported from england in 2003.we were going to a HELLACOPTERS gig in kings cross when some cops stopped him inside the train station and found out he was illegal. bad luck. after that i even tried to carry on the band with another drummer, actually the guy who put out our first lp, Paco, coz he was so desperate to help keep the band alive. but it wasnt the same without marcelo. it didnt feel right and it didnt sound right. I then formed another band called SILVERMACHINE, more towards rock an metal and marcelo got MOTHERHELL together back in brazil, some kind of brazilian incarnation of MOTORHEAD. good stuff. At the moment im trying to get silvermachine playing again and doing other stuff with people around my area. just playing.

VP=What are your biggest influences on NAILBITER work??
Since the excellent "ABUSED" 12 have a strong influence of ANTI-CIMEX and DEATHSIDE in the same way....but these new 5 unreleased trax are a bit different...more rock´n´roll...but in same way thay are fucking great too(!!!) and what are the inspirations for themes?? poetic inspirations,etc??
CARLOS= yeah, by the time we recorded the abused lp we were listening to a lot of japanese bands, and were very impressed by what DEATH SIDE had done, so we put a lot of that into the sound. we deliberately wanted to sound japanese, hehehe well , in the end were kind of tired of playing just hardcore songs so we started to slow down and be more tecnical, be more rock or metal. we listened to a lot of metallica and hellacopters before recording those 5 tracks that never got released. i find them really good, but unfortunately the punk labels didnt dig it as we did. about the lyrics. we never really put too much attention to what was going down to be honest. me and marcelo had ideas, some stuff we felt about the punk scene in europe in special that we wanted to address as a form of protest. in our minds talking about the "system" was saturated and the punk scene itself was becoming selfrightious and alienated from its original ideas. basically a lot of egotrippers using politics to promote thenselves into the punk scene. we wrote some funny lyrics about that , hehehe.


VP=How are the things in your area?? how is the underground scene there...gigs...zines...bands...etc....
CARLOS= the "scene" around here , if there is such a thing, is broken down to a few people who organize gigs, open squatts, do benefits, etc... some used to put zines out but it all scaled down in the last few years i think. or maybe I am not aware as much, as im not involved in anything apart from turning up at gigs here and there. well, like anywhere, some people are decent and honest and some are just wankers. punk is no different from any other section of society in this matter. most of the underground gigs are held in pubs or squatts. they are quite cheap, 5 pounds or so and the sound is often very good.

VP=How was the contacts with HARDCORE HOLOCAUST Records to release the ABUSED in USA??
CARLOS=man, I dont even remember. someone probably got in touch with us and offered to put it out , pay for the recording, etc...

VP=You said that any label show interest to release the last release...do you sent the master for some labels?? etc...??
CARLOS=yeah, we did, the first people was hardcore holocaust and they didnt want to put it out. i think we tried other labels at the time but with no sucess. we were too rock for most, hehehe and probably too punk for the rock labels too , which leaves us pretty much fucked, heheh we cant win!!!! the songs are still unreleased.

VP=Tell us about your discography...what do you have released...labels...etc...
CARLOS=we have the split ep with viimenen kollona, dont remember the label. we have the split lp with destruccion, by lavidaesunmus records, the abused lp by hcholocaust, the anti cimex tribute , by some guy in peru i think and i think thats it.

VP=Something about the past now...what do you remember about your days back in the past in Brazil??...friends...drunkard...gigs...etc??
CARLOS=man, what i miss the most about the really old times back in brasil, before politics killed everything was the friendship, the good talks, the tape swapping thing, how anybody could just record a demo in some dirty bedroom and everybody would get it, listen , review, inspire from that , etc... it was bloody honest and there was a true brotherhood beetween a huge network of people. all the "zineiros" fanzine makers, etc... that was a real scene man, i miss that a lot.

VP=Your top ten ??? records to play in the doomsday hour !!
11-ANTI CIMEX. absolut country of sweden/scandinavian jawbreaker
DEATH SIDE bet on the possibility
MOTORHEAD everything
METALLICA master of puppets / ride the lighting
BLACK SABBATH/black sabbath. thats enough. i hate making lists of bands. there's always loads you leave out and regreat. its the armageddon so listen to whatever you like, even if that is MENUDO. HEHHEHEHEHEHEHEHH thanks fofao for the interview.

www.myspace.com/nailbiteruk