Get Thrashed! (2006)

After spending years analyzing political propaganda and bad philosophy, you might think that manipulation reveals itself like flatus in an elevator, but it does not. You get lulled in, doze off in your inner critical faculty, and then suddenly wake up screaming once the horror becomes too real.

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Aaron Aites (Until The Light Takes Us) has cancer

aaronaites

Aaron Aites, best known for his documentary work on black metal (the aforementioned Until the Light Takes Us) was recently diagnosed with kidney cancer. He and his partner Audrey Ewell have put up a GoFundMe page in order to raise money in order to treat it. If you’ve found any value in Aites’ work, like several of the contributors to DMU have, then you might want to contribute some money. Besides the aforementioned Until the Light Takes Us, Aites has also produced some other documentaries and films, and released lo-fi pop music through a band named Iran. Furthermore, you can read DMU’s interview with Aaron and Audrey here.

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Blackhearts documentary seeks crowdfunding

Promotional image for the Blackhearts Indiegogo campaign
When we last checked in on Blackhearts, the upcoming documentary was halfway through filming, and the creators were optimistic about a 2015 release. The filming is done, and they have started a crowdfunding campaign on Indiegogo with the hopes of paying for the costs of post-production and marketing. As of this writing, interested backers have 31 days to contribute funds. A wide variety of rewards are being included, ranging from early access to the finished film, to memorabilia from various famous black metal musicians, to (amusingly enough) one of the producers selling shares of his immortal soul. Let’s hope that doesn’t backfire on him.

Blackhearts purports to offer a new perspective on modern black metal, as it follows three fans from around the world (Iran, Colombia, Greece) instead of merely rehashing the scene’s founding myths. In the words of its crowdfunding campaign, “It explores how a music scene develops across religious, cultural and political lines, and provides comic relief on the things humans say, think and do when hijacked by passion.”

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Dismember – Under Blood Red Skies (2009)

Dismember - Under Blood Red Skies (2009)

Review by Daniel Maarat

This DVD set of two filmed concerts and a documentary was the final release from “death metal legends and fucking idiots” Dismember. The sound quality and performances of the concerts are adequate, but fans will be disappointed that they aren’t from the prime period of the band in the early nineties; both were filmed after the departure of drummer, primary songwriter, and producer Fred Estby before the final, lukewarm album. Not entirely filling in his shoes was Thomas Daun of Repugnant and Ghost. Shitting in his shoes. I only made it all the way through both concerts and resisted the temptation to play Dark Recollections with the help of a six pack of Coors Banquet. More interesting is the included documentary, Death Metal and More Mental Illness. This also lacks contribution from Estby except for some footage from the 2006 Masters of Death tour with Grave, Entombed, and Unleashed. The performance of “Pieces” is better than the two included shows. The interviews with the Best Voice in Death Metal* Matti Karki and lead guitarist Dave Blomqvist provide good information for die hard fans.

Blomqvist says that Dismember never cheated with quantization, cut and paste digital trickery, or drum triggers while playing live. Live, they constantly had to stomp on the dimed Boss Heavy Metal 2 pedals at the end of guitar parts to prevent their ridiculous tone from frequency masking everything else. The only time they turned down the distortion was on their Nuclear Blast mandated sellout as death metal “was not in anymore” album, Massive Killing Capacity, which they admitted “sounds like shit.” Otherwise, Dismember never followed trends and kept true to their Autopsy, Sepultura, Repulsion, Morbid Angel, and Iron Maiden influences; Mental Funeral was their “riff bible.”

Karki reveals that most of his lyrics were written at the last minute; his vocals are from higher in the vocal registry than traditional Cookie Monster death growl, almost a harsher hardcore punk bark. Performing them in the studio “killed and devastated” him. We feel his pain through the presented footage of an overweight Swedish man in his underwear.

The drunken goofiness that satiated Dismember’s touring bleeds: A dozen minutes of the band headbanging, set lists written on bare backs, Swedish imitations American, and British accents. The film climaxes with a hen on the side of the road. Recommended for boredom.

*https://www.deathmetal.org/news/new-york-times-on-the-best-voices-in-heavy-metal/

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Industrial Soundtrack For The Urban Decay documentary explores origins of industrial music

industrial_soundtrack_for_the_urban_decayIndustrial Soundtrack For The Urban Decay explores the history of industrial music, featuring interviews from the genre’s most influential bands, artists, labels and fanzines.

The documentary film by filmmakers Amélie Ravalec and Travis Collins is currently in post-production. Its topic is industrial music, meaning the noise-based variety more than the post-EBM variety, defined as “an experimental music genre inspired by a wide spectrum of ideologies and interests” which “combines improvisation and performance with avant-garde, provocative, political and taboo themes alongside harsh noise and environmental sound recordings.”

According to the filmmakers, industrial was a DIY genre that rejected mainstream society — much like the original hardcore punk and metal — and “found inspiration in the avant-garde movements from the early 20th century like the Futurists, Dadaists or Surrealists, as well as contemporary writers William Burroughs and Brion Gysin. They were also influenced by early science fiction movies, Krautrock artists Kraftwerk, Can and Faust, The Velvet Underground and the DIY ethos of punk music.”

What follows is a list of the interviewees for this film:

  • Throbbing Gristle
  • Cabaret Voltaire
  • NON / Boyd Rice
  • SPK
  • Click Click
  • Test Dept
  • Clock DVA
  • Re/Search
  • Z’EV
  • Sordide Sentimental
  • Hula
  • In the Nursery
  • Hands Production
  • Klinik
  • Ant Zen
  • Orphx
  • Prima Linea

For more information, check out the group’s Facebook page.

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Until the Light Takes Us: Review

This long-awaited independent film documentary finally hit London as part of the Raindance film festival, as metalheads and indie pricks alike filled the seats to watch what has been promoted as the least sensationalist take on the all too familiar events surrounding the Inner Circle and that Scandinavian wave of Black Metal. ‘Until the Light Takes Us’ presents the story through the thoughts of some important figures from that scene, most notably Burzum’s Varg Vikernes and Fenriz of Darkthrone, who are able to articulate more of what constituted the worldview of that movement, from two very different perspectives – Varg as the idealist finding himself trapped within his surroundings and Fenriz as a former idealist now trapped within himself. For example, the Count Grishnackh likens his experience in prison to being in a monastery, as it imposes a strong sense of discipline on him, conducive to self-development, engaging with reality at the level of ‘ideas’ and the eternal quest for ‘Truth’. Fenriz, on the other hand, looks pretty directionless and resentful of the events that culminated in his loss of spirit to the extent that he describes his current music with Darkthrone as like petting dogs (the fans) and inspiring them to share his misery, possibly offing themselves as a result.

This film is clearly a chance for those involved to speak about such things after the initial media attention and exposure had long ago infected the exclusivist purity of Norwegian Black Metal. As such, it is not really a film about Black Metal. No clear picture is put together as to be able to explain what Black Metal is, although larger conclusions can be drawn as streams of dialogue intersect and are placed alongside appropriate imagery and Nordic scenery. The anti-Judeo-Christian sentiments of church burnings and the anti-consumerist, anti-westernisation implications of Helvete’s radical ideology are explored with reasonable depth, but there is nothing much said about what they affirmed and found beauty in, which is the real impulse behind many classic Black Metal albums. Combined with what seemed to be the ultimate fate of these artists as some form of social ostracisation and self-destruction (captured by Satyricon’s Frost and his throat-slitting public art display, and Dead’s suicide), Black Metal – whatever it is – comes off as a dark curiosity ultimately yielding fatalistic results. Fair enough, that’s not the purpose of the movie, but for a Black Metal initiate, this film offers little more than surplus interview material. It’s interesting as a documentary, exploring the detrimental effects of media bullshit super-imposed on an ideological and artistic movement that stood well outside of what the media can express in it’s limited lexicon, and provides content for those interested to further research this cryptic genre.

– Written by ObscuraHessian

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