JC: Well, basically everything fell through when we couldn't find a steady line-up. Finding a drummer that is both good and available is almost impossible. We tried out several people but there was always a problem with how much time they could commit to the band, or in other cases their style didn't fit our music too well. We got in touch with Anders from Nasum when we reformed, and he agreed to play with us but in the end it turned out that he couldn't make it due to time constraints. Also, he wanted to remain a fan of the band rather than get too involved in it. We respect his decision, and there was no hard feelings about it. We borrowed a drummer from a friends band (Construcdead) and did the Carcass cover song, and after that we tried to find somebody who could play but it was really slow going.. eventually we just accepted the fact that nobody was interested, so we kind of put the band on ice for a while. So yes, at one point we didn't really have anything going for us. No members, no website, nothing at all. The turning point was in 2002 when I talked to an old friend (Andy of Sayyadina) about recording some songs on his computer, just to see how they would sound. His band had just done a German tour where Adde from Birdflesh filled in on drums, so it was a natural choice to ask him if he would be interested in drumming on some future GS material.. the rest is history, as they say.

G: Jocke neglected to mention the bribes I received for gracing the band with my presence the second time around. Otherwise I think he covered everything rather eloquently in his long-winded answer.

From listening to the new mp3's, I can totally see that this time, you guys really ARE back! In fact, I think the newer songs are even better than the old stuff you guys did. Seems like taking 10 years off didn't hurt you guys one bit! Most of these reunions always fail (that new Grave album is terrible!), but this time, it has worked! Tell us about how it feels to really be back in action this time around.

JC: I'm glad you like them. It's actually a pretty common reaction we get to the new stuff, "Wow, these are actually good songs, not just another reformed band"... I can't blame people for being a little dubious. After all, we've been "reformed" for almost 4 years now and have very little to show for it. So we knew that we had a pretty high standard to live up to once we released some material, what with our "cult status" and all that. There's a pretty strict formula that you have to work with in this particular genre, but I think we managed to crank out some good tunes and still retain our old sound and just updating it slightly.
I had maybe 1/3 of the riffs written when we started writing again last year, so most of the split CD is fresh stuff that we worked very hard on to make it as good as we possibly could. It feels great to be back, especially now when were getting really good feedback from all around the world. I could not ask for more.

G: In my opinion it's due to the fact that the rest of the band have a certain something.... Talent or whatnot. Jocke's songs have been awesome and Andreas' and Adde's input has definately made the songs end up the way they have. Due to the outlook we've had on the band this time around, i.e. not taking things overly seriously and making sure we enjoy playing in the band, and the fact that we've taken our time, we're all very satisfied with the way the new material's ended up. And as for our perceived "cult" reputation... Wellllll, Matti's not in the band anymore, so we can't use Dismember as a selling point anymore. Damn. What a pity. Anyway, there'll always be nay-sayers and nothing we ever record will change their minds about Necrology being the best material we've ever or will ever release.

You guys are now working with Adde from BIRDFLESH on drums. How did that work out, and will Adde be the permanent drummer for GENERAL SURGERY? I think he's really added a new feeling to the band, making you guys faster and tighter than ever before.

JC: Adde is pretty vital to our new sound, being the talented drummer that he is... also he's a CrazyNiceGuy and has that luscious ass. He can easily match anything I can come up with, so there's no worries there at all regarding the future song writing. Even though we write the songs with programmed drums and he gets to hear them when they're sort of finished (because he lives a few hours away from the rest of us), he manages to inject a lot of his own style into it once he plays the songs with us. He's been playing this kind of stuff for a long time and it shows, he's got a great vibe to his drumming and doesn't overplay.. I can't stand when drummers are doing that.  I see no reason why our line-up should change now, these are the best guys that could ever be in this band.

G: "With the exception of our singer"

A: Adde is a really good drummer!

The new songs are still totally GENERAL SURGERY style, I'm so happy you guys didn't decide to change anything, and yet, you've managed to even improve on your sound! What really inspired you guys to make such a solid comeback?

JC: Old Carcass records. Booze. Lack of sleep. Piracy.

G: Threats of excessive physical violence, the aforementioned bribes, THE CHANCE TO RELEASE SOMETHING ON RAZORBACK RECORDS YAY! More to the point, I figured I'd jump on the bandwagon with a bunch of more talented people than myself.

A: The money...

Tell us about some of the new songs you guys have recorded for the split CD with THE COUNTY MEDICAL EXAMINERS. How long did it take to write them, and record them? Was it hard to record after years of being gone from the underground? Tell us about some of the lyrical content, and also the recording process. Seems like it went very easy for you guys, even though you haven't recorded in over 10 years!

JC: Some of the songs were already written, such as "Lab Rat". Also parts of "Decomposer" and "Pre-Bisectal Corrosive Immersion" were stuff that I wrote during 1999/2000. So we started with the little stuff I had, and once we got started demoing songs at Andy's place things kind of snowballed from there. I think we came up with 6 complete songs in 6-7 weeks.. which is pretty good considering that we only have time to get together once a week, if that. So, all the 7 songs were ready just before Xmas 2002. After they were recorded with programmed drums, we sent them to Adde so he could learn them, and in January we practised for one weekend for the first time. One month after that we started recording properly. The drums were first recorded on a computer in our practise room, but the files got corrupt so we couldn't use them. Luckily enough Adde knew of a cheap digital studio just outside Stockholm, so we managed to get a few hours there and redo all the drums. It took maybe 3-4 hours to do that. Then we had the drum files, fed them into Andy's computer and started recording on weekends, so it took a while to complete it because of our ever conflicting schedules. Recording was easy but the mixing process was a nightmare that I just want to forget about. It took us a long time to find the right sound and it was really hard work, but I guess it paid off in the end. The record doesn't sound flawless, but that wasn't our intention.... we
wanted a gritty, dirty sound but with a lot of punch. I think we achieved just that.

G: The lyrics are basically a continuation of the later lyrics on Necrology ("Crimson Concerto" & another song I can't remember the title of). No big deal for me. The music is what makes our new stuff what it is and the lyrics basically just back it up. What I've noticed now is how much easier it is writing lyrics what with online dictionaries and thesauruses. The subject matter could be considered more bizarre & humourous than before. I never really gave a flying fuck about excessive medical terminology. Put it this way; I don't have the knowledge to write anything legible in medical terms. I'll leave that to the professionals, i.e. Dr. Fairbanks. If I had his background and talent then it'd be an entirely different story altogether.

A: I guess none of the participants in this band has been "gone" from the underground for ten years, just doing other stuff. Jocke wrote all the music, and did he come up with some soon-to-be-classic stuff!!! The recording sessions was all fun, the mixing and mastering, on the other hand, was a nightmare... I think it, in the end, turned out really good though.

Let's go back in time a bit. After the release of the "Necrology" 7"(which later became a CD and even a cassette!), what happened to you guys? It almost seems like the band was just a myth at one point! You guys never recorded anything after "Necrology"? Did GENERAL SURGERY ever sign a contract with any label back in those days? I remember when Relapse had announced a full CD titled "Sex God Pathology", was that just a joke?

JC: We split up right after we had recorded Necrology.. maybe we even knew that the band was finished during the recording, I cannot remember. Matti was quitting because he needed the time to focus on Dismember, which was completely understandable. So we just continued on playing with our other bands and was quite taken aback with all the positive stuff we heard about Necrology. I was very surprised when I heard that Relapse wanted to release the complete session on CD two years later. I have no recollection of signing anything back then, but of course I could be wrong.

G: Sex-God-Pathology stems from a phone conversation I had with Matt J. when I said something in passing about how it'd be fun to record a full-length and call it something like Sex-God-Pathology. The title was a sort of hommage to the Swans. I didn't think much about it until Relapse's next catalogue came out and listed it as an upcoming release. Whoops. From what I recall, G.S. semi-existed for a while after Necrology was recorded, but never got anything done. Anyway, it was the other guys' fault, not mine. The bastards.

During the quiet years when the band wasn't active, did you guys know that the name GENERAL SURGERY had become a cult name with the exposure that the Relapse release brought you? What were you guys doing during those years, and were you happy or unhappy with the direction the underground death metal/grind scene was going in? Did you guys ever follow any of the black metal stuff that was happening?

JC: I was busy playing in other bands at the time and really didn't pay any attention to something that I had been doing for fun back in 1990. After 1992/1993 I was pretty much fed up with the whole underground scene anyway, so I was not very active for a few years. Black Metal was not something I found especially nteresting, although it had some amusing qualities to it that are hard to ignore. Musically it wasn't, and still isn't my style at all.

G: Personally I spent several years in the mid 90's wearing corpse paint. Never mind the fact that I only listened to 70's disco and James Last at the time. I had a slight inkling that G.S. has acquired a certain reputation, but I never really payed it much attention. Only as I grew older I felt the need for attention, recognition, respect.... something to maintain an identity.... Anyway, I started looking around on the net in the late 90's and found a bunch of stuff. I guess that was when the first idea of reforming came about. It only took about four years to actually produce anything, so I'd say we're on a winning streak.

In the past few years, more and more grind/gore type of bands started to form. When did you guys realizer this style of music was still going strong and even more than ever before? What did you guys think when you saw the fan made GENERAL SURGERY web site that Pierre from the BRAINDEAD webzine was doing? Were you guys surprised to see a web site for a band that hadn't recorded anything new in over 10 years? Did that help to inspire you guys to get back together to record new gore music for today's fans?

JC: That old webpage alone is pretty much responsible for the resurgence of GS, I'd say. When Grant found that, and told me it existed it was a very odd feeling, yet I felt very flattered about it. It was only then I realized that GS had played quite a significant role in the underground gore/grind scene the last few years. It was pretty weird to find out that something we did for fun mattered so much to a lot of bands out there, and I think that was the spark that made us realize that we should get back together and do something again.

G: Looks as if I've already answered this question already. I'm so pro-active I could puke. Or make other people puke, so it seems.

Jocke, I know you were in AFFLICTED CONVULSION (later just called AFFLICTED). What happened to that band, and how many albums did you guys record? Why did you guys break up? Was the band very successful with your album for Nuclear Blast? What other bands were you involved with over the years?

JC: We recorded two albums and I left in the summer of 1994 because I wasn't into the style of music that we played at the time. Regarding sales I have no idea how much the records sold. I don't think they sold that much, because NBR didn't do very much for the band. After Afflicted I joined a band called Face Down, which I made two records with. The first one came out on Roadrunner and the 2nd one on Nuclear Blast (again!). We did some touring in Europe in 1996-1998 with Napalm Death, Crowbar and At The Gates. I think that our biggest claim to fame is that our drummer left the band to join Entombed and that the singer left to join The Haunted, hahaha. So that came to an end in 1999, I think.. just before we were going to find a new label and record our 3rd album.

G: This explains in part why he's such a cynical swine.

Tell us about the early days of the Swedish death metal/grind scene. What was it really like? Were most of the bands all friendly with each other before many of the bands started to become bigger and more known? Are the bands that are still active still friendly with each other? Who were some bands that never really got too well known that you feel deserved to?

JC: From the little I can remember, it was friendly from the start but it slowly went downhill as soon as people started getting "big" record deals and so forth.. then it was pretty obvious that it was kind of elitist for a while and it was not really not that friendly anymore. People stopped going to shows and stopped hanging out with each other, which was a shame since it was quite a healthy scene in the early days. I think that most of the bands that are still around today that was friends back then are still friendly now.. I don't see any reason why they shouldn't be. I think Afflicted should have gotten more recognition, of course.. tee hee.

G: That's a pretty good approximation of it. Everyone hung out with each other and then the inevitable rifts showed up. It wasn't anybody's fault per se, just one pf these things that happens. It was good fun while it lasted. Having said that, we still know most of the people we hung out with back then. The difference being that the filthy metalheads of yore are now responsible fathers and family men. With a few exceptions. At least I'm not filthy anymore. Well, not in the physical sense. Next question.

Please give me some comments on the following bands: 1.FUNEBRE 2.XYSMA 3.CREMATORY 4.ENTOMBED 5.CARNAGE 6.AUTOPSY 7.PATHOLOGIST 8.MACHETAZO 9.CAR-CRASH 10.GENERAL SURGERY

JC:
1. Great death metal band that Afflicted played a show with in Turku back in 1990.
2. Good friends back in the day, great and very original music.
3. Well, one of the bands that should have made it but didn't. Featured the original GS drummer.
4. I prefer Murder Squad.
5. Great demos, too much old Dismember songs on the album.
6. The most important death metal band for me, along with Carcass and early Morbid Angel.
7. Never heard them. Weren't they one of the really early Carcass clone bands?
8. My new favourite band, along with Frightmare!
9. What?
10. Pirates!

G:
1. From Finland. Released a good demo and 7" from what I recall
2. The same, but after releasing a classic LP they released a bunch of hippie-dippie rock n'roll records.
3. SHUNKS! Great lyrics.
4. Good band. Great guys. Deserve all the recognition they get.
5. The Day Man Lost was great. I lost interest when they turned into Dismember mk2.
6. Their importance cannot and should not be ignored. One of the best death metal bands ever.
7. Good band from what little I've heard. Been around for a while, haven't they?
8. One of the best extreme metal bands around today. Anyone who idolizes Vincent Price is worthy of praise.
9. Sounds like a Carcass spoof band. And here was me thinking we were the only ones.
10. *insert witty quip here, since I can't be bothered*

A:
1 - ?
2 - Rihimäki rules!
3 - Nja
4 - Peaked a long time ago, seems to have gotten better lately though...
5 - Nope
6 - Yes!
7 - I prefer the surgeon...
8 - Great band!
9 - Train-crashes are cooler, more gore.
10 - What?

Do you remember any great old fanzines that used to exist back in the old days that you guys were featured in? Did you guys used to tape trade back in
those days? How helpful was that back then to spread the name of a band, especially a death/grind one? Nowadays, tape trading is pretty much extinct,
same with real fanzines! Very sad...

JC: Two great norwegian fanzines immediately spring to mind; Slayer Mag and Morbid Mag! I guess Slayer Mag is still going?! Great stuff. I used to tape trade and I have a few boxes of old tapes stashed away. It was crucial to a band back then to trade tapes and spread your flyers through the mail.. it was like a very slow version of the internet. It worked because it was all we had back then. While I appreciate the swiftness of the modern media, i.e. computers and the internet, I still feel nostalgic about typing up flyers on a beat up typewriter, doing scissors and glue type layout for flyers and demo covers.. and then spending a fortune sending the tapes out via regular mail. Bands of today have no clue how much work that was.

G: I think one of the first fanzines I got was Stage Dive, which was written by Rich Militia from Sore Throat. I still have it lying around somewhere. It opened an entirely new world for me. It was more outspoken than any of the regular metal mags, thoroughly entertaining and featured new bands I'd never heard of (Bolt Thrower when they were still a demo band for example). Sadly, I've got very few old fanzines or demos left from ym tape trading days. I have a tendency to give away stuff like that to people with a more burning passion for it than I do. I'm not really one for nostalgic values when it comes to these things. More likely that I refuse to be nostalgic now that I've given fucking everything away. Although I wish I still had my ND/SOB tour shirt left.

How did you meet up with THE COUNTY MEDICAL EXAMINERS for this split CD? What did you think of their music, and debut CD? Were you guys upset that a band sounded more like CARCASS than you guys did, or did it also help to inspire you guys to give it another shot? Tell us about how the split CD was planned, and what can people expect from it? How long have you and Dr.Fairbanks been friends?

JC: Dr. Fairbanks contacted me a couple of years ago when he came across our website. Being one of the original clone bands, he naturally had an interest
in GS, especially since we also used a little of the same kind of imagery. First he sent me their demo, and later on the album and needless to say I was totally overwhelmed with the way they pulled off their Carcass emulation! It didn't upset me as much as it spurred me on to start writing some music again. When their record came out, I felt there was a chance that a possible GS record could be interesting for today's metal crowd. As for putting the deal together, we worked separately and just had a deadline set earlier this spring, when both bands delivered their music and suggestions for the cover art. It was very smooth. I think people can expect the best of both worlds on this record: GS are definitely flying the flag for the RoP sound on our songs, while TCME are dancing VERY closely with the SoS type of sound on their songs. I'm really impressed with their skill, to say the very least. Their new bass player, Dr. Radcliffe, really added a new
dimension to their sound. I hope they retain him in the band.

G: I'm just honoured to know them. Fairbanks is a great guy. I'm really grateful that he agreed to write some of the lyrics for the split CD. It really adds to the lyrical content. I thoroughly enjoyed their first full-length, but their new material pisses all over it. In all honesty it isn't better than Carcass as such, but it's pretty close. As for what people should expect from the split... well, either 45 minutes of high-quality music, i.e. another good RZB release or alternatively an expensive drinks
coaster.

A: I love that record man, really do!!! Hearing it is all inspirational.

Do you guys have any other material in the works for other releases? I know you guys have some 7" ep plans, care to mention any of them?

JC: We're slowly writing new songs for two split 7"s that are supposed to come out later this year. One is with Machetazo on Dopi's own label Vincent Price Records, and the other one is with the Australian band Filth and will be out on Bones Brigade. I hope I'm not saying too much now though! These are tentative plans, but I sure hope that they will work out. And as if that weren't enough, we're releasing the split CD on a picture disc on Hater of God Records and on regular vinyl in Europe on Yellow Dog Records. Lots of future merchandise to spend your hard earned cash on.

G: Not to forget an eventual full-length, tentatively titled Sex-God-Pathology, out soon on Relapse Records.

What are your feelings on the CARCASS tribute CD that came out? Honestly, I wasn't really into the song you guys did. I felt the vocals weren't extreme
sounding enough for this style of music and I didn't really like the drumming. Were you guys dissapointed with this track? How did you like the rest of the bands on the CD? Who do you think was the best, or your most favorite?

JC: Great idea, but maybe poorly executed in some aspects. Our contribution was not the best, but it was the best we could do at the time. We had no drummer and had to borrow a guy and just throw everything together in a kind of rush. I don't regret participating on that tribute, it was a really cool idea and a good opportunity for GS to show that we were indeed still around. A lot of the other tracks on it are great, like RGTE, Machetazo and Impaled.

G: Our track turned out a bit cruddy. A bit too metal, and the vocals didn't turn out as expected. They'd probably fit perfectly on a Dismember record, but not for GS. Not extreme enough. Ah well, no point in crying over spilled milk. Unless of course it was the only thing you had to drink and you had no money left. And were stranded on a planet without water populated by crazed pirate aliens with a thirst for human flesh... and turtles. But that's beside the point. Anyway, as tributes go, it was one of the more interesting ones, with the exception of our contribution.

A: Rotten Sound ruled that tribute cd!!!

Now that there's absolutely no chance for CARCASS to ever return (considering Bill Steer doesn't even listen to metal anymore, from what I heard), who do you think is the best band today keeping the CARCASS tradition alive(besides you guys, of course!)? Any other CARCASS style bands you guys enjoy listening to today?

JC: The County Medical Examiners, of course. Machetazo has the same vibe, but they add a lot of one of my other favorite band in there too, namely Autopsy.

G: Nothing that I'd personally think of being directly Carcass-related, except TCME. There's a whole lot of good bands out there, but I never seem to hear any obvious Carcass influences. I guess I just think of it as being a natural part of that genre of music.

A: THE COUNTY MEDICAL EXAMINERS, of course!

What do you say to people who think ripping off CARCASS is pointless? Many people today seem a bit tired of this sound it seems like.(not me!!) What is your opinion on this? Do you think there can ever be too many of these bands?

JC: My first instinct is to tell them to fuck off. At least we're admitting to stealing shit. Every single band steals, there's no way of getting around that.. most bands just hide behind some false pretense of being original. I mean, if you play goregrind, how original can you be until it becomes something entirely different?

G: Ah... the neverending discussion of Carcass clones. As I pointed out earlier, I don't pay much attention to Carcass influences as such. Pretty much every band nowadays is influenced by some other older band, so why spend your time nitpicking about it. It's simple; if you don't like it, don't fucking listen to it. However, if anyone has a personal beef about us, then don't hesitate to get in touch with me as I enjoy arguing pointlessly. Us Scots are like that. It's part of our heritage.

A: That they´re wrong, but entitled to an opinion of course.

What would you like to accomplish with GENERAL SURGERY in your 2nd stage of life for the band. Seems like you are back to have a lot of fun, which I think is sadly missing in today's underground. Do you guys plant to eventually do a full-length album? "Sex God Pathology" perhaps? Any plans to play live and tour other countries?

JC: I think you made the point right there; create good music and have a lot of fun while doing so. It's pretty obvious we're not the most serious band around, if you read the stuff we have up on our website and look at the pictures. We are 100% serious about the music and lyrics, but we do take the whole goregrind thing with a big pinch of salt. We're old enough to have some distance to it now, and I think that keeps our outlook on the whole thing healthy. Future plans include making a good full-length album eventually, and also we're about to start booking small local shows so we can find out whether we're suited to the live environment or not. If we get the right offer to tour abroad, then we'll consider it of course.

G: We're not serious as people, which I think is blatantly obvious. We come across as misanthropic assholes sometimes... errr... OK, all the time. We enjoy fucking around, yelling at each other, throwing large objects in each other's general direction and firebombing each other's houses, but all in the name of good clean fun. Which, indeed, is what the band is about; being insufferable pricks and enjoying ourselves while we're at it. As my good friend Captain Obvious would say; if you don't enjoy being in a band & playing music, then don't bother. We're not a joke band, which I think is obvious when you listen to the music, but we do have a sense of humour.
That's another thing sorely lacking in music nowadays. Especially in metal. Lighten the fuck up and leave the constantly frowning kindergarten nihilism to black metal sissies instead. Anyway, enough of my semi-ranting.... Yeah, we have some eventual gigs planned, hopefully with our brothers in arms, Regurgitate. That'll be a blast. As Jocke pointed out, we figure we should get a bit of routine before hitting the continental circuit. And yes, Sex-God-Pathology will be out any time soon. On Relapse. Honest. Really.
Scout's honour. Don't believe me? Well... eh... Oh fuck. Next question.

One last question. Internet message boards - good, or bad?

JC: Yay!

G: Despite the prevailing elitistic attitude on a few UBB's I'd have to say "good".

Any last words of wisdom and pathology? I think I need to consume some bread. Carbs are good for you, you know. Feel free to selfishly promote any upcoming releases and everything else that's GENERAL SURGERY related!

JC: Visit our online morgue at http://generalsurgery.nu, buy our merchandise so we can get some cash together for future recordings. Look out for upcoming releases, everything will be advertised eventually on the website.
CAMELOT UNDER ATTACK!!!!!

G: Dear Billy & Jill... Thank you for releasing such awesome records such as TCME, Machetazo, Frightmare and others. Please send me money. And porn. Best
wishes - Grant (age 14)

Website: http://generalsurgery.nu

Contact:
Information, interviews etc:
info@generalsurgery.nu

Merchandise questions:
orders@generalsurgery.nu

Snail mail:
Grant McWilliams
Poste Restante
S-100 26 Stockholm
Sweden