OVERKILL Members Take Pride In Fact That They Manage Themselves

Mark Ashby of Uber Rock recently conducted an interview with vocalist Bobby "Blitz" Ellsworth of New Jersey thrash metal veterans OVERKILL in Belfast. You can now watch the chat below.

Speaking about OVERKILL's work ethic, Blitz said: "We're blue collar; there's no two ways about it. But you've gotta work to earn it. We're Jersey boys; we understand business. [Laughs] But it's a hundred percent true. This was never about rock and roll and lifestyle; this was about doing what we wanted to do. To do what we wanna do, we have to keep visible, we have to keep a good cashflow coming in."

He continued: "Usually, you don't hear this kind of shit in interviews, but that's just the bottom line. I don't finish these things [tours] and go vacation on desert islands with supermodels. I go home, I cut my grass and I figure out what I'm gonna do next for OVERKILL. And that's really the way it should be, in my opinion. Because this is what life is. That is not necessarily life. It's about playing, it's about producing records, writing records, touring, making merchandise, getting out there, reinventing yourself and having the opportunity to travel the world."

Blitz added: "I'm not sitting here complaining. I don't want anyone to misinterpret this as a complaint. Really, what I'm talking about is just maybe a little of the ins and outs [which] are necessary to understand to be able to continue to do it. And in our case, we were lucky that when it was the darker days of metal, when metal was not really… it was more of a dirty word than it was a catchphrase as it is today, we continued on, but we also managed ourselves. So we got to understand the ins and outs of it. So we still manage ourselves to this day, so it's kind of cool to know that my pride lies in the fact that I'm fifty percent of the approval of everything you see from OVERKILL — not Nuclear Blast, not anyone alse. It's me and D.D. Verni [OVERKILL bassist] who approve those OVERKILL products that you see. So there's a great amount of pride that comes with that too."

OVERKILL will embark on a European headlining tour in November. Support on the trek will come from U.S. sludge metal kings CROWBAR, Israel-based metallers SHREDHEAD and Aussie thrashers DESECRATOR.

OVERKILL entered the studio in May to begin recording the drums for the follow-up to 2014's "White Devil Armory", tentatively due in October via Nuclear Blast.

The band played a special anniversary show on April 16 at Turbinenhalle 2 in Oberhausen, Germany. The evening saw the group perform their classic records "Horrorscope" (which is celebrating its 25th anniversary) and "Feel The Fire" (30th anniversary) in their entirety. And if that wasn't enough, the show was professionally filmed and recorded for an upcoming DVD and CD.

OVERKILL utilized a stand-in drummer — their soundman Eddy Garcia, who is also a member of the El Paso, Texas band PISSING RAZORS — for their recent European tour because the band's regular drummer, Ron Lipnicki, was forced to stay home due to undisclosed family issues.