Soilent Green preview

Soilent Green
House Of Blues, Chicago
Monday, June 16, 2008

There’s bad luck, there’s terrible luck, and there’s absolutely, god-awful, ridiculous, don’t-wish-this-on-sewer-rats, Soilent Green luck.

Things went pretty good for the Louisiana metal band until 2001 (they formed in ’88). There were some obligatory lineup changes along the way, most notably original vocalist Ben Falgoust replacing Glenn Rambo, but there were also some well-received albums, a few high-profile tours (including numerous opening spots with Pantera during the height of their popularity), and a deal with Relapse. By the time 2001’s A Deleted Symphony For The Beaten Down arrived SG were a metal “band to know” because of their ability, and willingness, to move in and out of so many different styles, from doom and black metal to hard and grindcore. But that same year, during a tour with Morbid Angel and Exhumed, a van crash left founding guitarist Brian Patton and then-bassist Scott Williams with severe shoulder injuries. Less than a year later the Soilent Green van again proved a treacherous place when they crashed outside of Chicago while on the road with Gwar, this time with even worse results: touring bassist Johnny Model broke his collar bone and Falgoust (who is also in Goatwhore) was temporarily paralyzed from the waist down. He recovered, though, and by 2003 the band were up and going again before more bad news found them in 2004 when Williams was found dead in his apartment, the victim of an apparent murder/suicide committed by his roommate. Two years later (and just a few weeks after they released Confrontation) Hurricane Katrina claimed Rambo among her nearly 2,000 victims.

So please excuse Patton, Falgoust, bassist Scott Crochet, and drummer Tommy Buckley for being a little grumpy on this year’s Inevitable Collapse In The Presence Of Conviction, the group’s fifth full-length overall and first for Metal Blade. “It’s the basic idea of no hope,” Falgoust says in the album’s press materials. “It’s in reference to the history of Soilent Green and also just life in general.”

Soilent Green and Chimaira open for Dethklok.

— Trevor Fisher

Click here to download Soilent Green’s “Antioxidant.”

Category: Stage Buzz, Weekly