SUTCLIFFE JUGEND – Pursuit of Pleasure LP (4iB LP/0811/001)

Limited & Hand-Numbered USA/Europe/ROTW Edition of 300

Limited & Hand-Numbered Asia Edition of 300

Release details out soon…

4iB Records is proud to announce the official release of SUTCLIFFE JUGEND “Pursuit of Pleasure” LP.

SUTCLIFFE JUGEND – Pursuit of Pleasure:

- Thick Heavy Duty Gatefold LP Sleeve
- 180g Virgin Vinyl
- Direct Metal Mastering
- Individually Numbered
- 2 Different Editions:

• Asia (Red/Gold) - 300 Copies
  (Comes with a Limited & Hand-Numbered A3 Victims Poster)
• Europe/USA & ROTW (Black/Clear) - 300 Copies
  (Comes with a Limited & Hand-Numbered A3 Peter Sutcliffe Poster)

TRACK LISTING:

Side A
1) Involuntary Abortion Slide (Sample)
2) Revengance (Sample)
3) Shelf Life Size Zero (Sample)
4) With Brutal Intent (Vocals by Paul Taylor) (Sample)
5) Dark Love (Sample)

Side B
1) Pig Hole (Sample)
2) Shy (Sample)

SUTCLIFFE JUGEND – Pursuit Of Pleasure
Pursuit of Pleasure is the second album release by legendary Power Electronics duo Sutcliffe Jugend for 2012. It has also been 4 years (in 2008) since their last album release on vinyl format (Sutcliffe Jugend/Prurient ”End of Autumn“).

Pursuit of Pleasure is released in 2 different numbered editions of 300 copies each: Asia & USA/Europe/ROTW. Each numbered edition comes in different vinyl colours that is individually hand-stamped (Asia: Red/Gold Vinyl & USA/Europe/ROTW: Black/Clear Vinyl), inner sleeve (Asia: Yellow & USA/Europe/ROTW: Blue) as well as a hand numbered A3 Poster (Asia: Victims & USA/Europe/ROTW: Peter Sutcliffe). The album is made of 180 gm virgin vinyl and housed in high quality gatefold cardboard packaging inserted in a thick resealable polypropylene sleeve with a numbered album description sticker.

Comprising 7 tracks in total, Pursuit of Pleasure starts off with an instrumental track titled Involuntary Abortion Slide that reminds one of early SPK Auto-Da-Fe’s factory-line industrial churn of drowned out drones and abrasive screeches. This sets the course out for the entire album as it progresses into the encompassing textural layers of crazed noise that is Revengance. Further aggravated by Kevin Tomkin’s deranged rants and screams of agony, Revengance is almost incomprehensible to the sane. This 2nd track is executed in their trademark style of old school power electronics, but in a more structured manner orchestrated with the brutal organic assault of white noise overlaid by complexed layers of electronic feedback that resonate with piercing aural harshness. Together with Kevin Tomkin’s frenzied wails, they weave seamlessly well together with its high frequencies and overall disturbing tonal quality. Paul Taylor contributes to With Brutal Intent with his verbal tirade of anguished and maniacal outbursts. Just like a madman, he appears to be exacerbated by the tensions between his own drastic perversions and forlorn despair through sounding almost pained and tortured with his intent of brutality. The album concludes with Kevin’s personal favourite Shy, which is an epic track that stretches for over 14 minutes. Initially starting out as a haunting ambient introduction of drone loops and synth sounds, Kevin’s gentle whispers gradually build up into the background of harsh electronics and feedback loops. Struggling between the multitude of white noise and screeches, Kevin’s whispers gradually elevate into psychotic screams of fuckraging aural armageddon, through commanding his victim to ‘SWALLOW!’

Overall, Pursuit of Pleasure demonstrates the maturity of Sutcliffe Jugend as an experimental outfit who has redefined themselves through creative manipulation of sound textures. From their progressive redevelopments of careful structured organic elements of audio layers over the decades, this album brings forth the innovative evolution that highlights the creative processes of both Kevin and Paul, departing from the original 80′s power electronics style of harsh noise into progressive post genre movements. This album successfully emphasizes Sutcliffe Jugend’s artistic creativity as visionary musicians through their conscious attempt of reinventing themselves by incorporating new influences and their personal interests to break new ground in the contemporary experimental music scene.

Best Played Loud!

PAYMENT DETAILS:

Asia Edition – US$42.50 (US$25 + US$17.50 Int’l Airmail Shipping from Singapore, Asia)

To Purchase Asia Edition, Go Here.

Europe/USA & ROTW Edition – US$42.50 (US$25 + US$17.50 Int’l Airmail Shipping from Singapore, Asia)

To Purchase Europe/USA & ROTW Edition, Go Here.

Please direct all enquiries to:

4iB Records
PO Box 206
Singapore 914007

email: gerald@4ibrecords.com
www.4ibrecords

Pursuit of Pleasure is the second album release by legendary Power Electronics duo Sutcliffe Jugend for 2012. It has also been 4 years (in 2008) since their last album release on vinyl format (Sutcliffe Jugend/Prurient ”End of Autumn“).

Pursuit of Pleasure is released in 2 different numbered editions of 300 copies each: Asia & USA/Europe/ROTW. Each numbered edition comes in different vinyl colours that is individually hand-stamped (Asia: Red/Gold Vinyl & USA/Europe/ROTW: Black/Clear Vinyl), inner sleeve (Asia: Yellow & USA/Europe/ROTW: Blue) as well as a hand numbered A3 Poster (Asia: Victims & USA/Europe/ROTW: Peter Sutcliffe). The album is made of 180 gm virgin vinyl and housed in high quality gatefold cardboard packaging inserted in a thick resealable polypropylene sleeve with a numbered album description sticker.

Comprising 7 tracks in total, Pursuit of Pleasure starts off with an instrumental track titled Involuntary Abortion Slide that reminds one of early SPK Auto-Da-Fe’s factory-line industrial churn of drowned out drones and abrasive screeches. This sets the course out for the entire album as it progresses into the encompassing textural layers of crazed noise that is Revengance. Further aggravated by Kevin Tomkin’s deranged rants and screams of agony, Revengance is almost incomprehensible to the sane. This 2nd track is executed in their trademark style of old school power electronics, but in a more structured manner orchestrated with the brutal organic assault of white noise overlaid by complexed layers of electronic feedback that resonate with piercing aural harshness. Together with Kevin Tomkin’s frenzied wails, they weave seamlessly well together with its high frequencies and overall disturbing tonal quality. Paul Taylor contributes to With Brutal Intent with his verbal tirade of anguished and maniacal outbursts. Just like a madman, he appears to be exacerbated by the tensions between his own drastic perversions and forlorn despair through sounding almost pained and tortured with his intent of brutality. The album concludes with Kevin’s personal favourite Shy, which is an epic track that stretches for over 14 minutes. Initially starting out as a haunting ambient introduction of drone loops and synth sounds, Kevin’s gentle whispers gradually build up into the background of harsh electronics and feedback loops. Struggling between the multitude of white noise and screeches, Kevin’s whispers gradually elevate into psychotic screams of fuckraging aural armageddon, through commanding his victim to ‘SWALLOW!’

Overall, Pursuit of Pleasure demonstrates the maturity of Sutcliffe Jugend as an experimental outfit who has redefined themselves through creative manipulation of sound textures. From their progressive redevelopments of careful structured organic elements of audio layers over the decades, this album brings forth the innovative evolution that highlights the creative processes of both Kevin and Paul, departing from the original 80′s power electronics style of harsh noise into progressive post genre movements. This album successfully emphasizes Sutcliffe Jugend’s artistic creativity as visionary musicians through their conscious attempt of reinventing themselves by incorporating new influences and their personal interests to break new ground in the contemporary experimental music scene.

Best Played Loud!

To purchase, kindly go here: http://www.4ibrecords.com

- LA NOMENKLATUR
- SUTCLIFFE JUGEND
- CLUB MORAL

Location: Weststadt Bar (Darmstadt, Germany)
Date: 3 Nov 2012 (Sat)
Doors Open: 8am
Time Start: 9pm
Entrance Charge: 20 Euro

More info at: http://www.daigose.de/chambermusic/zugzwang/

HARBINGER SOUND & RAMMEL CLUB PRESENT:

- CONSUMER ELECTRONICS
Since the demise of Whitehouse, Philip Best’s Consumer Electronics has become a wriggling sex machine, his frothing mania bursting forth over an electronic scree with a fervid tumescence that is frightening to behold.
It’s the first visit to Nottingham for almost a decade from this “dirty word specialist” so slip into something fancy and make a real night of it. On this occasion Consumer Electronics will be the duo of Sarah Froelich and Philip Best. Don’t expect a sympathetic ear.

Links:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/363987140332798/
http://www.myspace.com/dirtywordspecialist

- SLEAFORD MODS
Over skeletal beats the Mods unleash an airborne stream of anger so virulent it’d have the ebola virus cowering in the corner given half a chance. Upcoming LP, Austerity Dogs, on Harbinger Sound promises to be a stone classic already and deserves to be dropped on major population centres in the UK in much the same way as other explosive payloads.

Link:
https://soundcloud.com/sleafordmods

- CREMATION LILY
The paucity of Internet yak on this unit should give you a clue as to how rare a live outing this is. Limited communiques from his own Strange Rules label go straight to the dedicated and are highly-sought after by the desperate. Dark and fractured electronics.

Links:
http://www.strangerules.com/
http://strangerules.tumblr.com/

VENUE: THE CHAMELEON ARTS CAFE, Old Market Square Alleyway (Next to the Bell Inn, above Clinton Cards)

DATE: 9 March 2013
TIME START: 2000hrs
TICKETING: £5 Advance/£8 At The Door
(Advanced tickets available from 22 January via this link: http://www.wegottickets.com/event/205668)

More Info At:
http://www.rammelclub.org/
https://www.facebook.com/events/135093359987993/

Whitehouse – Live Action 85, 13/02/1999, Barcelona

Bataille, Genet, Sade and company do swift business at the local bookshop, but some of the most adventurous readers I know tell me they haven’t gotten around to Peter Sotos. Distance renders depravity digestible, so cast the burly Chicago author in terms of his precursors––imagine Sade slopping through Chicago gloryholes; Bataille looping the audio of murderers, victims, and media whores into powerful sonic whirlpools; Genet diligently clipping/fleshing out/resuscitating news stories about child abductions (and abductors). Another turn-off to some: His books aren’t novelistic (and he doesn’t intend for them to be); instead, frame each as an ethics course steeped in cum shots and crime sprees. And for newbies, the texts are, in his words, “severely connected,” i.e. the more you read, the more complex the repetitions, shadows, echoes, reverberations.

Sotos’ personal history also threatens to obscure his work. Because of the insistence on a narrative first person, he’s been vilified as a misanthropic pedophile. (His mid-80s kiddie-porn arrest for the possession of the zine, Incest #4, is often what folks know about the author.) Due to his history with seminal noise group Whitehouse, some view him as a part-time writer. Regardless, Sotos continually proves himself a rigorous thinker (sentences shot through with Nietzschean quivers) whose brutally spare prose and complex inquiries into desire make him one of a handful of contemporary authors justifiably worth their “transgressive” salt.

As of late there’s been a lot of activity surrounding Peter. Creation Books published Proxy, a collection of books from 1991-2000: Along with Tool, Index, Special, Lazy, and Tick, it includes a cut-n-paste introduction by the author and a collagist CD (w/ Steve Albini). Last year Brooklyn-based Void Books published Selfish, Little and more recently made available Sotos’ strongest work to date, Comfort & Critique. Creation recently published Predicate: The Dunblane Massacre, Ten Years After (and, in fact, parts of this discussion show up in Waitress, released by Creation Books as a limited-edition accompaniment to otherPredicate pre-orders). He edited and wrote the introduction for Jamie Gillis’ Pure Filth, out on Feral House in October 2006.

Comfort & Critique looks at, among other things, the 2000 abduction and subsequent murder of 8-year old Sarah Payne by prior sex-offender Roy Whiting in Sussex, weaving-in the author’s everyday discussions about soup, Annabel Chong’s The World’s Biggest Gang Bang (Chong fucked 251 guys in 10 hours), the “Name and Shame” riots in Paulsgrove UK (at one point a pediatrician was attacked when locals misread a sign). Check out also its play on timelines and Wordsworth’s child to the man (vice versa), etc.

I interviewed Peter Sotos this past summer. Since then, we’ve kept in touch, most often about music. There’s the temptation to say something nice about the notorious author, but instead of selling you on Peter the person (admittedly a great guy to get drunk with while discussing the finer points of Shellac), why not read his responses in the following interview and formulate your own opinion.

FANZINE: Perhaps an odd place to begin, but how do you support yourself?

Peter Sotos: I work. Not that I think it’s such a good idea, but I always have. I don’t have a career. I do think it’s important that the books have no great commercial requirements and that my work isn’t split between lesser and greater degrees of seriousness — especially in regards as to who releases the material.

FANZINE: Any writing rituals?

PS: People sometimes ask if I write when I’m drunk. I do, sometimes, but it tends to get thrown out pretty quickly when I read it back sober.

FANZINE: Do you ever catch yourself writing for your audience?

Peter Sotos: I’ve heard how wrong I am for as long as I’ve been alive, it seems. So I have to weigh a possible audience’s possible arguments against mine all the time. But I don’t pander.

FANZINE: Where do you see yourself fitting in terms of literary tradition?

PS: I know where others say they see me fitting in. But, honestly, I don’t think in those terms at all. I don’t see anyone else doing what I do. Which sounds terrible, I know. But I don’t feel much kinship with contemporary writers, especially those who create fiction. My interest is in completely the other direction. There are writers whose work I love, of course, and it’s nice when some people make certain smallish comparisons. Sade, Dworkin… But nothing in terms of an ongoing tradition.

FANZINE: You mention Andrea Dworkin often. People might find the two of you an odd pairing, but on some level I guess you seem to share a notion of the humanity of victims.

PS: I disagree. I think Andrea Dworkin cared very deeply about her words being more than that – just words. I’m certain that I do, as well. But we don’t see the frustrating impossibilities of that action in the same context or towards the same result.

FANZINE: Have you read (Samuel Delaney’s) Hogg?

PS: I’ve read Hogg, of course. I think it’s supposed to be like a Tom Of Finland cartoon and it doesn’t do all that much for me. I like Times Square Red, Times Square Blue and The Madman much more but I’m uneasy about so fucking many of the community conclusions and connective politics. I honestly don’t think they exist. I go to the same kind of places Mr. Delany does, or did, I don’t know, and I have very different experiences.

FANZINE: When I think of contemporaries, I also pause at William Vollmann. But you’ve been critical of him and his work.

PS: I’m not convinced. He sounds untouched. A bad liar with quaint reasoning. We’re looking for different things, though. I don’t feel I have anything in common with such traditional concern.

FANZINE: People have referred to your books as formless, though there are obviously internal structures and connective patterns. How do you map the texts?

PS: I write what I like and connect the underlying themes and strains later. See what comes through, basically. Tick had a very clear numbering system running through it. Selfish, Little had a fairly rigid template. I suppose Comfort & Critique, though, has the most structure in that the news clips were very carefully selected and then placed in a very specific order. The book itself then came from that order and the general assumption that created it.

FANZINE: Proxy makes your self-sampling more explicit. Do you have an overall climax in sight?

PS: No. But Proxy was designed, in large part, to draw out specific degenerative repetitions. That’s exactly why the books aren’t in chronological order. The last three books are presented as going backwards and the first two books are, sort-of, the index. The introduction is made of excerpts from newer unpublished material constantly concerned with how most of the sex joints and expectations are gone or dying fucking badly. But it’s not a narrative, you know?

FANZINE: Was its two-column newspaper-style layout intentional?

PS: Probably not. It might be something that both Jim Goad––when he published Total Abuse––and James Williamson from Creation had in mind, though. I’m far more interested in the text being like a book than a newspaper. I’m responsible for the layouts of Pure and Parasite, but not the books. The images are mine, though. I don’t try to comment on newspaper and media hypocrisy, I’m just largely unable to get away from it.

FANZINE: In Comfort & Critique you write, “I’m absolutely sick of the differences between intention and interpretation. I want to create an art that is ideally shored. One that can’t be misunderstood any longer. Not by the powers that want to see me jailed or by the fucking mice that pretend I’m doing something socially significant.” How do you intend to make this happen?

PS: The work can only be done as writing. Where one sentence explains the one before it. Full length books. I’ve seen the questions I bark out used out of context and sold as something else, something less. I want to make sure the answers are rigorously considered and that can only be done by writing books, not creating advertising. I don’t have a blog or a e-commerce website.

FANZINE: What is it about the question and answer format and interrogation that lends itself to your project? And often, there’s often a noticeable disjunction between the question and the response.

PS: There’s some disjoint in the careful wording of the questions themselves. The way the questioner tells the answerer how to think isn’t subtle but still, almost always, almost naturally, accepted. Of course, there is my own internal dialogue at work, often enough, that finds focus and excitement in the way others pose and answer highly personal, as well as grossly impersonal, questions. That search for so-called brutal truth that is vain and badly done. The way cops and artists come off exactly like street corner faggots asking toothless hustlers if they’re cold without coats. The way that it can keep getting worse. The idea that others may know what’s best for you. May want to protect you and need to explain that to you. There’s quite a few reasons.

FANZINE: When did you meet Jamie Gillis?

PS: I met him in SF about six years ago, I guess. David Aaron Clark suggested it, originally. Jamie, as I see him, is exactly the rare sort-of person who understands the Q & A dynamic. He looks to me as if he genuinely wants to understand why these people, himself especially, do these things, these acts. Or want to see them. He asks legitimate questions and can’t be blamed for the bad answers of the participants. Or the low expectations of his audience. I do absolutely think he’d like to get more than type.

FANZINE: In Comfort & Critique, you write about the press defining victims, but the narrator also makes it known that he is not “blaming the parents or the other particulars or suggesting something about the nature of the press.” Still, there seems to be a hazy area where such a critique pops up.

PS: Such a critique of the press or the general media just seems obvious to me. You don’t get news reports that are devoid of spin and you don’t get news reporters who don’t wink at you because of that. So critiquing the nature of the press seems redundant and unimportant. There’s a huge market for such examinations, especially in music and film, but it doesn’t mean all that much to me. I’m far more interested in how that thinking creates the bodies and personalities it reports on. To be precise, and use the quotes you pull, Sara Payne gradually became the product that the news wanted. Or, at least, the side I’m sold. But not as a concentrated and conscious marketing ploy. Rather as someone, emotionally reduced or not, might respond to comfort and attention, sympathy and flattery, incredible existential and physical loss. It’s similar to what most people might say they want in a relationship. I’m not just saying that the press is lying.

FANZINE: Reading Comfort & Critique, there are these multiple levels and philosophical moments. “Critique” has a didactic ring: Is it a philosophy of ethics in the sense of what Foucault was investigating when he died? I also kept thinking of Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus.

PS: The title Comfort & Critique, essentially but not exclusively, refers to a simple journalism construct. Or pretense. The writers who concern themselves with Sara and Michael Payne, for example, who critique the situation, dispatch the news but shave any edges off so that the parents are constantly comforted and cared for. Whether they do this in obligation to their careers or a greater, perhaps humanist, ideal is incidental to my discourse. Of course, the bits you highlight connect this tendency to art. That most art, literature, music, journalism is blurred by a selfish interest in earning a living isn’t surprising. What is surprising is that these artists pretend that they’re offering an objective honesty. But, actually, I’m more interested in how that fluidity seeps into concepts of respect, love, sympathy, etc; personal and otherwise. Also the way that these journalists write so that they directly address the parents and the criminal at the same time. I understand the Wittgenstein and Foucault references in that they were trying to develop a systemic accuracy, a specificity; that is certainly a personal need of mine.

FANZINE: In the book there’s a vacillation between needing/not needing the photos of these children and the mention of needing only the “quickest trigger.” Why did you decide to include the images at the end of the book? Is this what Sarah would’ve looked like?

PS: They’re the images that provoked the idea of Sarah. The idea of a magazine came from my wanting to compile these scraps and make something more complete, something better, than the purely functional way they were being personally handled just before. The magazine wouldn’t have been adequate. The only way to do what I wanted was to write this book about the impulse.

FANZINE: You mention that “Sara Payne should know about this book.” Has there ever been an instance where a subject (or subject’s family) contact you about your work?

PS: That quote directly refers to Ian Brady’s book. I said that she should know about that book specifically because she had written an open letter to the “kidnapper” of Holly Wells and Jessica Chapman. She was offering a plea to the would-be killer. She was seriously out of her element, advice-wise, but definitely in her element public-wise.

FANZINE: Recently, you did readings in France in front of various still images: abducted children, television news, etc. I’ve seen a few of the CD-ROMs from where these images were pulled. Are they specifically companions to Comfort & Critique?

PS: The films you saw were actually companions to the book that had just been released in France–Au Fait, which is a translation of Tick. I have quite a few of those badly edited collections, I tend to call it a system, and they apply to any work I’ve done. They inform the books but they shouldn’t be seen as anything complete. I struggled a great deal with explaining their personal context in France.

FANZINE: Why is the textual portion of the book named after Katrina Kassel?

PS: If there is a reissue of the book––without the photos––then I wouldn’t include that title. This is something I’d like to see in the future. But this edition is a necessarily small amount without any legal haggling or concern. That’s why the photos are included and why the print number is so small. Katrina and Sarah were names that I thought the original information could come wrapped in. The text functions in much the same way as the photos do. And I think Katrina Kassel is an extremely important subject in Sarah Payne’s short life and Sara and Michael’s longer one.

FANZINE: In the book, you posit a working definition of pornography: “It’s that severe but specific reduction that creates the definition of pornography…. It is purely what I do to an image. Or a fucking act that I only run through my head. It is the limitations you accept…”

PS: It’s impossible to apply grand definitions to pornography because the intense precision of individual taste is central. This is why laws and the necessary text on pornography are so loud and popular. It allows different sides to establish self-serving moral grounds but never a concrete or unified answer. One defines pornography for oneself only. The act of masturbation wouldn’t, obviously, qualify everything as pornography but rather what one is looking for in pornography. Just that these objects are capable of being used as pornography. I’ve seen far too much of this so-called “transgressive” pornography that is completely defined by the ridiculous arguments of those who seek to vilify printed words and pictures. The ones that bask in their naked freedom and flaunted spirituality are just as ugly, just as obscene, as the ones who constantly beg you to watch out for their children’s future.

FANZINE: Toward the end of Comfort & Critique there’s the hysteria at Paulsgrove and the idea that perhaps Roy Whiting didn’t fuck Sarah. I don’t feel like you need to humanize the predators because they already feel human to me. Was that your intention when you introduced this information into the book?

PS: No. Not at all. I think it’s important to understand that he probably didn’t fuck her not because it makes him a more human or conflicted soul but because it defines what little he may have wanted.

FANZINE: In the book you also write: “see if you can title it without making a headline about the havoc of loss and the strength that rises from despair.” Is Comfort & Critique an attempt at that headline?

PS: Yes, in a much larger sense, I think it is.

FANZINE: Comfort & Critique features your most literary finale to date. The end ostensibly ties things together. It feels germinal and even elegiac. When it drops, you suddenly realize the dates have been going backwards and here’s your opportunity to look again at the book from end to start…

PS: The structure is for me. I’m not playing a game whereby the reader may or may not get the information at hand. I’m not including a surprise or something that may be obscure. The template runs that way because I deal with that material constantly. I understood what was happening with the way I read and keep and consider all that material. It was the way I thought of the people turned down into flat material and my suspicions and tastes were born out in the text. I see the way these people change and mold but I’m unconvinced that they acknowledge it. Not in the sense that it defies the incredible trauma that they’ve suffered but instead that they might be reverting to type. There’s also an element of where you’re allowed to dip into the middle of their lives and work backwards from the public associations and shaky philosophies.

FANZINE: Speaking of which, why have you included the following quotes? “I do not want to fuck the child. Let that be the theme that glues everything together,” “I’ve always imagined myself fully clothed with these children,” and “the fantasy has to be built around children because the impossibility and all the lesser excuses wouldn’t be possible any other way.” Is it an attempt to complicate the notion of memoir?

PS: I don’t put myself in someone else’s mind. If a public wants to see me as torturing someone then they can understand that the work is in the field of words on paper. I don’t pretend that there aren’t complications and responsibilities. Intention and satisfaction and complicity and tristesse; there are many that seek to tangibly superimpose these concepts onto the meta-physical. I understand, I hope, the limitations and incredible frustrations of language. I desperately try to break that down. There’s that part at the beginning of Comfort & Critique where I address the issue of police releasing carefully cropped sections of child porn in efforts to locate missing and endangered children. The way those in glory hole situations or anonymous sex backrooms try to connect to larger comfort and acceptance drives. The whole of Predicate, which is about Thomas Hamilton, is a personal history of just photos.

FANZINE: Sara Payne is presented as repetition. You also talk of your own repetitions: “Stop repeating yourself. Stop masturbating onto just photos and pretending it’s better than what the rest of the slime don’t even do,” “I’m not that hard to figure out. Especially when I’m repeating myself.” Can you imagine ever writing different sorts of books than the ones you have and are writing?

PS: I don’t write just to have a book with my name on it. I write because I’m compelled by the intensity, as well as the lack, in the material at hand. I think there’s a huge difference in the way I write now and what I’m better known for writing, but I see absolutely no reason to look for a subject to write about or find something I can somehow turn into a book or whatnot. I don’t look for new projects or ways to impress or surprise others. I’m not interested in craft. If I’m told I write well, I know that it comes from a passion with the subject. The subject propels the writing and the constant thought. I don’t have a need to create something. I have a need to create this.

Source: http://thefanzine.com/interview-with-peter-sotos-2/

NOTICE FOR EUROPEAN CUSTOMERS ONLY!

4iB Records will be at WAVE-GOTIK-TREFFEN 2013 in Leipzig, Germany from 17-20 May and will be shipping our releases directly to European addresses from Germany instead of Asia. In view of this, all shipping cost will be absorbed for purchases sent during this period. 4iB Records is currently taking orders for the following releases:

1) 4iB001 – SUTCLIFFE JUGEND “Pursuit of Pleasure“ Gatefold LP (Limited/Numbered Edition Of 300 Copies/Each Edition). More Info Here.

(PRICE: €20/£17.50)

2) 4iB002 – AUTOGEN “Mutagen“ Digipack CD In Slipcase (Limited/Numbered Edition Of 500 Copies). More Info Here.

(PRICE: €10/£8.50)

Please Send any Enquiries or Invoice Requests To: gerald@4ibrecords.com

Cheers!

4iB Records

ARTISTS:
- CONSUMER ELECTRONICS
This will be a rare outing of the full band line-up, featuring Philip Best, Sarah Froelich, Gary Mundy (Ramleh/Broken Flag Records), and Anthony di Franco (Ramleh/Ethnic Acid/JfK).
This is violent electronic music. A writhing, wriggling, repugnant beast slithering forth in an amoral haze of sex and leather, extreme fetishes and fear. The stranger in the park your mother warned you about. No compassion, no remorse. A deafening torrent of feedback and high end squeals; scraping away at your brain, providing the soundtrack to your overwhelmed senses, your confusion, as stream-of-consciousness aggression rains down on your pretty little head. Co-opted by cunts. Always.
Come on, come clean.

- CONTENT NULLITY
Content Nullity is dead end power electronics.
At the absolute forefront of the new generation of dark, slow-burning, unforgiving, artists for whom integrity is everything.
Catharsis through scrap metal, entertainment through despair. Content Nullity leaves you drained, emotionless, dead behind the eyes. Nothing matters. Nullity is absolute.

- CEMENTIMENTAL
https://soundcloud.com/cementimental
Have you ever been on the internet? Then you know Tim Drage/Cementimental.
Over a decade of dedication to harsh noise absurdism has led to the “hardest working man in showbusiness” rightly staking his claim as the most recognisable face in the UK noise scene today.
I’d love to tell you what to expect on the night, but i’ve got no idea. Could be harsh noise, gabba, musique concrete, chiptune, circuit bent rough music, minimal, maximal… Whatever it is, it’ll be pure entertainment with the best hair this side of a L’oreal advert. You owe it to yourself to be there, because you’re worth it.

- JfK
JfK is one of the many solo projects of Anthony Di Franco (Ramleh/Ethnic Acid).
JfK’s sound relies on drum loops to create a pummeling, unrelenting, near-psychedelic, proto-industrial ‘groove’, before melting in and out of swamps of feedback, abrasion, static and noise to ensure you never get complacent or comfortable.
A much welcomed double LP re-issue/compilation of JfK’s late 80s work, ‘Teenage Fantasy 1987-88′, was jointly released last year on Harbinger Sound/Hospital Productions.

VENUE: THE GROSVENOR, STOCKWELL, 17 Sidney Rd, Stockwell, London SW9 0TP, United Kingdom

DATE: 25 May 2013
TICKETING: £8 (Advance), £10 (At The Door – Subject To Availability)
http://www.wegottickets.com/event/211156

More Info At:
https://www.facebook.com/events/623934960955207/
http://www.thegrosvenorsw9.co.uk/

OUT SOON IN JULY 2013

SUTCLIFFE JUGEND and JUNKO (非常階段/HIJOKAIDAN) - Sans Palatine Uvula CD (4iB 003):

TRACK LISTING
1. Mouth Ripping (Sample)
2. Throat Ripper
3. Mouth Leak
4. Mouth Slipping
5. Lip Splitter
6. Sans Larynx
7. Throat Leak
8. Throat Slipper
9. Sans Palatine (Sample)
10. Tongue Splitter

Details:
– Gatefold CD Cover (Paintings by Kevin Tomkins)
– Inner Cardboard CD Sleeve
– 8-Page Booklet (Containing Images & Japanese/English Text Translated by Yuko UNDER)
– Individually Numbered
– Limited Edition 500 Copies

PRICE (Including Airmail Shipping from Singapore): USD 20/€15

SUTCLIFFE JUGEND and JUNKO (非常階段/HIJOKAIDAN) - Sans Palatine Uvula

Sans Palatine Uvula showcases the amalgamation of 2 pioneering artists of their respective genres: Power Electronics and Japanoise, both whom have made their presence significantly felt (through sight and sound) ever since the early 1980s in England and Japan. Sutcliffe Jugend and Junko (from 非常階段/HIJOKAIDAN) are renowned artists in their own right, having been uniquely defined in the experimental noise scene as innovators of sound through their personal style of artistic expression that involves the churning of audio mayhem through guitars, electronics and vocals.

This album sees Sutcliffe Jugend taking a step beyond as they push the envelope of sound progression to greater heights. Junko‘s piercing screams and squeals serve as a canvas for Sutcliffe Jugend to work on and develop it further in their own innovative style. The results demonstrate a very unique reconstruction of the shriek queen’s original vocal outbursts, which see them being reworked and reinvented separately through manipulative treatments of cut-ups, distortions, samplings and introduction of other sonic elements.

This collaborative work between these two unique and respected artists of different genres from East and West encloses the listener with sonic chaos through its ten varied tracks. For some, it may seem like a difficult album to digest at the first listen. However, the tensions that have been separately produced from the harsh elements of voice and sound eventually subside as they resonate with each other, bringing forth a balanced unity of yin and yang.

Best Played Loud!

To Purchase, Please Go Here.

Please direct all enquiries to:

4iB Records
PO Box 206
Singapore 914007

email: gerald@4ibrecords.com
www.4ibrecords.com

ARTIST: SUTCLIFFE JUGEND
TITLE: Pursuit of Pleasure
CAT NO: 4iB LP/0811/001
FORMAT: LP in Gatefold Sleeve (Limited/Numbered 300 Copies in 2 Editions)
PRICE (Incl. Airmail Postage from Singapore): USD42.50 / €34 / £27
MORE INFO: Click Here
TO PURCHASE: Click Here

ARTIST: AUTOGEN
TITLE: Mutagen
CAT NO: 4iB CD/0712/002
FORMAT: Digipack CD in Slipcase (Limited/Numbered 500 Copies)
PRICE (Incl. Airmail Postage from Singapore): USD20 / €15 / £13
MORE INFO: Click Here
TO PURCHASE: Click Here

ARTIST: SUTCLIFFE JUGEND and JUNKO (非常階段/Hijokaidan)
TITLE: Sans Palatine Uvula
CAT NO: 4iB CD/0513/003
FORMAT: CD in Gatefold Sleeve + Booklet (Limited/Numbered 500 Copies)
PRICE (Incl. Airmail Postage from Singapore): USD20 / €15 / £13
MORE INFO: Click Here
TO PURCHASE: Click Here

More Information at: http://4ibrecords.com/2013/06/06/sutcliffe-jugend-and-junko-非常階段hijokaidan-sans-palatine-uvula-4ib-cd0513003-out-in-july-2013/

THE WHITEHOUSE FOUNDING MEMBER CHATS ABOUT GHANAIAN PERCUSSION, JAPANESE THEATRE AND A BERLIN POWER STATION

TL: You just came back from playing Berlin Atonal – how did it go?
WB: It was an unforgettable experience – the Kraftwerk venue is the disused heat power station in the East of the city and they’ve converted it into an enormous, incredible brutalist cathedral-like space with a huge laser-sharp sound system, and visuals and lights to match. It’s an absolutely fantastic place for seeing live music.

TL: What’s the plan for the Summerhall show – will there be any of the visuals from previous live shows (featuring African subtitles, voodoo and joujou inspired symbols, monochrome scribbles etc…)?
WB: Oh yes! Since that last time, lots of new stuff has been added and adapted to many of those original themes and best of all is the recent exciting transition to full colour.

TL: In your Whitehouse days, you once said you wanted to create, ‘a sound that could bludgeon an audience into submission’. When you first started Cut Hands what did you hope it would sound like?
WB: Until I began learning more about my collection of Ghanaian percussion instruments, I was never really sure how it would sound. Only that the Haitian musicians I’d seen were making some of the most mind-blowingly intense music I’d ever experienced, with almost none of the electronic technology that I felt that I’d become addicted to deploying.

TL: Last year’s Black Mamba was a very full-on, beautiful, polyrhythmic exploration of drums, ritualism, darkness and driving energy. How did it differ from your first Cut Hands record?
WB: The debut album Afro Noise I could probably be described as more eclectic in scope and certainly has more abrasive noise elements, probably because it was recorded over seven or eight years, some of which were during the Whitehouse years.

TL: What would you say were the themes influencing Black Mamba?
WB: It’s very hard to distil all those individual often complex themes, however in general terms it is to make things happen that you previously thought were impossible.

TL: Any plans for other releases coming up? As Cut Hands, or anything else?
WB: The new EP, ‘Madwoman’, on the Downwards label, just came out this week which is exciting, plus some music on new film soundtracks too including the just-released Kings Of Cannabisdocumentary.

TL: Besides your own record labels, which labels do you keep an eye on for interesting releases?
WB: It’s really a golden age in underground music at the moment. In addition to Blackest Ever Blackand Downwards, I also closely follow what comes out on Hospital Productions, Modern Love, Panand others.

TL: You seem like a tireless trawler of all kinds of musical styles to find new rhythms, artists etc – have you made any interesting discoveries lately?
WB: It’s true, I’m constantly lusting after potential new inspirations. Most of that comes from the voracious consumption of books and films however, rather than the musical domain. Currently I am wallowing in the brilliant treatises of Zeami Motokiyo, the Japanese 14th century Noh playwright. Despite never being an actor, I love finding ways to apply the principles of drama across to musical performance.

Summerhall, 8 Aug, 8pm, £8 (£7), with support from Stefan Blomeier and Claire.

More Info At: http://edinburghfestival.list.co.uk/event/355418-braw-gigs-presents-cut-hands-stefan-blomeier/

(Source: http://edinburghfestival.list.co.uk/article/53446-interview-william-bennett-aka-cut-hands/)

Whitehouse just could be the most extreme form of music ever created. They may be the most repellent as well. Regardless of whether or not you can stomach their brand of aural torture, they’ve maintained a unique form of purity that is unmatched in the world of pop sell-outs and media marketing rock ‘n’ roll whores. In fifteen years, and with that many releases under heir belt, Whitehouse have never even broached the edges of the commercially acceptable music business. Carving out a private niche for themselves, the band refuses to deviate from their trail blazed path of relentless, uncompromising deviant noise.

Beginning in 1980 as a phantasm in the mind of Essential Logic guitarist William Bennett, it wasn’t long before an electronic project called Come mutated into Whitehouse after a few singles. Fed up with New Wave and techno pop, William began to finally reach his goal of a veritable “electronic maelstrom” which would leave audiences either reveling in unbridled power or begging for mercy, depending on one’s predilections. Over the years Whitehouse has peripherally and directly involved an astounding number or underground luminaries, including Daniel Miller (The Normal), Kevin Tomkins (Sutcliffe Jugend, and now Body Choke), Philip Best (Consumer Electronics), Glen Wallis (Konstructivists), Stefan Jaworzyn (Skullflower), Jordi Valls (PTV, Vagina Dentata Organ), David Tibet (PTV, Current 93), Peter Sotos (of Pure magazine infamy, now publishing Parasite), and most recently, Jim Goodall (Medicine). On top of this cast of players, recent Whitehouse efforts have featured the production/engineering input of Steve Albini and the incredible artwork of Trevor Brown.

Since day one, rumors and innuendo have followed William and Whitehouse like the plague, and many of them are still bandied about over a decade later. In an effort to set the record straight, the following interview sheds light both on the band’s history as well as it’s controversies. In spite of an often frightening reputation, William Bennett is in reality a charming and personable fellow. Don’t let that fool you though, as the sheer determination and unswerving dedication of Whitehouse to their violent appetite, which remains unquenched after fifteen years, should warn beyond a doubt that they will not be denied in the end…

Michael Moynihan (MM): Daniel Miller, who founded Mute Records, was on some of your early releases, right?
William Bennett (WB): Yes. On the Come stuff, which was like the crossover, or the bridge between the two sounds [leading to Whitehouse]. He recorded things like The Normal and the Silicon Teens album in a little studio in London called IPS, and he kindly took me down there and did two or three sessions together, and he helped me mix it. I knew nothing about that sort of thing, and he also helped releasing it, as he’d just done The Normal single ["Warm Leatherette"] and he gave me contacts for distribution, where to get the sleeves done, the labels, and so on…

MM: What was the original idea behind Come Organization?
WB: It was essentially a record label for Whitehouse. I can’t really remember how the name came about, but the ‘organization’ part was inspired by a pornography company called “Private Organization”, which ironically is the one that publishes the magazine called Whitehouse. So there’s two things that got together a little bit there.

MM: And why did you choose the name for the band?
WB: It was just the idea that there was a pornographic magazine called Whitehouse, and then of course Mary Whitehouse, who I’m sure you’re familiar with, being the anti-pornography campaigner.

MM: Was that a coincidence that the porno mag had the same name as the censorship activist, or was it a deliberate effort of the publisher’s to rub salt in her wounds?
WB: That’s what I’m not sure of, I don’t know. But it seemed like a classic bit of irony, and I love things with two meanings or three meanings or more…

MM: Does Whitehouse, the magazine, still exist?
WB: I think so, but it’s a crap magazine-I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone!

MM: What fueled the ideas behind the Whitehouse releases at the outset?
WB: Bits and pieces. It didn’t really have much direction at the beginning I suppose. It was only later, with Erector. That was the first time when I thought there was a sense of direction.

MM: How did the obvious interest in the Marquis de Sade come about?
WB: Initially, that went back a long way, from about 1977, when I was at University in Glasgow, Scotland. I was very good friends with a guy called Alan, who’s now the guy from Postcard Records. At the time he wasn’t involved with music directly but he put out a punk fanzine called Chickenshit. The Marquis de Sade books were banned everywhere, but he had access to some special library where he could get a hold of a copy in French. He used to translate a couple of pages of it for each issue of his fanzine. And that’s where I was first familiar with it, and I really loved reading it. It was until a year or two later that I actually managed to get the Grove Press editions, and I’ve just been collecting his stuff ever since.

MM: Have you read it in the original language?
WB: Oh yeah, I do read the stuff in French. In fact, it’s much better in French. With the English, although they’re beautiful translations, there is a lot of embellishment to make it sound of the period [18th Century]. They use a very sort of floral language, whereas in the French it’s much more simplistic, and there’s a lot of humor that doesn’t seem to translate. I think they’re beautiful translations, but reading it in French makes for an entirely different experience. And he uses very simple sentences very effectively; it’s a very interesting style. The books certainly haven’t lost any of the power over the last two centuries. What people forget is how much black humor there is in it. They are serious books, but there’s a lot of black humor in there. Unfortunately they haven’t translated the [Sade] biography by J. J. Pauvert, three huge volumes that have come out in French. I don’t understand why they haven’t been translated into English, because they make all the other biographies totally obsolete, as almost works of fiction. He’s had access to all the letters from the Sade family’s mansion, chateaux, and some of the revelations in there are just extraordinary.

MM: Was there anything else that had impact on you like that of de Sade?
WB: Anything in that genre, things like Krafft-Ebbing, Venus in Furs, and I enjoy reading things like Naked Lunch-other books of that ilk.

MM: So whatever was explicit in one way or another.
WB: Yes. And then in the next year or two, having finished reading all that, I moved across to start reading more non-fiction books. I didn’t like any fiction after reading de Sade, it all seemed really tame. And then it was biographies of murderers and a lot of stuff on the two World Wars.

MM: True crime books must have been a lot harder to come by then, as opposed to the glut of them today.
WB: Yes, that’s right. It’s a big industry now. There was no such thing as a “true crime” section in a bookstore 15 years ago. Certainly not of contemporary true crime. The books about someone like Peter Kurten were very rare, but we just spent lots of time hunting around all the stores in London, hunting for the stuff, and you got lucky.

MM: Your interest in Nazi imagery was growing then as well.
WB: Yes. I read a lot of books about the concentration camps and biographies of people like Himmler, especially. It was an amazing period for that sort of thing, where there was seemingly a license for these guys to do almost what they pleased. And the imagery itself, the fetishistic implications of that as well…

MM: You didn’t hesitate then, to incorporate allusions to all these things in Whitehouse?
WB: No.

MM: You weren’t worried about what kind of reaction it might provoke?
WB: At the time there were already quite a lot of things put out which were pretty risqué, controversial. So I wasn’t frightened, I had the confidence to do just about anything, and I certainly don’t regret it now. But obviously it did cause an incredible amount of controversy. I find that a record like New Britain, for example-there’s no real political content in it at all, if you look at it carefully. It’s all imagery, really. There’s no real content to the imagery. It does appear very sinister, and Whitehouse has been more controversial than a lot of other groups, for the music as much as anything-being very harsh, electronic, and difficult music to listen to. But a lot of other groups have dabbled in that kind of imagery, like TG and Joy Division…

MM: Some the latter’s stuff is incredibly blatant…
WB: Yeah, I mean the very name itself! Death in June as well, but they’re rock bands so it doesn’t really matter so much. We got hammered a lot harder for two reasons: because the music was so harsh, and people didn’t really know where we were coming from-it wasn’t rock music- and secondly, we incorporated a lot of what could be called sexist imagery.

MM: You couldn’t arrive at a more unpopular combination of imagery for the liberal humanist types!
WB: Certainly, yeah, and especially with Rough Trade, who were responsible for a lot of our distribution at the time.

MM: Your distribution problems with Rough Trade were somewhat legendary.
WB: Well, they were being totally hypocritical about it. I still don’t think there’s anything wrong with that sort of imagery at all. But they banned the first Nurse With Wound album, some Stranglers records, and I think Blondie were even banned for awhile! They were very sensitive. The worst thing was, that while they’re in their rights to stop whatever records they want, of course, people would go into their shop in London and ask for Whitehouse records and they’d get a fifteen minute monologue over why they shouldn’t be looking for Whitehouse records! And that’s beyond reason…They should politely say, “No, sorry we don’t have anything.”

MM: Where was it that they drew the line? Was it a specific album that caused it, because originally they didn’t seem to have a problem.
WB: I know they disliked the Leibstandarte SS MB albums, and I don’t they appreciated the Für Ilse Koch compilation, but where they drew the line was actually the Right to Kill album. They literally picked up the box of records and threw it at me when I went down there. The legend is that I was wearing a Nazi uniform, which was totally untrue! The other anecdote with all this is that Doug P. from Death In June was working there at the time, and I wrote a letter to Geoff Travis [who ran Rough Trade], who I’d been good friends with since Essential Logic (who were a Rough Trade band), saying I think this is a bit hypocritical since you’re still distributing all the Death In June stuff. I wasn’t getting at Death In June-I was happy that they did distribute their stuff. I was just pointing out the injustice of it. But then because of that it started a feud with Doug P., as he thought I was trying to get them into trouble.

MM: Did a record like New Britain get any sort of reaction from extreme right wing types, or was it too obscure or bizarre for them to even notice?
WB: No, nothing really at all. Politically, there’s nothing there at all. I’ve no interest really in that sort of politics. And I certainly don’t think they would have any interest in that sort of music.

MM: Were there ever problems with anyone besides Rough Trade?
WB: They were the only problem. The records continued to be distributed, the thing with Rough Trade was more that they had taken a lot of them at that time, but we found other distributors. It didn’t really affect the sales, or the mail-order. I can’t really think of any letters that would come saying “This is wrong”…

MM: Weren’t there some similar difficulties in Germany on a recent tour?
WB: The second show we did was in Nuremberg, and for some obscure reason-I think it had more to do with Pure magazine than with anything else-something went out on the radio or there were some flyers distributed which threatened to cause trouble at the original venue, so they just changed the venue that night, and there was no trouble at all. There were like 150 people there, but it probably would have been a much bigger show at the original venue, ’cause that’s where all the promotion was for.

MM: How was the last US tour, which was the first one in many years?
WB: It went really well, from our point of view. Very diverse kinds of places. We tried making the songs sound like they are on record, for a change, and that worked really well.

MM: How does that compare with what you usually do?
WB: The songs used to sound very different live, I think, than they did in the studio-mostly because of the equipment that we used.

MM: Can you describe what’s used to create the live sound of Whitehouse?
WB: Last time we were in the States, which was a long time ago, we had the two Wasps [synthesizers] and the vocals, which were treated a little bit. But this time there was no treatment at all on the vocals and we used one Wasp and one tiny little Yamaha quasi-toy keyboard. And it worked really well, the sound was excellent-I think the best ever.

MM: Is it difficult to duplicate the studio sounds live?
WB: What we do is to put the Whitehouse sounds into the toy keyboard and then the Wasp is pretty easy to program. They are three basic sounds, which are modified occasionally.

MM: What are the songs you choose for performance?
WB: It’s quite a varied sort of set, actually. A couple of songs from the first album, and a new song that hasn’t been released, bits and pieces-all the classics really, a bit of everything. We finished most of the sets with “Shitfun”, which seemed to work very well.

MM: Looking at your tour itinerary here, I can’t help but wonder who would turn out to see Whitehouse in a place like Knoxville, Tennessee…
WB: Some real weirdos! There were about 35-40 people there, in quite a small club, but every one of them, I can guarantee, was 100% eccentric! But I’ve always felt that whether the audience is one or one thousand, it’s always interesting. There’s a different dynamic every time, so I’m not all that concerned about how many people are there.

MM: Did anyone show up who’d seen you on the last tour, ten years ago?
WB: Well, we played some cities where we hadn’t played before, but in the ones we had played two or three people came up afterward and said they’d seen us way back when. But it was weird because they seemed like really young people anyway-so you know, you start calculating… were they twelve when they saw the last show?!?

MM: That’s a scary thought.
WB: Yes!

MM: Philip Best, who played in the earlier incarnation of Whitehouse back in 1984, must have only been about fourteen years old then, correct?
WB: Yes. The first Whitehouse show he ever came to, which was, I think, Live Action 3 or 4, really early on, he had to run away from home! From a city about a hundred miles away!

MM: Were the shows fairly violent this time around?
WB: Yeah they were, some of them. In Chicago, for example, we did “Birthdeath Experience” which is a silent song-it’s just silence and us wandering around on the stage, inciting the audience in various ways. I couldn’t see very far out into the audience but I know from speaking to people afterwards, that three or four fights broke out. Exactly the same thing happened in London, when we did “Birthdeath Experience” for the first time. It seems to create a lot of tension in the crowd.

MM: But no one in the audience has tried to attack you on stage?
WB: Only once. It’s surprising with this sort of music, I mean I remember seeing the Birthday Party play live once and Nick Cave just seemed to be asking for trouble and he almost always got it-somebody would start hitting him or kicking him. I don’t know why-maybe the music’s more intimidating-but there’s never actually been direct violence towards us from the crowd, other than throwing objects. Except for once in Newcastle…

MM: Where the girl went berserk?
WB: Yeah, and that was because I severely provoked her anyway!

MM: Whitehouse disappeared for a number of years in the late 80′s-can you explain what caused this?
WB: It was a number of things. Logistically Whitehouse became very difficult. We did Great White Death, which came out really well, much better than I anticipated, but at the same time as that was recorded Kevin [Tomkins], who was a very important member of Whitehouse, moved back to the area where his parents lived. We’d just done a couple of shows in Spain, and I was sick of living in England, in London, at the time. And I thought, this is the place to live, I loved it so much. So I decided, more or less on the spot, to move there. A lot of other people were moving out of London as well, like Kevin, and David Tibet, Steve Stapleton got a house in Ireland. On top of that, after Great White Death, I felt we didn’t have a lot to say anymore, because that album seemed to encompass everything musically and otherwise.

MM: What did Spain have that England was lacking?
WB: It wasn’t a small-minded country, which Britain is. The people are very tolerant, especially because they’d just ten years before then moved from a dictatorship to a democracy. So things like drugs were virtually legal, pornography of every kind was suddenly available, and this is from a country that used to censor Elvis Presley songs. There was a great feeling of libertarianism-anything could be done as long as you didn’t spoil anyone else’s enjoyment-which is not like Britain at all.

MM: And you lived in the city there?
WB: Yes, in Barcelona for about three years. I loved the people, the climate, and lots of things, like drink was very cheap!

MM: Were you doing anything with Whitehouse during this period?
WB: Well I would have, but I just didn’t have any ideas left for songs. I just seemed like Great White Death said it all, and it was pointless doing re-hashes of that record. I would go back to London every six months for a couple of weeks, and meet people, so it wouldn’t have been difficult… But after about a year in Spain I just wound the Come Organisation down completely. And I didn’t think about it at all after that.

MM: And Kevin Tomkins stopped doing anything?
WB: Yeah, he got married apparently. I didn’t even have his phone number or anything, and he just disappeared.

MM: So the entire scene around Whitehouse died at that point.
WB: There was a big scene in London up to then, you know we’d do a show and whole crowds of people would show up. Another person who was involved, John Murphy, went back to Australia around then. There were a lot of people coming around to the shows at the time, like Crystal Belle [Steven Stapleton's wife], she was called Crystal Clitoris then, and would appear everywhere with her slaves…

MM: Did people like Glen Wallis or Jordi Valls, who were involved with Whitehouse but also played or worked with TG and PTV, receive a lot of flak, since Genesis was always insulting Whitehouse publicly at the time?
WB: No, I don’t think they did personally, I mean Jordi is a very flamboyant character, so Genesis wouldn’t have had any influence on him anyway, although they always continued to be really good friends. But I think in addition to what we’ve already said, there was a lot of petty jealousy. The fact that Jordi and Glen weren’t just working with Psychic TV, I think there was a lot of that involved as well…

MM: Did you move back to England before going to Thailand?
WB: No, I stayed in Spain for about six years and then went straight to Thailand.

MM: And what drew you there?
WB: It’s a weird place, because something like Playboy magazine is banned there, and yet-

MM: -you can buy six year olds on the corner!
WB: Right, to do anything or to look at anything in real time-you know, I’m referring to live sex shows and things. So you can’t look at it on the printed page, but you can participate in it. It’s a weird sort of inversion of the West, in that respect.

MM: Was this any inspiration to start doing the Whitehouse stuff again?
WB: That had already started about 1988, when I was still in Spain. It was actually after Tibet came for two or three days to stay with me in Barcelona and we went out for paella, the traditional Spanish meal, in a restaurant, and started talking about this idea for “Thank Your Lucky Stars”. Having that song gave me a fresh new outlook on writing. And then luckily Pete [Sotos] managed to arrange a weeks’ recording with Steve Albini. Pete and me had already written a few more things together, but it took a long long time to get the single out. Bit by bit then the other stuff came out.

MM: And what was the next incarnation?
WB: I met up with Stefan [Jaworzyn] again, who’d played live with us a few times back in 1984. We’d known him since ’83 though, he was another one of these people who hung out in London and came to all the shows.

MM: Was he in Skullflower at that time?
WB: More or less around that time I think he actually stopped playing with them. So we did Twice is Not Enough. That was also with Dave Kenny and Glen Michael Wallis. Dave Kenny was the guy from IPS studio, which I mentioned before, and he did Great White Death, but this was a different studio-he works at a posher place now.

MM: What’s going on with the record label now?
WB: As far as Susan Lawly is concerned, I’m pretty much in charge of that. I hate dealing with money, and with CD manufacturers, but it’s no problem, it’s just a bit of extra work.

MM: Will the out of print stuff be re-released?
WB: I don’t like re-issuing stuff, I’ve got a sort of phobia about it. To me it gives the impression that you’re cashing in on stuff. I feel it’s better to use the resources that one has for new projects, rather than spend money on re-releasing old things.

MM: Can you explain the genesis of the name Susan Lawly?
WB: It didn’t come from anywhere, it’s just that name of the record label that I came up with. A lot of people ask if she’s a mass-murderer or something, or a sadist that people don’t know about.

MM: Was it just some perversity on your part to use such a normal name?
WB: No, there’s no perverse reason but that’s all part of the fun of having the name that people assume there is a reason for it.

MM: Some of the songs on Twice is Not Enough seemed to be based on a gambling theme. I heard there was also a particular book that inspired some of that.
WB: The Diceman-it’s like a cult classic amongst people in England, although it’s by an American named Rheinhart. It’s a classic book. The blurb on the back is quite funny because he says, “All my decision making was by the throw of the dice”, and it’s written sort of semi-biographically-you don’t know how much is true or isn’t. So he’ll say, “Am I going to stay home and watch a video or am I going to go down and rape the girl who lives downstairs? If it’s a six I’ll go down and rape but if it’s a three I’ll stay here”… and he throws a six. It’s amazing stuff!

MM: Any other current obsessions?
WB: There are bits to glean from all over the place, as I’ve said it’s nothing in particular. Apart from the three books by Brett Easton Ellis-there’s a rich train of stuff in those. And then bits from films, porno movies-I’m always on the lookout for ideas, since they don’t come up when you want them to generally.

MM: Probably the most common complaint about Whitehouse is that it’s sexist. How do you justify the constant use of sexually violent subject matter?
WB: It’s simply what I’m interested in, and what I like I reading about and watching and participating in, to some extent. I wouldn’t do things that I wasn’t interested in. It’s just personal interest, obsessions, if you like. Really nothing is sacred, as far as I’m concerned. I wouldn’t not do anything. There’s no taboo that I wouldn’t be quite happy to break if I thought it would make for some good music.

MM: And despite all the controversy and disapproval, there has always been an audience for Whitehouse?
WB: Yes, it sells consistently well.

(Article first published in EsoTerra #5, Spring/Summer 1995)

(Source: http://www.esoterra.org/whouse.htm)

HARBINGER SOUND & RAMMEL CLUB PRESENT:

- CONSUMER ELECTRONICS
Since the demise of Whitehouse, Philip Best’s Consumer Electronics has become a wriggling sex machine, his frothing mania bursting forth over an electronic scree with a fervid tumescence that is frightening to behold.
It’s the first visit to Nottingham for almost a decade from this “dirty word specialist” so slip into something fancy and make a real night of it. On this occasion Consumer Electronics will be the duo of Sarah Froelich and Philip Best. Don’t expect a sympathetic ear.

Links:
https://www.facebook.com/groups/363987140332798/
http://www.myspace.com/dirtywordspecialist

- SLEAFORD MODS
Over skeletal beats the Mods unleash an airborne stream of anger so virulent it’d have the ebola virus cowering in the corner given half a chance. Upcoming LP, Austerity Dogs, on Harbinger Sound promises to be a stone classic already and deserves to be dropped on major population centres in the UK in much the same way as other explosive payloads.

Link:
https://soundcloud.com/sleafordmods

- CREMATION LILY
The paucity of Internet yak on this unit should give you a clue as to how rare a live outing this is. Limited communiques from his own Strange Rules label go straight to the dedicated and are highly-sought after by the desperate. Dark and fractured electronics.

Links:
http://www.strangerules.com/
http://strangerules.tumblr.com/

VENUE: THE CHAMELEON ARTS CAFE, Old Market Square Alleyway (Next to the Bell Inn, above Clinton Cards)

DATE: 9 March 2013
TIME START: 2000hrs
TICKETING: £5 Advance/£8 At The Door
(Advanced tickets available from 22 January via this link: http://www.wegottickets.com/event/205668)

More Info At:
http://www.rammelclub.org/
https://www.facebook.com/events/135093359987993/

I can’t tell you why you should listen to Whitehouse, or that you really necessarily should. I can only tell you about the profound effect listening to their records and seeing them live over the years had on me. Formed in 1980 and with 19 albums and 178 self-declared “live actions”, William Bennett’s group created some of the most fascinating and intriguing work to ever be associated with industrial culture, electronic music and avant-garde sound. I first heard them via their MP3.com page 14 years ago after a friend had given me a ridiculous description along the lines of “it’s like Suicide, but with a bloke in a trench coat calling you a cunt.” Whilst this ended up being misleading, it still didn’t stop me from tracking down as many of their CDs as possible, which at the time could only be bought in London from the old Sister Ray shop in Berwick Street or Camden’s goth bunker Resurrection Records.

Here’s a brief guide for the curious and unfamiliar, though without wanting to sound like a patronizing wanker, it is advisable not to take some of the themes and content in the work you read about below at face value. Extreme electronic music; please acquire with caution!

START HERE:
BIRD SEED (SUSAN LAWLY, 2003)

I’d say you could almost define WH albums by the decade they were released in. The ’80s was dominated by piercing microphone feedback and crude noise; the washy, almost “ambient” synth work of the predominantly Albini-engineered albums ’90s; and the albums in the ’00s which explored digital technology, acoustic hand percussion and more complex lyrical content. Bird Seed features their most accessible track, “Wriggle Like A Fucking Eel,” and sees the first explicit use of polyrhythmic drum patterns which WB has continued to develop with his Cut Hands project. It’s rhythmic without being beat-driven and is possibly the only WH track to deploy an almost verse/chorus/verse/chorus structure; it’s an unbelievable piece of music. Other highlights are the borderline disturbing and difficult “Philosophy,” the sharp “Why You Never Became A Dancer” and the brilliantly tense “Cut Hands Has the Solution.” The latter being like no other piece in the Whitehouse catalog, consisting of vocals and a single drum beat.

THEN TRY:
QUALITY TIME (SUSAN LAWLY, 1995)

“Nothing happened?

Nothing happened?

His shit’s in your mouth and you’re saying nothing’s happened?”

The ’90s was a strange decade for Whitehouse, but in my opinion these albums are terribly undervalued within the catalog. There’s a greater deal of restraint in the sound than most of the material from the ’80s, leading to a more threatening and bizarre atmosphere overall. Quality Time is the strangest of the lot though. The last album to be recorded with Steve Albini, it sounds a lot drier than the albums that preceded it and features WB’s oddest vocal performance sounding almost like a cross between a cockney fruit & veg seller and Zippy from Rainbow on the title track. The record is also notable for featuring a return to vocals from Philip Best on “Just Like a Cunt” (containing lyrics appropriated from Bob Dylan’s “Just Like a Woman”) and the track “Baby,” which in the context of the album opens the door for many questions, without giving a single answer as to what is going on behind the scenes.

FOR SERIOUS FANS ONLY:
DEDICATED TO PETER KURTEN (COME ORGANISATION, 1981)

“A man has been charged with a ripper murder…”

The idea of a Whitehouse record being “for serious fans only” is an amusing one, but if you made it this far and you’re still listening then I guess you obviously qualify. This is my favorite LP from the early brutal and crude ’80s period. The songs here are fairly short and sequenced in relatively quick succession giving it more of a “punk rock” feel compared with other records from this time like Birthdeath Experience and Total Sex. The sound here is incredibly heavy on the high end and aside from the odd water and TV sample consists of little more than white noise, distorted vocals and piercing microphone feedback.

(Source: http://www.self-titledmag.com/2014/02/18/helms-guide-to-whitehouse/)

‘Extreme’ music and graphic representation online 
Andrew Whelan
Faculty of Arts, University of Wollongong 
awhelan@uow.edu.au

Abstract
Previously obscure musical genres, traditionally mediated by tape trading, mail order and the like, become relatively public as they migrate into online environments.  The niche is now easily available in ‘pirated’ format: mp3 blogs post links to material which was previously only available on limited-run cassette or vinyl. Such material also circulates widely on peer-to-peer networks, and listeners can conveniently find each other and new bands through platforms such as Last.fm. One such genre is considered here: power electronics or ‘noise’. The textual and visual material around power electronics is presented as a limit case for considering the grounds upon which censorship operates in Australia.

Power electronics has a longstanding thematic preoccupation with transgressive content, and it addresses such issues from a complex and sometimes indeterminate position, ultimately leaving judgement with the listener. However, such material appears increasingly problematic where there is no grasp of the context of use, and no grasp of the often surprisingly nuanced approach taken by the artists and fans involved. Ambivalence is characteristic of the subtle orientations evident in power electronics, and this has in the past led to interpretive problems inside and outside of the subculture. Regardless of whether an argument can be made about the aesthetic merits of this genre, its increasing online visibility is inflected in the Australian context by a legal framework likely to criminalise it ‘on sight’. This is an imposition which obfuscates the meaning of the material, its social use, and most seriously, the broader societal context which gives rise to such material in the first place. 

1. Introduction
Check out the skinny white kids from Boston who ditched their Converge hoodies when someone told them about Whitehouse. Now they roll with that new “shocking” noise scene, which is pretty much an ongoing, transparently calculated ploy staged by quite ordinary MySpace nerds and J. Crew shoppers. Gratuitous screeching, noncontextual use of the word “faggot,” and songs about child rape will earn you a super-scary rep when you get banned from the local art gallery, but to the rest of us it’s as safe, boring, and dumb as any football game. See you in a few years for your folk-rock phase, brohams [1].

‘Extreme’ is a generic designator, applied positively by participants within a range of musical subcultures, and used as a marketing feature by music magazines such as Terrorizer (“extreme music – no boundaries”), Zero Tolerance (“extreme views on extreme music by extreme people”), and Pit (“the extreme music magazine”).

As one may assume, ‘extreme’ does not refer to contemporary state-funded opera, although that music may be considered extreme by many people unfamiliar with it. It does refer to entire artworlds, such as death metal, black metal, industrial music, power electronics, speedcore and other musical subcultures.

However, there is a continuum of extremity as it were, and access to online materials renders relatively public what had been obscure genres, mediated by a private, backstage set of practices engaged in by enthusiasts: tape trading and mail order and the like. Where the aforementioned magazines sometimes feature breathless reviews of the ‘unlistenable’, the previously niche is now easily available in ‘pirated’ format: numerous mp3 blogs post links to material which was previously only available on often extremely limited-run cassette or vinyl. Such material also circulates widely on peer-to-peer networks, and listeners can easily find each other, as well as further musical leads, through platforms such as Last.fm [2]. The very form of digital distribution, combined with such capacities as folksonomic tagging on Last.fm and other ‘Web 2.0’ sites, is such that rare and obscure releases now become much more accessible: initiates simply pursue the trail (by searching, for example, for all releases tagged with ‘noise’).

This has some consequences for a number of popular music subgenres which have thematic and stylistic preoccupations with, among other things, death, violence, and violent sex. Two such genres are ‘grind’ or ‘brutal death metal’, a metal subgenre, and an industrial subgenre: ‘noise’, or ‘power electronics’, the focus of this paper. Noise as a genre marker is a broad umbrella term, now incorporating a wide variety of styles, but for the purposes of this paper, discussion will be restricted to those bands and artists who routinely address transgressive themes.

Grind and noise differ in their stylistic approaches to signification, and this has some bearing on the interpretation of the material. And where metal in general has repeatedly been the subject of media concern and moral panic [3], industrial has generally avoided such attention, often deliberately. As William Bennet has said of Whitehouse, the band most frequently credited with the emergence of the genre:

(Source: http://ro.uow.edu.au/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2055&context=artspapers&sei-redir=1&referer=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com%2Furl%3Fsa%3Dt%26rct%3Dj%26q%3Dsutcliffe%2520jugend%2520pursuit%2520of%2520pleasure%26source%3Dweb%26cd%3D98%26ved%3D0CGMQFjAHOFo%26url%3Dhttp%253A%252F%252Fro.uow.edu.au%252Fcgi%252Fviewcontent.cgi%253Farticle%253D2055%2526context%253Dartspapers%26ei%3DnqsYU-7_MoaIiQee8oG4Bw%26usg%3DAFQjCNFk5cts4Nk9AUwlbnP4k50AGOkgOQ%26sig2%3Dw-c90LbMvX5qPwMkHi5C6Q#search=%22sutcliffe%20jugend%20pursuit%20pleasure%22)