Hardcore punk from Finland was one of the most intense music forms around in the early to mid 1980’s. I can only surmise that some of the reason for this was the way of life in the Arctic Circle was infinitely harder (and colder) than the life punk cousins in the U.K. or U.S ever had to bear. H.H.C. excepted! Witnessed from the few punk bands I know who have travelled to this area, bringing stories back with them, of hordes of hard drinking punks (cheap spirits not cider) marauding the halls with an aggressive edge, it could not have been too pleasant to perform in those venues for those bands. Still these stories could be just unlucky nights, or mass generalisations. Anyhow, Rattus, Killed By Death and Kaaos had all been formed and existed in the harsh Finnish environment, as had KTMK. The debut LP by KTMK from 1985 has some great material on it, more in line musically (surprisingly enough) with The Ex or The Fall, than Discharge, the band that the other Finnish bands favoured as musical role models to their sound. The band was formed in Oulu at the start of 1984 and lasted until March 1986. The band only performed about 20 gigs during this time and had this LP released on Barabbas Records, and shortly after in 1986 a 12″ released on Fuck Records. Had some tracks on various compilation LP’s and tapes also.
Peoples Safety Music Commission is what the band’s name means in the English language incidentally. Question: Did a member of Disorder move permanently to Finland or was that an urban myth?
Jon Ward
March 10, 2008 at 7:35 amTaff from Disorder moved to Norway in the 80’s – hence Live in Oslo CD
Nic
March 10, 2008 at 9:46 amYes, he did: I made a purchase of some chemicals from him there back in 1994 (along with some members of Elastica)…
Finnish Thrash: total doss…
chris
March 10, 2008 at 12:41 pmNic, think you missed out the ‘r’ on ‘doss’ 😉 arf arf
chris
March 10, 2008 at 12:41 pm‘dRoss’ more like 😉 arf arf
chris
March 10, 2008 at 12:43 pmerrr. delete. having some probs with postings today.
Nic
March 10, 2008 at 12:52 pmChris – that joke wasn’t worth posting once, let alone twice…
🙂
chris
March 10, 2008 at 1:53 pmno, it wasn’t.
actually, i like the cover of that above LP and it sounds interesting so will check it out tonight.
i really could NEVER get my head round the appeal of ‘thrash’ (in all its myriad genres) though. it just all seemed very ‘speed for speed’s sake’ and i’ve always found speed to be (with the exceptions of Discharge & Rusimentary Peni and a few others) something that completely emasculates the power and intensity in music. it just leaves me totally cold in the same way anaemic euro-trance does. I genuinely don’t know why as a large percentage of the music i like and listen to, from ligeti to merzbow, is completely a-melodic.
Nic
March 10, 2008 at 2:37 pmVelocity is certainly a key element of Thrash (just as it was a key element of interrogation in much of the artwork of the first half of the C20, such as that of the Futurists), but not the only element: to diminish its content to ‘speed for speeds sake’ is understandable, but perhaps erroneous…
Thrash may also be seen to contain and explore many other elements such as approaches to minimalism, reduction and distillation to essence, and a focus on the physical presence and effect of sound…
Of course, much of this is completely outside of the conscious actions of the creators of the sounds, but that doesn’t in any way diminish the fact that these elements are there…
Velocity can act to dissolve the traditional song structure and to make a composed piece aspire twoards the condition of ‘pure sound’: among other effects, it can ‘flatten out’ the musical content to enter a mode which creates echoes of the laminar flow of sound one experiences from the music of artists such as Merzbow or AMM…
On another level, the emphasis on the physical qualities of sound could be seen to draw parallels with the use of volume in the work of La Monte Young or Phill Niblock…
For me, thrash is energising, uplifting, a representation of – and aspiration towards – abandonment, and ultimately cathartic…
Like all the arts, it is more than the sum of its parts: it has deeper resonances and interweaves with many other forms of expression…
I suppose we all have very different ears: for example, I can’t imagine how anyone could possibly ever want to listen to any of the music made by New Order…
🙂
chris
March 10, 2008 at 4:30 pm“Of course, much of this is completely outside of the conscious actions of the creators of the sounds, but that doesn’t in any way diminish the fact that these elements are there…”
hmmm, i doubt Derrida had ‘Anal Cunt’s hoover in mind when he developed that theory 😉
will get back to this later…
Chris
March 10, 2008 at 8:02 pmWTF??? has someone hacked in and changed my posts? that said (Anal Cunt’s) OUVRE not bloody ‘hoover’ !!!!!