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As the voice of hulking, death-metal singer Nathan Explosion and creator of Cartoon Network's Adult Swim series "Metalocalypse," Brendon Small has gotten closer to his childhood rock-star fantasies than he thought possible.
Today he's leading the live version of "Metalocalypse's" animated band Dethklok as it tours with real bands Mastadon, High on Fire and Converge. The quartet of heavy acts plays the Fillmore on Wednesday.
"I definitely spent a lot of time air-guitaring with a vacuum cleaner. I was a boy from the suburbs. It was my destiny," says Small from a tour stop in Boston, where he once studied at Berklee College of Music.
Small didn't expect to have a career in cartoons. He was discovered doing stand-up comedy on the third floor of a Chinese restaurant in Harvard Square by the producers of the animated series "Dr. Katz, Professional Therapist."
That led to a shot as a voiceover actor that evolved into his first animated series, "Home Movies." The adorably quirky show about wacky child filmmakers ran for four seasons, but was canceled by UPN and Cartoon Network (which still airs its reruns). After "Home Movies," Small moved to L.A., where he frequented metal shows with his future "Metalocalypse" co-creator Tommy Blacha.
"Another friend who has a show on Adult Swim said 'Why not create a show about what you talk about all the time?'" recalls Small. "I thought here's a show where I can do the music, write the scripts, and it's about dopey celebrity-ism, but we get to bookend it with metal!"
The resulting series allowed Small, who'd composed the music for "Home Movies," to revisit his metal roots while poking fun at the genre's self-seriousness.
In cartoon world, Dethklock rules
In the series, Dethklok is the biggest band in the world. The show has opened doors Small never foresaw stepping through.
Dethklok's 2007 debut album "Dethalbum" became the highest charting death-metal album of all time, selling more than 300,000 copies. It also gave him the opportunity to work with his guitar heroes who have voiced characters on the show.
"To have Steve Vai repeat jokes back to me is really great and for him to give me compliments on my guitar playing is more amazing," says Small. "Joe (Satriani) helped me get my lead guitar sound for this record ("Dethalbum II"). The 15-year-old inside of me is very excited."
And of course there's playing for thousands each night. While Small leads the live band on stage, he's still not the star. That distinction belongs to the animated members of Dethklok.
"There's a movie-theater-size JumboTron behind us. The whole thing is like the show with comedy sketches between songs and enough story to hang your hat on," says Small.
He notices Dethklok recruiting new metal fans.
"The thing I hear back from fans when I shake hands with them after shows is 'I don't like metal, but I like Dethklok.' People who hadn't listened to metal before are considering it in a way they haven't before. It's a cool gateway."
