HR035 - Viktimized Karcass — Flaming Desires — C90 — 1986
REVIEW by Jerry Kranitz
The Viktimized Karcass train keeps rolling with the Flaming Desires cassette album. The fun begins with ‘Butt Puss’, which comes roaring out of the starting gate in brain-shattered punk experimental alien invasion space chaos rock mode. Phasers are set to kill as the band embark on a cosmically free-wheeling jam that confuses, befuddles, and delights. The electronics and keys make an incredible racket as they simultaneously blast, crash, swirl and sear, led by a plodding bass lead, soloing guitar... it’s like an alien invasion on a factory while it’s in full production mode. Disturbing yet energizing, chaotic yet fun. Is Space-Noize-Rock-‘N’-Hed-Trip-Roll a genre?
Wow, that sucker tired me out. But the band show no quarter as the avant space-noise fun continues on ‘Advance’, an industrial-goth kosmiche rock ‘n’ sound exploratory dirge. Spaced out machine and engine room effects and noisy meandering rock create a lysergically surreal rocking vibe that’s like an atom smashing blend of Throbbing Gristle, Chrome, The Residents, and Hawkwind. This is sick stuff and anyone would be the better for giving it an attentive headphones listen.
The madness keeps right on rolling with ‘It’s Not Over’, but played to a punk-dub groove, with wacky electronics and a disjointed toy synth sounding melody plus zany effects. Actually, Side A has played like one long ever evolving jam. And, sure enough, I thought we were still on ‘It’s Not Over’ but the lyrics are for the next track, ‘Joke Smoke’. Which is all fine and dandy because the music just keeps morphing and transmutating nicely. I love the acid oscillating section that whirs insanely to the ‘Joke Smoke’ vocal rant, with dirty blazing noise waves, soloing guitar, an electro robotic rhythmic groove and slow, steady, underlying drone.
Wrapping up Side A is ‘Arabian Takeover #1’, which sounds like Shaman rock for the noise crowd. I love how the band create a noisy yet mesmerizing atmosphere with freaked out chanting, junk yard drones, bleeping electronics, and intensely noise cracked atmospherics. Side B opens with ‘Arabian Takeover #2’, which picks up right where Side A left off. The contrast between industrial punk Shaman and noisy space experimentation is bizarre and confounding. Then a kind of electro tabla groove kicks in and we’re deep in noisy psychedelic territory.
‘Cat’s Eyes’ is next and features a killer space bluesy noise-gliss-acid guitar and an array of edgy electronics that create an adventure into sound that is equal parts Space Ritual, power electronics, and black mass. Eventually it starts to ease up as slow synth and trippy slide/whiney guitar melodies tame the beasts, bringing the dirge to a peacefully intense finale.
VK take a stylistic turn on the dreamily cracked ‘Carpet Crawl’. It’s beautifully tuneful, with tasty guitar soloing and multiple varied keyboard/synth melodies. It’s raw and disjointed, yet seductive. LOTS going on! The appropriately titled ‘Cocktail Lounge Blues’ is another melodic song, though totally drugged and mournful. It’s like a space rock noise take on a Residents song. But WAIT... these are the lyrics to Grand Funk Railroad’s ‘Were An American Band’!! Words cannot describe how freakin, ummmm ... FREAKY this is! Brain fried and FUN!! Finally, ‘I Can’t Breathe (Lounge Version)’, is yet another noisy yet dreamily melodic tune. Call it dream-core for noise crooners. Whatever lounge they’re in, I want a table in a dark corner with a scotch on the rocks.
One thing I’m figuring out about Viktimized Karcass as we progress from one cassette album to the next... they will defy any expectations I might have.
INTERVIEW with Chris Phinney by Kranitz
Jerry Kranitz (JK): I had described the previous cassette album, Death’s Deal, as very different from the previous Viktimized Karcass albums, and the best to date, and then Flaming Desires was yet another different set. Each album was different recording sessions, right?
Chris Phinney (CP): Oh yeah, definitely. We were smoking a little more herb. That’s what Flaming Desires basically refers to. The front cover has a bud on it. Weed on the cover.
JK: I love the second song, ‘Advance’. I make Throbbing Gristle, Chrome, The Residents, and Hawkwind analogies.
CP: I remember we had the tape rolling. And we just kept jumping into the next tune. ‘Sheriff Joe’ on the Death’s Deal tape is the beginning of where we started using a lot of improv. Mostly everything was improv from there on out. You won’t hear any earlier songs redone, except for ‘Time To Kill’.
JK: It’s interesting to hear that this was mostly improvised because at this point you guys have really come together as a band. It’s crazy… but it flows really nicely.
CP: Either I would start a key riff, or Richard would start a key riff, or maybe Mike would start a bass riff, or Roger would start with guitar, and then we’d jump right into it. Somebody would always start a riff and then we would delve into that riff and gel it all together and make it a song.
JK: One that I liked a lot that was different… wrapping up Side A and starting Side B is ‘Arabian Takeover’ #1 and #2. I described it as being like Shaman rock for the noise crowd.
CP: I found these tapes in the closet of a house I was painting somewhere. They were religious tapes from Jordan and we snuck some of them in on that.
JK: You mean from the Middle Eastern country Jordan?
CP: Yeah.
JK: And then I hear what I described as an electro tabla groove. Some rhythm that sounds like tablas.
CP: They were bongos with a bunch of effects. A set of bongos played with two pieces of metal. Little metal sticks that were about 8” long. I had made them in metal shop in college.
JK: Another highlight is ‘Cat’s Eyes’, which I described as “space bluesy noise-gliss-acid guitar”. More great guitar from Roger, and what I described as “trippy slide/whiney guitar melodies”. Great guitar on this song.
CP: More improv. We were must jamming man. Of course we didn’t have a drummer. It was all drum programs.
JK: I got a kick out of the song title ‘I Can’t Breathe’, where you put in parentheses ‘(Lounge Version)’.
CP: We just added that as a joke. A jokey lounge Frank Sinatra type version with Richard singing “I Can’t Breathe” and we all played real slow.
JK: Well I described it as “yet another noisy yet dreamily melodic tune. Call it dream-core for noise crooners. Whatever lounge they’re in, I want a table in a dark corner with a scotch on the rocks.”
CP: Right. The lounge version was a tribute to Frank Sinatra.
JK: And you’ve got ‘Cocktail Lounge Blues’. I’m listening to this song and all of a sudden I realize the lyrics are to Grand Funk Railroad’s ‘Were An American Band’. That was hysterical.
CP: Yeah (laughs). Richard was singing that one too. He just decided to sing ‘We’re An American Band’ while we were playing.
JK: I finish the album review by saying “One thing I’m figuring out about VK as I progress from one cassette album to the next... they will defy any expectations I might have.”
CP: Everything ended up different. We learned to play our instruments better and started to get our style. Karcass changed every time because it was improv. So there was no telling what we were going to do. We’d set up our gear, start rocking and see what happens.
The Viktimized Karcass train keeps rolling with the Flaming Desires cassette album. The fun begins with ‘Butt Puss’, which comes roaring out of the starting gate in brain-shattered punk experimental alien invasion space chaos rock mode. Phasers are set to kill as the band embark on a cosmically free-wheeling jam that confuses, befuddles, and delights. The electronics and keys make an incredible racket as they simultaneously blast, crash, swirl and sear, led by a plodding bass lead, soloing guitar... it’s like an alien invasion on a factory while it’s in full production mode. Disturbing yet energizing, chaotic yet fun. Is Space-Noize-Rock-‘N’-Hed-Trip-Roll a genre?
Wow, that sucker tired me out. But the band show no quarter as the avant space-noise fun continues on ‘Advance’, an industrial-goth kosmiche rock ‘n’ sound exploratory dirge. Spaced out machine and engine room effects and noisy meandering rock create a lysergically surreal rocking vibe that’s like an atom smashing blend of Throbbing Gristle, Chrome, The Residents, and Hawkwind. This is sick stuff and anyone would be the better for giving it an attentive headphones listen.
The madness keeps right on rolling with ‘It’s Not Over’, but played to a punk-dub groove, with wacky electronics and a disjointed toy synth sounding melody plus zany effects. Actually, Side A has played like one long ever evolving jam. And, sure enough, I thought we were still on ‘It’s Not Over’ but the lyrics are for the next track, ‘Joke Smoke’. Which is all fine and dandy because the music just keeps morphing and transmutating nicely. I love the acid oscillating section that whirs insanely to the ‘Joke Smoke’ vocal rant, with dirty blazing noise waves, soloing guitar, an electro robotic rhythmic groove and slow, steady, underlying drone.
Wrapping up Side A is ‘Arabian Takeover #1’, which sounds like Shaman rock for the noise crowd. I love how the band create a noisy yet mesmerizing atmosphere with freaked out chanting, junk yard drones, bleeping electronics, and intensely noise cracked atmospherics. Side B opens with ‘Arabian Takeover #2’, which picks up right where Side A left off. The contrast between industrial punk Shaman and noisy space experimentation is bizarre and confounding. Then a kind of electro tabla groove kicks in and we’re deep in noisy psychedelic territory.
‘Cat’s Eyes’ is next and features a killer space bluesy noise-gliss-acid guitar and an array of edgy electronics that create an adventure into sound that is equal parts Space Ritual, power electronics, and black mass. Eventually it starts to ease up as slow synth and trippy slide/whiney guitar melodies tame the beasts, bringing the dirge to a peacefully intense finale.
VK take a stylistic turn on the dreamily cracked ‘Carpet Crawl’. It’s beautifully tuneful, with tasty guitar soloing and multiple varied keyboard/synth melodies. It’s raw and disjointed, yet seductive. LOTS going on! The appropriately titled ‘Cocktail Lounge Blues’ is another melodic song, though totally drugged and mournful. It’s like a space rock noise take on a Residents song. But WAIT... these are the lyrics to Grand Funk Railroad’s ‘Were An American Band’!! Words cannot describe how freakin, ummmm ... FREAKY this is! Brain fried and FUN!! Finally, ‘I Can’t Breathe (Lounge Version)’, is yet another noisy yet dreamily melodic tune. Call it dream-core for noise crooners. Whatever lounge they’re in, I want a table in a dark corner with a scotch on the rocks.
One thing I’m figuring out about Viktimized Karcass as we progress from one cassette album to the next... they will defy any expectations I might have.
INTERVIEW with Chris Phinney by Kranitz
Jerry Kranitz (JK): I had described the previous cassette album, Death’s Deal, as very different from the previous Viktimized Karcass albums, and the best to date, and then Flaming Desires was yet another different set. Each album was different recording sessions, right?
Chris Phinney (CP): Oh yeah, definitely. We were smoking a little more herb. That’s what Flaming Desires basically refers to. The front cover has a bud on it. Weed on the cover.
JK: I love the second song, ‘Advance’. I make Throbbing Gristle, Chrome, The Residents, and Hawkwind analogies.
CP: I remember we had the tape rolling. And we just kept jumping into the next tune. ‘Sheriff Joe’ on the Death’s Deal tape is the beginning of where we started using a lot of improv. Mostly everything was improv from there on out. You won’t hear any earlier songs redone, except for ‘Time To Kill’.
JK: It’s interesting to hear that this was mostly improvised because at this point you guys have really come together as a band. It’s crazy… but it flows really nicely.
CP: Either I would start a key riff, or Richard would start a key riff, or maybe Mike would start a bass riff, or Roger would start with guitar, and then we’d jump right into it. Somebody would always start a riff and then we would delve into that riff and gel it all together and make it a song.
JK: One that I liked a lot that was different… wrapping up Side A and starting Side B is ‘Arabian Takeover’ #1 and #2. I described it as being like Shaman rock for the noise crowd.
CP: I found these tapes in the closet of a house I was painting somewhere. They were religious tapes from Jordan and we snuck some of them in on that.
JK: You mean from the Middle Eastern country Jordan?
CP: Yeah.
JK: And then I hear what I described as an electro tabla groove. Some rhythm that sounds like tablas.
CP: They were bongos with a bunch of effects. A set of bongos played with two pieces of metal. Little metal sticks that were about 8” long. I had made them in metal shop in college.
JK: Another highlight is ‘Cat’s Eyes’, which I described as “space bluesy noise-gliss-acid guitar”. More great guitar from Roger, and what I described as “trippy slide/whiney guitar melodies”. Great guitar on this song.
CP: More improv. We were must jamming man. Of course we didn’t have a drummer. It was all drum programs.
JK: I got a kick out of the song title ‘I Can’t Breathe’, where you put in parentheses ‘(Lounge Version)’.
CP: We just added that as a joke. A jokey lounge Frank Sinatra type version with Richard singing “I Can’t Breathe” and we all played real slow.
JK: Well I described it as “yet another noisy yet dreamily melodic tune. Call it dream-core for noise crooners. Whatever lounge they’re in, I want a table in a dark corner with a scotch on the rocks.”
CP: Right. The lounge version was a tribute to Frank Sinatra.
JK: And you’ve got ‘Cocktail Lounge Blues’. I’m listening to this song and all of a sudden I realize the lyrics are to Grand Funk Railroad’s ‘Were An American Band’. That was hysterical.
CP: Yeah (laughs). Richard was singing that one too. He just decided to sing ‘We’re An American Band’ while we were playing.
JK: I finish the album review by saying “One thing I’m figuring out about VK as I progress from one cassette album to the next... they will defy any expectations I might have.”
CP: Everything ended up different. We learned to play our instruments better and started to get our style. Karcass changed every time because it was improv. So there was no telling what we were going to do. We’d set up our gear, start rocking and see what happens.