In 2013, Metalocalypse closed its doors, leaving fans believing it would never resurface. This show transcended the realm of mere animation; it was an artistic masterpiece that crafted a world of dark comedy. It delved into the lives of anti-hero minds orbiting around the melodic death metal band Dethklok and the chaos that ensued within the band and its relationship with their fans. Few shows successfully capture the essence of metalheads, with cult classics like Beavis and Butthead remaining legendary and untouchable. However, against all odds, Metalocalypse has turned fiction into reality by bringing the band Dethklok to life on record and in concert. Metal Insider had the opportunity to cover their recent stop in Boston, where the once-fictional characters took on a tangible form and brought the not-yet-fully-real band to life before a live audience. It was a truly theatrical moment.

Before the release of the new film Metalocalypse: Army of the Doomstar and the album Dethalbum IV on August 22nd, 2023, Metal Insider sat down with Brendon Small, the writer, actor, musician, and co-creator of this legendary classic. We delved into the highlights of the film, explored how the theatrical Babyklok tour with Babymetal came to be, pondered whether music could indeed save the planet, speculated on the future of Dethklok, and ventured into the creative genius behind the double life as a writer and musician. In this conversation, we uncovered how both worlds converge to narrate the stories of Nathan Explosion, Toki, Murderface, Skwisgaar Skwigelf, and Pickles.

 

Can you discuss the inspiration behind the return of both Metalocalypse and Dethklok?

The story still needs to be finished, and we didn’t get to make it earlier, so we had an opportunity to make it. The inspiration right there to make it as concise as possible is that the story needed to be completed.

 

With the return of Dethklok, how did the Babyklok tour with Babymetal come about? 

Here’s the longer answer to this whole thing. I think in 2019, I got a call from Atlanta, which is Adult Swim, and they said, “Hey, would you like to bring Dethklok back?” And I said, “Yeah, yeah, I would. Yeah.” And they said, “Well, okay, would you like to headline an Adult Swim festival? And we have a pretty big one lined up.” So I said, “Let me find out if Gene Hoglan is available.” Because that’s the first call I always make, and he was. So I said, “Okay, we can do it.”

And I realized at that point someone over there was rooting for us to get back into business. And if we delivered the show we wanted to deliver, I was thinking we may have this opportunity to make this movie or complete this thing. And so we performed for like 20,000 people at this Bank of California stadium here in Los Angeles. And it was a fun show. It was a scary show to do because it was a one-off. One-offs are like pressure cookers. You don’t really get a second chance. So, getting everything up and running was tricky, but we did it.

And so the next call I got was in early 2020, and they said, “Hey, what about making a movie? What about putting out a new Dethklok record? What about a soundtrack as well? And what about a tour?” And I said, “Okay, let’s sort this whole thing out.” And that’s what we did. So now we’re a week before, this is three years ago. So, for the last two and a half years, I’ve been working on this project, and we’re finally leaving the house. Finally, going out because we’ve been in these offices making this movie and at our homes, screen sharing.

And so at some point, I am presented with some options for touring, and I heard Babymetal, and I said, “Well that really adds up with what We’re doing on stage. There’s a theatricality to what we do because we have this pre-produced, pre-animated show that we play to, and we amend it every single time, and we add to it, and we keep on kind of building to on this timeline.” And I thought because we have this really fun celebration of the show and music and picture coming together in this very specific way, I thought that would be great with the crazy theatricality of the Babymetal show. We’re both doing something that the other one isn’t, and It’s entertaining. So that’s why.

 

 

I can see now with the theatric answer. I was curious how the two would pair together. But the way you explained it makes a lot of sense. Do you have any surprises for fans for this tour?

I think the fact that we’re going out is a surprise. The fact that we haven’t gone out as this project doing a world tour for ten years. I don’t want to give away the show, but I think very long and hard about what the live show needs to be in these instances. Because I go to shows all the time, I go to metal shows all the time; I go see anything live that is a performance, a play, a musical, or anything that I can just because I’m interested in studying what’s working, what isn’t and why. So when I see Maiden on their last tour, half the time I’m watching the amazing folly on stage and what they do with Eddie and what the surprise is with Eddie this time. And what they’re doing with their budgets and their huge crew and everything.

And then I’m spending half the time looking at that, and the other half I’m looking at the audience. And I’m looking at where the mosh pit is, and I’m looking at the cheap seats, and I just think, everybody left their house, everybody came. Some of these people are bringing their kids; some people have babysitters. But it’s tough to get to one of these shows. So what can you do that’s completely entertaining with the time you have on stage?

And that’s something that I’m thinking about all the time. And I don’t want to wear out our welcome. I don’t want to make the show too long. I don’t want to make the show too short. I’m always thinking about what is the ultimate timeline of the show and how we make the most of it. So that’s where I’m coming from, and I think Babymetal does the same thing. Babymetal, I also think are similar to what we do. There’s one person who puts all this stuff together and casts the show. Mine has been around a long time, and I try to keep the same people around as much as I can. 

 

 

I think it’s great that you think about the whole nine yards of show versus like, “Oh, I’m going to be on stage and play.” It’s nice seeing the full perspective. In the movie, Metalocalypse: Army of the Doomstar,  I watched it, and saw the symbolic beginning of the film. This portrays the situation where fans believe they understand a celebrity, but in reality, they lack a true understanding of who they are. Can you discuss more about that?

Well, there’s a really interesting thing. And by the way, I don’t know if the fans are wrong or Nathan Explosion is wrong. I think everybody’s a little bit wrong. And I think all relationships are a little complicated. And I think the relationship between an artist and the audience is a complicated relationship. Sometimes it’s a love fest, sometimes it’s anger, sometimes an artist can turn on the audience, sometimes an audience can turn on the artist. So I think it’s a really complicated thing. It’s just like every other relationship.

And by the way, this relationship has been part of this show from the first episode where Dethklok has always just hated their fans, and that’s kind of what defines them. They think that they’re stupid. They think that they’re an annoyance, and Dethklok just thinks about themselves. So, giving the fans a bigger voice in this movie was really important. Plus, like I said, “It’s an important relationship that starts in one place and ends in a different place.” And that’s what we need. So that’s what it is. And that’s what completes an arc.

So there’s something that somebody brought up, and I never used this even when I was thinking about this. I was thinking this was the natural arc of the show. This is where this story needs to land because that’s a conclusion, as far as I’m concerned. Somebody else brought up toxic fandom. And it’s true, but there’s also a part where I remember somebody told me when I was a kid in elementary school. And we were building bird feeders with pine cones, bird seed, stuff, and peanut butter. And I remember one teacher saying something really kind of that stuck with me. They said, “Be careful. If you’re going to put out a bird feeder, you kind of have to commit to that for life because the birds will come to rely on that food. And if you take it away, they’re all going to get angry and then eventually die.”

And that’s what I think about the kind of art and the artist. You’re the one that put the bird feeder out there, and you have a responsibility to keep it filled with food. Otherwise, the birds can get really angry and turn on you. And they may die, and then you may have nothing, and then nobody has anything. So that metaphor made sense to me in the audience and the performer. And, like I said, it’s verbalized at some point. Sure, it can get tricky, but it’s a symbiotic relationship; one needs the other in order to survive. And it’s a bigger statement. And it can feel like a romantic comedy, and it can feel like it’s dire, too. So all that stuff wadded into one thing. There was a lot of thought put into it.

 

 

 

I thought it was a brilliant scene, and you see that battle and the relationship throughout the movie. And it’s also exciting seeing all of this stuff come to life. How was it going through making the new album, Dethalbum IV, along with the movie?

It’s tricky. There’s a really great thing about having more than one project on your docket to deliver at the same time. There’s a point where you go, “Okay, this is as much work as I can do today on this, and I’ve got the rest of the day, and I have to let this breathe;” In storytelling, in writing, and writing the script, for example. So what I can do, though, is when I go, “Okay, I don’t know. I’m hitting a wall here. What am I going to do? I can turn to either my guitar and start working on the music on the record. Or I can turn to my piano or my MIDI controller and get an orchestra dialed up and start building the score.” So, I’m always trying to explore. Through the score, I’m thinking about the subtext of the character.

Nathan has a theme that grows and mutates throughout the movie. So next time you watch it, listen to Nathan’s theme, and you’ll hear that that comes up later in an important place, in a couple of important places. And it keeps on twisting and turning. And so that’s something to me. Like Nathan Explosion’s emotional state is something I can write down. But sometimes it’s even better if I sit there and start composing what his emotional state is and what that sounds like, what it sounds like, what his subtext is, what it sounds like in his soul, what Murderface’s soul sounds like. What the good guy theme versus the bad guy. What are the bad guys thinking about? So I’m constantly taking these three kinds of projects, the movie, which is one huge, gigantic visual, audio, character, music, and then building around it and supporting it with music.

And then the Deth album is another thing where I’m just sitting there with my guitar, three years ago, four years ago, and just forcing myself to show up and to write. The way I describe it is it’s like you’re at a slot machine and you’re pulling the slot lever, and each time you try to write something, you open up a new session. It’s like pulling the slot, and sometimes you get three cherries in a row and go, “Okay, okay, I could see this song through the finish line. That’s pretty cool.” And sometimes you get a tire, shoe, and an onion and go, “I can’t work with this.” Sometimes, you get two cherries and a lemon, and you go, “Wait a minute, I can turn that other lemon into a cherry along the way.” But ultimately, I have somewhere around 40 different pro tools files with song ideas, with ideas that I’m asking of this project.

And when I say I’m asking about this project, I don’t even think about it in terms of what I want. Dethklok is the one who is asking, and I try to go away and let Nathan Explosion take over, and kind of make these decisions. What has Dethklok done? What has Dethklok not done? What are some feelings and moods that Dethklok hasn’t explored yet? And what are some things that feel like classic Dethklok? And so I’m trying to swirl all that around into one project that can hopefully live in relation to the movie and stand alone at the same time.

 

 

 

Yeah, I get how when you’re writing, the characters create the story for you. And I wanted to talk about Nathan Explosion because there was another scene. Quite a few scenes just made me laugh out loud while watching the movie. But there was the heartbreak scene after the rejection of the proposal because there are people like this in the real world who claim to fall in love with someone after just making eye contact and being ready to hand over the engagement ring. You see a lot of the gender dynamics and the classic How I Met Your Mother, “Bro Code-” like ties that exist. Seeing Nathan’s soft side, do you ever see him ever being able to find love?

So, in this movie, all that stuff is. That’s part of the story is to get Nathan in this place. First of all, he’s fresh off the heels of this previous incarnation, which was the Doom Star Rec room. And it got to him. He realized there’s a world outside of him that’s very dangerous, and his celebrity and his power don’t do him any good whatsoever, because this is ultimately an experiment about celebrity culture from the very beginning. And we just so happened to get to make it about something cool, which is a metal thing.

And so the idea is, here’s this guy who’s in this kind of professional flat spin, he’s in this romantic flat spin. And then we get him down there literally on his knees so that we can smack him in the face more and just beat the tar out of him. Because wouldn’t it be more interesting? That’s when he gets tasked with writing this song.

So, being creative under emotional duress, I think is something that’s interesting. And because this is the last big hurrah, we have to start opening our characters up, exposing them, and getting them to a little bit more of an emotional place. And here’s a guy… I mean, think about this. He’s a celebrity. He doesn’t really think about what other people want. He thinks about what he wants. So, if he thinks he may be giving this gift of a life with Abigail. But the truth is that he hasn’t really manufactured anything remotely close to a grownup relationship. Throughout this series, he’s been searching, searching, searching, searching.

And so, again, this is kind of a spoiler. So I don’t know if you want to air this or anything, it depends what it comes out. But he has to, at some point, and this is a really important part of the movie’s structure and moving into the third act. Which is that he has to be a big boy, and he has to say, “I’m sorry. I fucked up. I want you to have a great life without me because my real relationship is music.” And what happens beyond that will be up to him, but he has to stand up and become what he needs to be. And that’s really him making peace with his own kind of tragic proposal to get to the next place.

So again, this is a story of the lost boys becoming big boys. The first episode was about these guys making their own dinner, being big boys. And so this is like, how do you grow up? How do you grow these guys up that are these 13-year-olds in men’s costumes? And this is about tragic masculinity too, this tragic romantic masculinity, and a family, this band that is a family.

Everything I’m talking about right now was part of the theorem from the first episode and developed as we continued. But Nathan and his search for companionship, love, or whatever it is, has always been there. Once he found Abigail, he found a woman who is strong that isn’t around him because she’s a fan that is a very professional person. And he’s trying to upgrade his life and figure out what an adult would do. And he does it wrong every single time.

 

 

 

No, it’s awesome because yes, there’s a lot to catch on with this. It is so exciting because you have the movie back, the album. Now, there’s a tour. You know people are going to want to ask for more after this. So is there anything…

I know. That’s something that everyone’s been asking me in these interviews, “So what’s next?” I’m like, “What’s next? What’s next?” I mean, look, I think this is Metalocalypse, and Dethklok has actually been around long enough to kind of become IEP. So It’s like…. I like shining a light on all this stuff. To me, this is working in a kitchen or something where the audience has ordered up this food. And I go back in the kitchen with the whole team, with the animators, with the music makers, with Gene Hoglan, with Ulrich Wild, with the tour managing team, with the monitors people. And we all go, and we’re cooking, and some of the stuff needs to be slow-roasted for a long time. Some of it just a fresh fry at the very end. But we’ve built this gigantic meal for you, and it took a long time.

And I really have to say whatever makes me insane is part of it is I really like a very difficult challenge where I have to again take these five total dipshit assholes, These dipshits and make you change your feelings about them, about Nathan Explosion. He is the surrogate centerpiece of this story. And to give him this tale, this kind of… I guess you’d call it a redemption story or you’d call it kind of a rite of passage, becoming a big boy story. That to me was putting the end on this thing.

But is there a future of Dethklok beyond this? It’s possible. It really is. I mean, what I would like to do after this big, heavy, gigantic thing would be kind of go into a comedy world. But we’ve got this kind of supernatural, almost fantasm logic kind of world that we’ve built, and it’s going to be hard to ignore that stuff, too. But we really wanted to make this as cool as we could. And every single department rose to the challenge because they felt what I felt, which was an obligation to put more food in the bird feeder. So, none of the birds die.

 

 

Yeah, it’s awesome. And in a way, my next question is a fun one. You mentioned supernatural and comedy. So we’re in a world where 90 movies fearing AI and UFO sightings are colliding with reality today; doomsday type of stuff is happening around us in a way. So my fun question is, can the power of music unite humanity to save the planet in reality?

Oh, man. It’s a wonderful kind of hippie notion. I know what music has done for me had I not discovered it when I was forced to it. Had I not discovered the guitar, I don’t know what I would be. Because whatever ADD, OCD kind of lunacy that kind of drives me to learn guitar, to want to learn how to make a movie, to learn to write, in the wrong hands could be a very dangerous thing. So I’m so thankful that I found music. And I know that there are people like me, and I know the heavy metal community is like me because they worship it.

I’ve talked to… Speaking of Metallica, I remember talking to Kirk Hammett at some point. And we were just talking about how much we loved some piece of music or something. I don’t remember what it was. But then Kirk said something, he said, “Melody is spiritual.” And I thought, “You’re right.” Some people have gods; some people have music. And this movie asks, “Can music be the God? Can this band become a religious experience through the music? Can music actually unite people?”

And I would love to live in a world where it did. And I think it does, too. There’s a moment in this movie where we talk about these invisible frequencies that can change a person’s emotional structure. And I think it’s true. When you put pictures and movies together, you can make people feel different. You can make them feel better. You can take them from being in a bad place to a good place. In a gigantic world, if you could build a universal stereo and play something that united everybody, it’d be amazing. So I don’t know. I don’t know if it’s going to happen, but I’d love to question it all.

 

 

I wish it does save the planet and everything. So that’s a nice answer. Music is the gods, the melody. That’s actually a really nice way to put it.

Well there are two songs in the movie, and one of them is supposed to be a tantrum, a self-inflicted, ego-ridden tantrum. And then the other one is supposed to be a religious experience. There’s a voice coming from the sky. Is that a God, or is it a man? What is it, and what is it doing to bring people? What is it doing for the people who are alone and scared?

So those are all questions. Those were the inception of this piece, this whole idea is to elevate it from a TV show into a feature film that feels like a movie. And to ask those questions and to play with that stuff. Can music… It’s a celebration of just your relationship, our relationship with music. And it’s a dream. It’s like this kind of void and arrogance, strange kind of like God’s screaming from the clouds and hell on earth. And to me, it’s like an operatic. And that’s what we’re going for, too. Just something bigger than what we’ve done before.

 

 

Nice. Is there anything you want to say or add to your followers, fans, or super fans?

First of all, if you’re my fan, I really appreciate it that you stuck around this long and waited out in this kind of interim that may have never happened. It’s crazy, and I think it’s because of the fans that we got this far. It’s funny… Somebody asked me a long time ago, in this interview cycle within the last few weeks, someone asked me… ‘Cause there was a big fan protest when they found out the show wasn’t coming back. And somebody said, “Oh, so that was years ago. So that didn’t work, huh?”

And then I think I answered at the time, I said, “Yeah, it didn’t work, I suppose.” But then I realized… I thought, “You idiot, what are you kidding? Are you kidding?” The only reason that Dethklok returned is that fans kept watching it and showing it to their friends and watching it and watching it and watching it and supporting it and caring about it. So this is theirs. It’s not mine. It’s theirs, and they made it happen.

So I do my best to put something together. And I made a big bet that is true, which is that heavy metal people have pretty big hearts and they really care, so thanks to them.

 

They do. It’s a really… It’s a beautiful community.

It is. I know. I know. It’s like the horror community, all that stuff. They’re just the nicest people, and they really care.

They’re teddy bears inside.

Yeah, I know. That’s the bet. So that’s my big wager on the conclusion of this project.