Carnivore

“Human beings are the most savage things walking the earth,” Body Count frontman Ice-T tells Apple Music. “We’re in this form of denial about why the earth is fucked up and why life is fucked up, but all we do is eat and destroy shit.” It’s the kind of shrewd observation that has propelled the gangsta rap pioneer since the early ’80s, and which catapulted Body Count into the public eye with 1992’s ultra-controversial “Cop Killer”. But Ice assures us that the title and overall sentiment of the LA metal band’s seventh album doesn’t just apply to meat-eaters. “It has nothing to do with your diet,” he says. “Vegans might think they’re on some type of higher level because they don’t eat animals. But they still eat life—plants are alive too—so don’t try to tap out of being human with that bullshit. We’re all part of the same human nature—we’re all carnivores.” Here are the stories behind each of the album’s tracks, directly from Ice-T himself. Carnivore “My overall belief of human nature is that we’re very violent, we're very dangerous and it’s self-preservation over everything. Humans are the only thing that kills for sport. We’re very interesting creatures, and we figured out ways to justify the shit we do. So that's what the carnivore is: animals that stand erect. That's us.” Point the Finger (feat. Riley Gale) “This was Riley’s idea—he wrote the outline of the song. It’s about one of those cases we’ve seen too many times, especially recently, where people are getting shot by the cops and then the cops vilify the victim. ‘They used to be this, they used to be that, they were bad.’ It’s common tactics: An unarmed person gets shot and it’s like, ‘How the fuck do I end up being the problem?’ Now, as far as Riley, I got turned on to Power Trip when I was out on the road. Everybody was telling me they got big riffs that are heavy like Body Count. So I went to see them, and I was blown away. Riley’s bad as a motherfucker and the group sounds dope. So when it was time for t