Dimitris Kontogeorgakos of the Chicago-based webzine Metal Kaoz recently conducted an interview with Max Cavalera (Soulfly, Cavalera Conspiracy, Go Ahead And Die, Killer Be Killed) who talked about Soulfly's upcoming US tour, his decision to bring in Dino Cazares (Fear Factory), firing  Marc Rizzo and more. An excerpt follows:

“I don’t know what happened with Marc – he had a mental breakdown, I dunno, this is crazy,” Max says. “And I don’t really understand all the accusations too. It’s so out of character for him. I don’t know. I mean, when we are touring, you see people for like three months and sometimes you come back from tour, and it’s nice to have the space from the musician. I have that with my brother; sometimes I go six months without talking to Iggor and then we go on tour again, and it’s the same with Mike and it’s the same with some of the crew, and it’s the same with Marc. But now, we have all these accusations, it hurts. It hurts to hear after everything we did for him, which was a lot – put him in all the records and always took really good care of him, always really gave him good treatment to him – to hear him backstabbing us like that; it’s not nice and he’s obviously trying to get fans to be against me and make him the victim, you know. 

“I mean, I don’t have bad things to say about Marc myself; it was good during Soulfly, we made great records, but I think maybe it just run its course, you know, like I noticed it was a little bit stale – the situation was a little bit stale and going through the year, the last show we did was in Mexico and something felt a little bit different but I was, you know, getting ready to tour, getting ready to go back on tour. And then, we started hear all these crazy accusations for me. He even says in one of the interviews, he had a mental breakdown like a month ago or something. I don’t know, man. It just sucks, you know. 

“We’re not supposed to do that to each other, to musicians that we play with. All of the ex-Soulfly guys are all friends of mine; Roy, Johny Chow, Mikey, Logan – it’s nice when you get to [interrupting himself] you had your time in Soulfly, and we keep the friendship, you know. But he [Marc] thinks very bitter about everything, and it just sucks to hear all that. Definitely hurts me when I hear all these accusations that I know are all lies and BS. It’s all fabricated by his crazy mind, I don’t know. It’s a strange situation, but I had to fire him. I had to do something, so in July, I made the decision to have him no longer be in the band. And it wasn’t an easy decision because we spent 18 years together, but I had to make that decision, I have to look out for Soulfly and then, you know, I had the idea to invite Dino to be on the tour. Because we already had the tour booked.”

In a new installment of his Max Trax video series, which can  be viewed below, Soulfly / ex-Sepultura frontman Max Cavalera addressed the departure of guitarist Marc Rizzo from Soulfly, saying "We decided to part ways with him due to personal reasons. I wish Marc the best on his career. I wanna thank Marc for the 18 years with Soulfly."

In Rizzo's place, Soulfly have announced that Fear Factory's Dino Cazares will be joining the band on stage for the upcoming US tour. The 33-date trek kicks off on August 20 in Albuquerque, NM, and will make stops in New York, Chicago, and Austin before concluding in Tempe, AZ on September 25. The final date will be a family celebration as it will include performances by Incite, Go Ahead & Die, Healing Magic. Joining the band for select dates are Niviane and Suicide Puppets.

Max Cavalera comments, "I'm very excited to be sharing the stage with Dino. He is a true OG riff master, It's going to sound heavier than Soulfly has ever sounded before! Dino's legendary Fear Factory crunch guitar sound mixed with Soulfly is going to sound insane."

Dino Cazares states, "The first time I met Max in 1991, I knew we were going to be long-time friends. I was standing at the bar, he grabbed my arm and yelled 'Papa Capado.' I was like 'who the F@#% are you? He said “I’m Max' and from there we just hit it off. That same night I played him the Fear Factory demo tape on his cassette Walkman in his hotel room while we were attending a music convention in Los Angeles. He liked it so much that he wouldn't give it back, so I had to wrestle him and take it out of his walkman, haha. It was my only copy.

"Max told Monte Conner, the A&R director from Roadrunner Records, that we had a new demo that he needed to check out, so our manager at the time sent our demo to Monte after many labels turned us down. The rest is history.

"Over the past 30 years, I’ve guested on a few of Max’s projects and jumped on stage whenever and wherever I could. Now it’s a great honor to be doing this tour alongside Max as the second guitarist. It’s going to be amazing for all the fans to see the two of us playing a selection of Soulfly songs and a few familiar extras.

"Much respect to Max and his family -  thank you for always making me feel at home with the Soulfly Tribe. Let’s Do This!!! Um Dois Três Quatro."

Tickets for the tour are now on sale here.

Tour dates:

August
20 - Sunshine Theater - Albuquerque, NM **
21 - Marquis Theater - Denver, CO **
22 - Sunshine Studios - Colorado Springs, CO **
24 - Wave Outdoors - Wichita, KS **
25 - The Bottleneck - Lawrence, KS **
26 - Red Flag - St. Louis, MO **
27 - Piere's - Ft. Wayne, IN **
28 - Metal In The Mountains @ Pipestem Event Center - Pipestem, WV **
29 - Skully's - Columbus, OH **
30 - Rec Room - Buffalo, NY **
31 - Crafthouse - Pittsburgh, PA **

September
1 - Gramercy Theatre - New York, NY **
2 - Alchemy - Providence, RI **
3 - Alchemy - Providence, RI **
4 - The Lost Horizon - Syracuse, NY ^
5 - Diesel Concert Lounge - Chesterfield, MI ^
6 - WC Social Club - West Chicago, IL ^
7 - Emerson Theater - Indianapolis, IN ^
8 - Diamond Pub Concert Hall - Louisville, KY ^
9 - Zydeco - Birmingham, AL ^
11 - Warlando Festival - Orlando, FL *
12 - Hell @ The Masquerade - Atlanta, GA ^
14 - Scout Bar - Houston, TX ^
15 - Come and Take It Live - Austin, TX ^
16 - Trees - Dallas, TX ^
17 - Country River Club - Tyler, TX ^
18 - Vibes Event Center - San Antonio, TX ^
19 - Rockhouse Bar & Grill - El Paso, TX^
21 - Encore - Tucson, AZ *
22 - Brick By Brick - San Diego, CA *
23 - Alex's Bar - Long Beach, CA *
24 - The Whisky - Los Angeles, CA  *
25 - Marquee Theater - Tempe, AZ +

* - No Support
** - 8/20 - 9/3 - Niviane
^ - 9/4 - 9/19 - Suicide Puppets
+ - with Incite, Go Ahead & Die, Healing Magic