Venom and Bathory as this gruesome, ultra-heavy, satanic noise from the 80’s. Although these
bands were overtly satanic or heavily engrossed in Norwegian folklore, none were armed
militants.
The ultra-violence of the Satanic underground exploded in the early 90’s with the
“Second Wave” of black metal. A handful of lunatics from Norway (Mayhem, Burzum, Emperor)
decided to create their own antithalian reality. In historical light of their ancestral roots, and
culturally repressed by a timid church state, the underground Norwegein scene violently
exploded.
At first it was the attempt to make the darkest, grimmest, most haunting musical
destruction laudible. One thing led to another, and thus begat a campaign of terrorism which
climaxed in the wreckage of a dozen burned churches, the murders of a handful, and a litany of
prison sentences.
Those kindred to that initial seed are the die-hard black metal fanatics, the ones who
advocate everything from genocide against all religious faiths to pagan neo-Nazism. They take
the literal interpretation of the occult Hitler deadly serious, and theirs is an autotheistic war-cry to
bring about heathen glory.
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Yet most involved in the European and American black metal scene decry genocide
because they detest being persecuted themselves. Most European metal bands – even black metal
ones -- detest Nazism. The Europeans still have not forgotten the bloodshed of their past. The
ultra-fascistic BM bands in America are few and far between, but there are plenty still polishing
their machetes, enthusiastic to unleash hell…
Not all into black metal are right wing to this extent. In America, black metal was
discovered through devices like Napster, because no one imported this shit anywhere in the 90’s.
Most are hardcore metal-fans that collect vinyl and bootleg everything they can get their hands
on. Wearing a Burzum t-shirt is less a statement of White Superiority then it is the same as
sporting a Ted Bundy shirt, and collecting these violent episodes of music is akin to owning
bootlegs of Cannibal Holocaust or SALO.
The super-misanthropic underground is a surge of isolated loners or small groups of
tight-knit outsiders. Many of the black metal kids in America are into fantasy period; you have
this strain of Dungeons & Dragons & renascence fest people. Otherwise they are pissed off
misanthropes, musicians, or weirdo’s obsessed by the awkward, painful quality of the more
droning, ambient work. This droning, experimental side can best be described by bands like
XASTHUR, Bethlehem, or Blut Aus Nord…
The death-metallers tend to be horror-movie obsessives, very disciplined and with small circles of
friends. They love sick humor or ugly porn, such as collecting tampons or down syndrome
bukakki. Total brutal sickout measures, cartoonishly violent, anti-religious, or tongue-in-cheek
misogynistic. 90% don’t take themselves all too seriously.
Same with the Thrashers. They worship at the altar of Testament, Exodus, Nuclear
Assault. Slayer are the progenitors of thrash, and their style its very definition. They love
screaming at the stage egging on guitar solos with a pitcher of PBR raised high. Thrashers of true
grit usually detest keyboards. Long hair, leather pants, sleeveless denim jacket covered in patches
-- oldschool high-top Reeboks if snazzy. Their musical world is not dated, it’s timeless…
The power metallers are into the soaring, banshee shrieking, ‘warriors of the world’ sentiment of
bands like Blind Guardian, Iron Savior and Manowar, respectively. It is a world of guitar heroes,
poodle hair, leather pants, and monster Harley’s. This all started with the duel onslaught of Judas
Priest and Iron Maiden. Everything classic about metal can be traced here and every nuance of
the 80’s lives onward.
Power metallers rarely get along with the death metal crowd who think their whole vibe
is aptly “gay,” but none so much as musically homophobic as the black metallers. Power metal
outside of Europe is truly a rare breed, but it does not stop a man from blaring Stratovarius in any
parking lot gathering he feels needs some quasi-spiritual uplifting…
Grind was a reaction bridging ultra-hardcore politically charged crust punk with thrash metal. It
can be easily identified by its particular blast-beat and its short-attention span variation on death
metal – most songs range between 3 seconds to a minute. Grind started in Flint, Michigan (just
north of Detroit) by Repulsion in 1985. They combined Negative Approach, Celtic Frost, and
Discharge into one horror-obsessed entity. It was, at the time, one of the rawest albums ever
recorded…
The guys in Napalm Death got a Repulsion cassette in a tape trade and, promptly floored,
decided to alter their own formula, churning out spastic, metal/punk hybrid ten-second-songs. It
developed technically and spread accordingly, but has almost always retained its punk stylings at
key moments. This is the closest thing you get to a crust punk in the world of metal, as most
grinders are hand-in-hand with crusts. This is a prime area for communal squats, political
dialogues, leftist opinions…
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Doom metal is the subterranean depths at which the die-hard eventually finds himself one day.
Doom is either classic garage Black Sabbath-influenced metal complete with the rock n’ roll
blues-scale backbone, or the slowest, snail-paced funeral dirge ever created. Doom can be highly
complex, but it’s always dreary and medium-paced at best. Some doom bands have songs ranging
up to 30 minutes encapsulating minimalist drumming and two or three riffs that drag on forever.
Truly effective doom metal sucks the life out of you harder than watching Gummo fifty
times in a row. Most into doom are surprisingly big grind heads or gravitate towards the darker,
more experimental black metal for its coldness and distance. It’s all connected to one extremely
polarized head-trip.
The metalcore and tech crowd come from a bridging of newer styles towards the end of the 90’s.
Metalcore is basically hardcore with a diverse spectrum of influences thrown in (thrash, death,
and prog). All-out tech metal (or “math metal”) is the sound-freak, we-practice-eight-days-a-
week, “so complicated your head explodes” style.
It’s newer, and thus hated by the “you’re a poseur” death, black, and thrash-heads. But
any musician -- be it a blues artist to a symphony conductor – appreciates the jaw-dropping
complexity of the often jazz-based fusion rhythms. Tech is the most disciplined metal outside of
death, and is truly a 21st, post-modern variation of it. Tech metal is traced back to early Dillinger
Escape Plan, with newer bands like Between The Buried And Me & THE END upping it to the
next level. The “Repulsion of Tech Metal,” consequently, is a generally unknown Seattle band
named SWARMING HORDES who in 1995 released the first album of its proto-genre…
Since metalcore and tech have become mainstream with bands like Unearth, All That
Remains, and Job For A Cowboy, there is a huge influx of hipster metallers that wear tight pants
and have girlie emo haircuts, lots of streaks -- this weird offspring of the YouTube generation the
old guard don’t really understand but pretend to…
They’ve infiltrated to the point where all the old metalcore bands (all of whom
maintained the DIY of punk) are abandoning their old styles. Having a sea of clone bands before
them, this vastly confusing apparatus, it changes things…
It’s kind of a mess right now, honestly, and it seems everyone is jumping ship to play
oldschool thrash, doom, or crazed experimental styles. The trend will die, as they always do, and
all the underrated, overlooked bands like The Nain Rouge, Psyopus & Signs of Collapse will go
down in history, wholly accepted by the “Rock N’ Roll Hall of Fame” & pimped through tourist
shops alongside Ozzy toothbrushes and Jimi Hendrix coffee mugs…
The Industrial scene is a different vibe altogether though. America has never truly embraced the
tank-rousing, street war digital hardcore that Alec Empire has busted out in Germany with Atari
Teenage Riot, or the truly bizarre, Warhol-esque drug freakout zone that Throbbing Gristle pulled
off in the UK.
Instead, American industrial has mutated into this kind of hedonistic dance utopia, where
metal heads, punks, and electronic music junkies coagulate at 3am wearing devilish suits and ties
while half-naked freak-dolls are led by the chain of a dog collar whilst electrical tape covers up
their nipples and thing-a-ma-boobers. It is the future of post-modernity that Marquis de Sade
cranked to in solitary confinement.
When a live industrial band such as VNV Nation or Skinny Puppy comes through a
territory, the traffic will change to another venue, but the great mass of freaks will always flock
back to the seedy club that has been designated as the outpost. Expect pure darkness, candle-lit
atmosphere, The Cure, EBM, shouting alcoholics, rivers of booze, some fine hush-hush white
powder guzzling up a nostril or two…
The industrial scene is both a fuck-frenzy and the ground zero campaign of all dramatists
to live out their Anne Rice flavored romanticism, complete with interpersonal goth legends that
increase in magnitude with every passing solstice. You’ll find the worst of them feeble &
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begrudged in a shadowy corner, sobbing their vulnerose anguish while gazing at a dried dead
rose, railing for attention with some lame tale of a half-hearted suicide attempt…
The goth/industrial crowd is not to be confused with the ravers. Ravers are more like dance club
people promoting a hedonistic celebration of life. There is a core vibe of humanism and
communication; a fanatic push to fuse the body and soul…
As with metal, you have those who actually listen to electronic music as opposed to going
with it. When actually investigated, the electronic format is limitless. The repetitive nature of the
more braindead “loop-based” trance & house has given a negative connotation to the genre.
Punks & metalheads almost unanimously hate DJ’s. They generally don’t consider it an
art form, and grumble stereotype lines like “Pick up an instrument you fraud!” I personally
consider Disc Jokeying an exercise in clever editing, which is an art form in and of itself, as well
as the ability to sculpt the ambience & psychological permeation of a dance floor as the conductor
would a symphony. It is a very careful balancing act, and takes a great degree of talent. But the
DJ is not a musician…
Plus the ravers are not as deviantly sexual. The industrial crowd wears their S&M
leanings on their sleeves. The ravers are more peace & love, not ‘Let’s whip each other in a
dungeon setting and go ape-shit kinky with straight-razors.’
While the dance-floor can be quite an aphrodisiac, the problem is when you finally get
home at 6am and are actually in the position to have sex as opposed to making it on some fucked
up, torn leather couch in the middle of a warehouse, the guys are so strung out from coke they
can’t pitch a tent, and the girls are so drained from ecstasy all they want is to cuddle or dance
around a living room until they pass out from exhaustion. Either way it’s a nightmare…
So where do I fit in? I’m somewhere in the middle of it all, with my own extreme views on
everything. My people are generally the moderates that devour film and literature, who collect
vinyl and blab weird stories until 5am. Depraved sex hounds and the bombastic radicals who’ll
still heed to common sense…
I’m too dirty to be a skin, although I believe in their discipline and unity. I do not see the
blue-collar lifestyle as something to fight for, just another bane and curse to overcome. Though a
sort of anarchist I am no molotov-chucking one either, nor have I ever pretended to be. I have no
qualms about working for money, I support free-market economy within fair standards, and I
believe that government should exist as a moderate form of Democratic Socialism, whereas its
goal is to actually benefit its citizens -- as opposed to cannibalistically exploiting them like a
cannon fodder battery supply.
Still, I think it be perfectly appropriate to mention that I am, of course, a pyrate and an
outlaw. Although I believe how a government should be in theory, I still don’t give a fuck. I’m a
criminal, as any sane man is. How can one subdue themselves in light of the ghastly policies of
the machine?
I actually enjoy taking a shower at least every three days, unlike the crusties who
enthusiastically sleep in dumpsters, priding themselves on the absolutist rejection of hygiene. For
the nihilist crustie, I am too clean cut and organized (if you can even really call it that). I’m too
abrasive for the politically correct crowd, yet I have no qualms against playing bongos with a
bunch of hippies in the park.
Still I find myself offending all with my political views, and challenge meathead quotas.
I’m quite vocal about what I think is rude, uneducated gibberish. I won’t shut up & never will
until they steal my vocal chords like kidney thieves in the dead of night.
I enrage, I insult, I do spastic cartwheels, I take great pride. As Monsieur de Sade once
said: “Kill me again or take me as I am for I will not change.” I’m a FREAK -- a proud one of a
long-dead, quasi-nationalism that arose from the concrete of East Dearborn in 1994. I am its
champion flag-waiver, and oldschool in my tastes and preferences…
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THE VILLA WINONA (PORT OF ALL STORMS)
Two and a half days since I left Detroit, and only one more hour of waiting until the Greyhound
slips the Los Angeles terminal and takes me -- like a golden chariot with flaming wheels -- to the
San Diego drop off point. This is my third experience with the LA depot, and still there are
screaming Mexican babies everywhere. Like all inner-city terminals, outside the glass doors
prowl a mob of ex-cons slinging pain pills & stolen cell phones…
The Villa Winona – a quasi-crust house filled with fellow Detroit expatriates -- will be
the port of all storms during this voyage. I head onto the road for 2 months, go bankrupt, hustle a
bus ticket for San Diego, then land like a comet right back on the couch. I then, in theory, find a
lame minimum wage job fit for a teenager. I make a grand, book further adventures, then rush
back out into America until this book feels complete. Literally, I have no plan – I instead put my
faith in fortune cookies and astrology columns…
This is my first return to The Villa Winona since June -- and my second experience with
California. It was that very trip 6 months ago set me off like a time bomb. After a killer burn in
the romance department, I'd gone to reclaim some peace of mind. Instead I was thrust into a
bizarre tale of green card bride schemes, BDSM porn off