An announcement re: death beast
posted on 17 Sep 2005 under category News
Who knows how some of these things start?
What sounds like a great idea at night can sound so fucking stupid the next morning that you wonder how on earth you could possibly have thought it was smart at all. Sure, you have REASONS, but are they IMPORTANT? I mean REALLY Important? I could list all the reasons why I faked having Rampage be a live band - to be taken more seriously; to not get lumped in with the ‘talentless hack makes one man band’ category; as homage to Bathory; to have something taken on its own merits instead of ‘oh, that’s so-and-so’s band…’; as performance art - both for humor and to criticize those who lie about their own band histories (“Yeah, we formed back when we first heard Bathory in 1986 but only recorded last year because…”); and, quite honestly, just to see if I could get away with it. And if so how far.
Well, I did get pretty far, until I started admitting it - I was too clever and just had to tell everyone about it, thus making the “Rampage = Vic” thing the worst-kept secret in the underground. But at least when I saw it was silly I came clean and admitted it.
But, like the boy who cried wolf, people continue to speculate. Even though I tell the truth and only the truth now, people STILL think wacky shit like that I’m also the guy behind most of the other bands on UHR (Gomorrah, Festering Sore, Cross Sodomy, etc. etc. etc. - they know Toby’s behind Eyes of Ligeia, at least…) or whatever. I’ve found that the truth is wackier than whatever kind of shit people imagine about me.
Which makes coming clean this time a bit dangerous, since either people won’t believe it or they will and will AGAIN speculate about all kinds of other shit. Still, I’ve examined my reasons for this and I think the truth is better out. Okay, here it is:
I really am in Death Beast.
Now, before you grab the tar, feathers, and pitchforks, let me explain.
Dementor and I really cooked up the idea of doing a two-man band project of old-school thrash called “Death Beast” back in 2001, when we were putting together the New World Blasphemy split. We put some songs together, and I did have the idea to try to perhaps get other musicians involved. But right about the time we had enough songs for a demo done that I intended to give to Black Goat of Barbarian Wrath, he emails me out of the blue (almost) and asks me to run Barbarian Wrath Vinland for him. We managed to meet up on AIM and on the same day he asked me to run BWV I told him that I had a demo I wanted him to hear - and when he heard the Death Beast tracks he flipped - he loved it.
But, we were both worried about appearances of nepotism.
Now, anyone who knows BG knows that such things are beneath him - he has no qualms about slamming music even of friends (and that’s a big reason why he never even wanted to touch Rampage back in the days when I still did vocals), and I’m not the type to try to exploit something like this into a quid-pro-quo situation. I was honestly seeking him out before he asked me about BWV, he didn’t know about Death Beast when he asked me about BWV, and it was sheer coincidence that I took BWV and he signed Death Beast on the same day.
Still, we both knew what petty shits the underground is infested with. So we cooked up the idea of pseudonyms. Since it was a different band from Rampage, I thought that would be a good way to reinforce the difference between the bands as well, since Death Beast was NOT just Rampage with another singer. Also, people wouldn’t think he just signed us because I work for him.
The catch was that I’d been posting Death Beast news on Usenet for months so everyone KNEW I was in it.
Well, the fiction we cooked up to combat that ended up nearly being reality; between my own band, UHR, and runnning BWV, I had less time for other bands and was forced to bow out of Death Beast. This was plausible since I was halfheartedly looking for other musicians anyway - and had in fact by that time met The Axecutioner. Actually, ‘The Axecutioner’ was going to be me when Dementor and I had to come up with pseudonyms, but I found Alex and we got signed so close together I just let him take the name. But I digress.
So, the ‘official’ story was that we were putting together the band, but I had to quit but I still stayed somewhat affiliated by doing session bass on the album and doing the production (it is, after all, my studio…). The reality is that Dementor, Axe, and I just kept chugging, we found Black Tormentor as a drummer, and we tried out a shitload of suck-ass bassists. And one guitarist. That guy was such a disaster I said I’d still do guitar as well as bass, but we’d only credit me with bass. Fortunately he was a good singer - but we didn’t ask him back to try the vocals out until after we unsuccessfully tried to get Ramrod into the band on vocals (under the moniker “Juggernaut”). So that’s how we met Notorius Butcherus.
Then time took over, BWV got to be more work, work got to be more work, and I had a kid. Which is why it took us like three years to get this shit done. So long, in fact, that BWV ended in the meantime - which pretty much removed the only obstacle that justified this elaborate fiction anyway.
And, the truth of it is, I doubt that people wouldn’t think it was me on the album just from listening anyway. Plus, honestly, I like the songs so much that I WANT to be able to publicly take credit for them.
So, there it is - the bald truth - I’m in Death Beast, just one of four, and I did a good bit of writing and such.
And, wouldn’t you know it, a label has actually signed and is going to release something that *I* did. Just my luck it wasn’t Rampage - but I’m no less proud about Death Beast.
And whatever else I come up with in the future I can assure you I WON’T be making shit up about. Nobody would believe it anyway, and the reality of it would probably be even wackier than anything I could dream up.
(And, as anyone know knows me and follows me knows already, my already-shaky connection with the truth when it comes to bands and band members knows that a lot of the above isn’t exactly truthful either. I could say it was just elaborate performance art, or was a distraction a’la Quorthon to try to just throw out so much bullshit that people give up trying to figure it out and just listen to the music.
The truth is a combination of wanting to appear as more than just one person, as well as wanting to avoid appearances of nepotism - after all, I ran BWV for a few years and even after BWV closed and converted to the ADR webstore I was still the official North American BW distributor. Both Opyros and I know he didn’t sign me as a favor, but I thought it best to avoid appearances. However, this album turned out so well I really wanted to claim credit for it, hence this pseudonymous historical surgery.)