Max Cavalera has started assembling material for SOULFLY's fourteenth album, less than a year after "Chama" arrived through Nuclear Blast Records in October 2025 — and he is framing the next record as the one that actually has to prove the point.
"I have already some ideas for the new SOULFLY, because I really believe 'Chama' is kind of a record that is a really special record for me," he told Laughing Monkey With Shawn Ratches. "I think it's a record that set up the blueprint for what SOULFLY is gonna become on the next 10 years."
That is a large claim to hang on an album that is barely ten months old, and Cavalera did not soften it. "So I think the next record is even more important than 'Chama', because it's a continuation of what we started, and I think it's something that we can actually evolve with it. We can develop that further and go deeper into this idea."
Part of what makes him confident is a shift that happened behind the kit. For the first time in SOULFLY's history, Cavalera handed the producing credit and creative direction to his son, drummer Zyon Cavalera, who co-produced "Chama" alongside Arthur Rizk. Ten years into playing together, the father is unambiguous about what he is watching.
"I love the musicianship that's going on. Zyon's playing his ass off right now," he said. "We nickname him 'The Octopus', because he looks like an octopus when he's playing. People love to watch him, man. It's cool. We play festivals and you see other bands' drummers on the side of the stage, and they don't even look at me. They just look at Zyon the whole night. It's pretty cool."
"Chama" — the word means "flame" in Portuguese — was recorded at Platinum Underground Studio in Mesa, Arizona by John Aquilino, with Rizk handling the mix and master. The album follows a boy out of the favelas of Brazil and into the tribes of the Amazon in search of a higher power. Igor Amadeus Cavalera played bass, Mike De Leon played guitar, and Carletta Parrish created the artwork.
Before any of the new material gets finished, SOULFLY have a fall to get through. The band's 25-date U.S. run opens with a festival appearance at Louder Than Life and takes in Dallas, Salt Lake City and West Hollywood before a hometown headline show in Tempe, Arizona on October 15. Support comes from INCITE and from NAILBOMB, Cavalera's cult 1990s industrial sludge project with Alex Newport.
Source: blabbermouth.net