About Eyehategod
Eyehategod is an American sludge metal band from New Orleans, Louisiana who formed in 1988. They have become one of the better known bands to emerge from the NOLA metal scene. Their core lineup has remained consistent since the band's inception, with the exception of the bassist , until the death of drummer Joey LaCaze in 2013. As of 2021, the band has released six studio albums.
Eyehategod have noted Melvins, Carnivore, The Obsessed, Discharge, Black Flag, Corrosion of Conformity, Black Sabbath, Celtic Frost, Confessor, and Saint Vitus as key influences to their sound. Heavy, detuned, and bluesy guitar riffs dominate the band's discography. They are combined with walls of feedback, and tortured vocals, with lyrical themes centered around substance abuse, to create a harsh misanthropic mood.
The band were friends with grindcore group Anal Cunt and performed with them for the first show after their frontman Seth Putnam was revived from his 2004 coma. Putnam had previously filled in for Mike Williams at a show in New Orleans during Mardi Gras in 1996. Williams was out of town at the time.
Jimmy Bower and Joey LaCaze founded the band on April 20, 1988 , and they recruited Mark Schultz, Steve Dale and vocalist Chris Hilliard. Hilliard would later leave the group early on, and would be replaced by Mike Williams. The band then recorded two demos Garden Dwarf Woman Driver and Lack of Almost Everything ; the latter was sent out to various labels. They eventually got signed to the small French label Intellectual Convulsion, and released their first album In the Name of Suffering in 1990. The album had a far more primitive and raw sound than later releases , and had a more hardcore feel to it. The label dissolved with only a couple of thousand copies having been printed, so the band had to find a new label. They soon signed with Century Media however, who re-released In the Name of Suffering on December 1, 1992, as it is known today. Also in 2006, In the Name of Suffering was re-issued with four bonus tracks. These four tracks were the same as those on the original demo Lack of Almost Everything.
Eyehategod then went on to record Take as Needed for Pain in 1993, with new bassist Mark Schultz who had also contributed on In The Name Of Suffering. The album was recorded at Studio 13, a small recording studio working from the 13th floor of an abandoned department store on Canal Street in New Orleans. The band played daily during this period to put down tracks for the album. At the time, Mike Williams was homeless and living in an abandoned, flea-infested room above a strip club just a few minutes away from the studio. The sound of Take as Needed for Pain seemed much closer to what the members intended than the material on In the Name of Suffering, and it shows a cleaner, more distinct sound with better defined riffs. The southern rock, blues, and doom influences are also more distinctly felt on this album. After the release of the album, the band toured extensively with acts such as Chaos UK, Buzzov*en, White Zombie and Corrosion of Conformity. After touring, the band members briefly spread out in different directions. Mike Williams busied himself contributing to Metal Maniacs magazine. Jimmy Bower played drums on Crowbar's Broken Glass as well as Down's debut album, NOLA. Brian Patton recorded Soilent Green's debut album, Pussysoul.
The band had been recording several demos, which were released on various seven-inch records and splits on various labels, but finally in 1995 settled down to record an album, with Pepper Keenan of Corrosion of Conformity as producer, and new bassist Vince LeBlanc, which would be named Dopesick. At the time, Mike Williams was living in Clinton Hill, Brooklyn in New York City, and so had to travel between there and New Orleans frequently for the recording sessions. The recording sessions were infamously chaotic, and involved the studio owner reportedly calling Century to ask if the band were insane, and threatening to kick them out. This particular incident occurred after Mike Williams had attempted to record the sound of smashing glass for the introduction to the album, by smashing a bottle on the floor of the studio. In the process he slashed his hand open badly and bled all over the studio floor "). One of the band members then apparently smeared the words "Hell" and "Death to Pigs" in Mike's blood. Brian Patton and Joey LaCaze then flew out to San Francisco to mix the album. This album was far more chaotic than their previous, but still retained the distinct southern, bluesy feel, distancing it from In the Name of Suffering. The band then embarked on a US tour in the spring of 1996 to support the album, supporting White Zombie and Pantera, bringing their music to a far wider audience, raising the profile of sludge metal, and becoming famous as one of its founding acts.
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