While publicly proclaiming my love of kaiju metal a few months ago, I did severe damage to my credibility by forgetting that Justin Broadrick is not the only one who has fallen under the sway of Godzilla's benevolent lepidotera companion. Canadian power violencers The Endless Blockade have also sung the praises of the peaceful spirit of the Earth. While I prefer Battra, the spirit of the Earth's rage, I've got to admit these are a pair of pretty sweet songs.
Like a lot of guys my age whose childhoods revolved around dreary nowhere Midwestern towns, my formative Saturday afternoons often consisted of marathon sessions of Japanese dudes in rubber monster suits whaling on each other. Kaiju eiga were a staple of my childhood, and I've been binging on them lately after a good decade away. Watching the original,uncut Gojira (sans a drunken, condescending Raymond Burr) and Rodan (which is essentially a doom lovers' story), I was struck by just how grim, how metal those movies really were in context. The subtext was probably lost on me at 10, but, like me, plenty of heavy musicians have drawn inspiration from what, on the surface, were pretty ridiculous seeming popcorn flicks. If you'll allow me to step away from grind and hardcore for a moment, I want to pay tribute to four monstrous sounding bands who also have a fondness for the King of All Monsters. It's like Kaiju Big Mettal.
Starting with the very first generation raised on rubber monsters, proto-metallers goofs Blue Oyster Cult went straight for the best of the beasts with "Godzilla."
When they weren't being all dour and gloomy and bummed out by Birmingham, industrial titans Godflesh sang the praises of peaceful lady creature "Mothra." Look for her to be stamped on tramps everywhere.
Whales in space would make for a great kaiju flick on its own, but French metallions Gojira prove their titanic monster bonafides by going straight to the source, swiping their name from a more correct anglicazation of our beloved Godzilla.
I'm just gonna straight to Wikipedia for this one because I can't make it sound more metal: "Gigan is a cybernetic monster sporting a buzzsaw weapon in its frontal abdominal region and large metallic hooks for hands. Gigan is considered Godzilla's most brutal and violent opponent, alongside Destroyah, both of which were easily able to severely injure Godzilla. Gigan was also the first monster in the Toho sci-fi series to cause Godzilla to visibly bleed."
Comparative Anatomy Mammalian Mind Flare Media Just when you thought Hatebeak and Caninus were enough to get PETA’s fair trade, animal product-free panties all bunched, Virginia’s Comparative Anatomy stitch together an entire album of experimental electronics from the tortured bleats of defenseless animals and abused machinery. Fair warning off the top: this is not grindcore. Instead, Comparative Anatomy wield a pastiche of funk bass, industrial drum machining and audio loops into a sometimes coherent ruckus all while sporting animal costumes that would make Attack of the Mad Axeman blush from shame. Largely instrumental, the two manimal band lets the animal noises stand in the stead of vocals on songs that are looping and slowly mutating with repetition. It’s like listening to Swans’ Soundtracks for the Blind as remixed by an autistic kid with a Fisher Price See ‘n Say. Each song gets its own animal avatar guiding development of the noise. “Peter Rabbit the Great’s Carrot Phalanx” rings with martial horns, sending up military engagement in the tradition of the Marx Brothers’ Duck Soup. “Puppy Hatred” blends ’50s crooning with Red Harvest industrial glower in an intentionally jarring juxtaposition. Among the most involved and layered songs, “Swarm of Camels” manages to stitch together samples of Indian vocals and melodies, funk bass, industrial beats and cell phone ringtones into something that stops just short of unified.
When things don’t jell, like the screeching, monotonous “A Car Full of Seals in the Mall on the Day After Thanksgiving,” Comparative Anatomy begins to look less serious about their craft. And that’s the crux. A lot of the compositions tend to be clever and can engage on an intellectual level, but I’m not getting any kind of visceral or emotional jolt from the songs. I’m left wondering how much further Comparative Anatomy can take a concept many (most?) people will write off as a one-note joke.
[Full disclosure: MindFlare sent me a review copy.]
