Impetigo's Faceless -- Naked and Sweating and Ready to Be Beat

Monday morning.  Facing another week of mind-numbing work, I needed something to get me up and running.  Cocaine was out of the question, so I put on the 1991 Impetigo release, Faceless, on Wild Rags Records.

Grindcore from Illinois seems as unlikely as political hip hop from Cheyenne, but here it is.  Four listed songs plus one "hidden" track, Impetigo delves up some serious horror on this slab grey vinyl.  "Mortado," "Dis-Organ-Ized," "Bloody Pit of Horror," "Sinister Urge" and "Faceless" are all good songs.  They aren't pleasant, but when you find yourself dreading the upcoming day it is sure a lot healthier than, say, any number of things.

"Naked and sweating/Let the beatings begin."  That's a line from "Bloody Pit of Horror."  It sums up the e.p. quite well.  The audience that is looking forward with masturbatory glee to Smash is the same audience that would be appalled by "Mortado crucified/Skewered to a tree" in "Mortado."  That suits me just fine.  This release isn't for them.  It's for the people who understand why someone would go "hunt humans."

In the end, Impetigo's Faceless is less a blueprint for murder and more an adaptation of an EC comic book.  Its over-the-top violence is cathartic in a purely anti-social way.  It never got play on mainstream radio stations, and it was never "acceptable."  The world needs things like that, a lawn mower to the flowers, a piece of glass to lobotomized eyes.  It makes Mondays safe for everyone.

What did you listen to?

Mandatory FTC Disclaimer: I bought this, bitches.

Uncontrollable Urge

Catasexual Urge Motivation (CUM, if you can't figure it out on your own) is not an easy band to swallow. Pun intended, though I'm sure it goes down good for you. This Japanese grindcore band has song titles meant to offend, uses images meant to sicken, and destroys stereo speakers seemingly on purpose whenever a release is played too loud.

Yeah, I like it.

There is something therapeutic about grindcore. It's primal, yet there is a precision to it that screams "industrial age." It is unpleasant at best to untrained ears, but that savagery is what makes it appealing on a purely base level. It's not something you blare from your car stereo. It's something you pump out in your room when you are creating art or injecting drugs.

The genre is easily dismissed by just about every "serious" music journalist. Those are the same guys who constantly sing the praises of Springsteen, Dylan and Green Day. In other words -- they will never get it. Grindcore, as a musical genre, is meant for an elite few. And to stand out in it, like CUM does, is not only a badge of honor, it is praise of the highest degree.

I can't listen to CUM every day. I have to be in the right mood. The kind of mood that says "the next person who fucks with me gets scissors plunged two inches deep into their right eye." It's the same kind of mood Ricky Martin fans often find themselves in.

I've sung the praises of this band before, but today I had a tough day at work, as per usual. Lots of misery. I put the band on when I came home, played it loud enough to vibrate the table, and wrote. I couldn't have asked for a better soundtrack.

Thank you, CUM. You have achieved greatness in my eyes. The rest of the world can burn.