Time to bastardize
The genesis
Think the mid-90’s. Not just different times, a different civilization. No internet, no email, no social medias, no smartphones. Only fax and handwritten letters. Knut came together early 1994 in the Swiss city of Geneva. The sum of four individuals with diverse musical backgrounds. A drummer (me, Roderic) who grew up listening to prog and classic rock, Genesis, Rush, Yes, Pink Floyd, ELO, The Police, later converted to noiserock, punk/hardcore and extreme metal. Two knob-twiddling nerds with a strong inclination towards industrial, power electronics and radical sounds ranging from Coil to Swans, Neurosis and Today is the Day, from Throbbing Gristle, Whitehouse and Merzbow to Skullflower and Zeni Geva. One of them (Thierry) was a gifted bassist and a recording engineer who would later open his own studio. The other one (Didier), though asthmatic, possessed a hoarse and powerful howl, hence took over the mic. Also an audio enthusiast, he happened to be an avid reader, owner of an amazing book collection with everything from survival guides to Jungian theory, cyberpunk/dystopian literature, piles of Tape Op Magazine, Maximum Rock’n’Roll and underground comic books. The fourth man (Philippe) was a long-haired guitarist who studied art while headbanging to thrash and hardcore. We connected on the Melvins, Godflesh, and fucked-up stuff like Eisenvater (Einstürzende Neubauten meets death metal, if you’ve never heard those crazy Germans, go check out their third and best album.)
The first fruits
Our first attempt was a 7 inch recorded sometimes in 1994 down in a basement on a half-inch 8 track Tascam recorder, 200 copies on wax, hand-numbered and passed to bunch of friends, or sold at shows in local squats. Friends were supportive, a scene was taking shape. Hardcore, punk, metal, noise, industrial, improv, we absorbed it all. Could we do an album next? There was no label around that we could relate to, so we did our own. Didier started Snuff Records around 1996 with a couple of friends, out of a common reverence for Dischord, Touch & Go, AmRep, Alternative Tentacles, Sub Pop, Skingraft, informed by Steve Albini’s essay «The Problem with Music» (still relevant to this day), the whole DIY culture and way of handling business. They wrote a letter to Jello Biafra for his advice, he kindly replied something like «go for it, do it your way and never compromise.»
Everything set in motion. Leftovers came out early 1997 with seven tracks and just over half an hour of music, a sound as yet undefined. Self-recorded in a squat’s basement, released through Snuff, gaining our first reviews and distribution deals abroad.
Sharpening our knives
We had to work harder. We dropped tuning, pushed ourselves hard. By that time, completely self-taught on guitar, I started bringing more and more stuff, churning out riffs manically. Stuff piled up, beats went more hectic, more discordance and repetition thrown in. We approached David Weber who had mixed Leftovers in his recording studio located at L’Usine. An old fabric formerly dedicated to gold refinery, now entirely occupied by cultural activists. Switzerland had changed a lot in the 80’s, with new energies rushing from the underground. L’Usine had a cinema, a theater, an art gallery and two venues where Unsane, Barkmarket, The Jesus Lizard, Godflesh, Today is the Day, Entombed, Scorn, Napalm Death and even an obscure trio called Nirvana would play any night of the week. Should I mention The Young Gods? They and Coroner, Celtic Frost, Fear of God, Calhoun Conquer, Alboth, Voice Crack paved the way for Swiss newcomers with a radical approach to sound.
So here we are, Summer of 1997. Recording at the Studio des Forces Motrices, by the Rhone river. Weber had a classic Neve desk and a rare Soundcraft 24-track tape machine. We figured we could sound huge and organic. Thierry and Didier had recording skills, it was agreed that we would handle it ourselves. Weber left us the key and went on holidays. By August, we were in the place, confident, reckless, somewhat unexperienced. Some of the material just completed, hardly ever played live. So what?
Bastardiser
First side metal, second side experimental. Though not intentional, the subdivision occurred to me as I listened to the album for the first time in years: this remastered version does absolute justice to the original recording, especially in the low end of the spectrum. Bastardiser sounds like an apt title for this mixbag of styles, a record that would prove hard to categorize. You clearly hear the band establishing its sound, transitioning from classic sludge/metal/hardcore influences for the most part, to more disjointed, discordant forms. At the same time, the experimental tendencies due to Didier and Thierry’s affinities with industrial and noise have never been so evident as on the eleven minutes of «Crouch». Our non-US influences such as Godflesh, Skullflower, Zeni Geva, Eisenvater, Coroner, The Young Gods strongly permeated and made us a European band, unequivocally.
So, it’s time to bastardize! Here (below) is a track-by-track breakdown of the record that changed it all for us.
Crawling On All Fours: A 100% metal opener, fast-paced and syncopated, granted with one of those amazing songtitles from Didier. We liked switching time signatures, going from an off-beat stomp to a heavy 4/4 groove. Healthy doses of Meshuggah, Pantera, Helmet mixed with our own un-bluesy rigid European approach. Onstage, when the «Reduuuuced» breakdown came, Didier would fall to his knees which would turn blue. Intro lifted from TAD’s «Cooking with Gas» could have been cut in half… typical youthful error.
Engine: On the metal side too, but sludgier ala Crowbar/Eyehategod. With a syncopated part in the middle that forced us to count while playing (it became more natural later). We added lots of fuzz and a gradually opening wah-wah effect on the climbing riff at the end. That one, dare I specify, was inspired by the noisier side of the first Korn album (yes, I know). For some reason, Didier decided to write about driving cars and getting hurt, using typical American imagery like powerful engines, concrete bridges over the interstate, twisting it in his own sadistic way. The nod to J. G. Ballard’s Crash is quite obvious here.
The Whip: I’m pretty sure this is the last tune we came up with, just before entering the studio. The chaotic direction is clearly influenced by the stuff we were absorbing at the time, Rorschach, His Hero is Gone, Deadguy, Kiss it Goodbye, Acme, Breach, Coalesce, Converge… Although in my mind the main riff, 100% thrash, came from Slayer, Carcass and Coroner. In retrospect it almost sounds like a ripoff of «Read my Scars», one of the best metal riffs ever! Lyrics are scary here as well, Didier at its S/M best. Not sure who the «coach» is: might be his then-boss or, more perversely, it may comment on the sometimes harsh interactions within Knut, when one would push the other to get the expected results.
High/Low: We were also big into Kyuss and Tool’s Ænima. Take this type of epic stoner riff and speed it up, mix it with Napalm Death’s aggression and frenzy (circa Fear, Emptiness, Despair). This tune was physically challenging to drum to, at the time. You can actually feel the exhaustion wearing as the track goes. It features the kind of patterns and structure we’d explore more in the future.
Merge: The combination of two writers, me and Thierry. Slow, heavy discordant droning intro ala Neurosis/Godflesh brutally switches to a super disciplined 4/4 Helmet-type riff, only thrashier. The crazy discordant bridge, I think, came from Philippe and evokes more Zeni Geva type abstraction. Lyrically, Didier might be expressing his wish to escape social control.
Fungus Mat: I came up with this tune after hearing Shane Embury’s project Blood From the Soul, «Natures Hole» especially, and the more atmospheric parts of Coroner’s Grin, on heavy rotation at the time. I wasn’t sure if an instrumental like this would appeal to my bandmates. Apparently it did, maybe they just didn’t feel like saying it sucked. Anyway, to get this big room reverb, we moved to the huge empty space next to the studio, a room where hundreds of drinkers would party each night of the week. It was emptied out and cleaned up for Summer break. We noticed an old kit rusting in a corner of the studio, so we set it next to the giant windows and placed a couple of mics on the opposite side of the space, wires strung from the inside of the control room. No backing track, I played with a basic structure in mind, Thierry indicating changes. Then I picked Philippe’s Apex guitar which looked weird, like a shark tooth, but sounded great. I think we did this one-take.
Wiped Out: Can’t say much about this one as I had almost no input in the writing. What I recall is that by the time we hit the studio, we weren’t crazy about it, the first half especially. For a moment we considered dumping it, but the record would have been too short. Someone came up with this idea of playing the beginning through a small speaker with a mic in front of it. Then the middle part would punch in. It works, although the tune doesn’t really feel complete.
Descent: Opening riff is slow and grinding. Following are a bunch of mean semi-melodic, noisy metal riffs. Philippe’s metal influences shine through here, in the palm muted riffing and a couple of well-placed piercing harmonics.
Crouch: Faster-paced than I remembered. Shouldn’t it have been much slower?? We started playing this repetitive riff – Thierry and Philippe’s combined idea I think – and let the tape run until the end. We used a Leslie speaker to get the Hammond organ effect in the mid section. Didier sounds really sore and desperate here, his demented industrial vibe all over the track. One night, at a show in our hometown, we played this riff for half an hour straight before leaving the stage. The kind of trick we enjoyed. We would never sound this extreme again, not even on «H/armless».
The aftermath
The album helped us tour more, cross frontiers, meet countless amazing people, explore new territories. A few line-up changes happened along the way, the Chrome Saint Magnus/Hydra Head/Conspiracy labels came into play, eternal gratitude to them and a few others. Millennium bug, touring America, 9/11, global hysteria, new levels of consciousness, Challenger, hopes and fears, more challenges – it all belongs to a new century. I don’t know about you, but despite it’s flaws, Bastardiser hasn’t aged too badly. Thanks for reading, and to Abel / Head Records for this beautiful reissue.
Roderic Mounir, January 2020
Thanks to Vincent de Roguin for re-reading this carefully
Knut – Bastardiser 