In Praise Of: Christian Death "Only Theatre Of Pain" (1982)

The cover art, meanwhile, seems to predict 9/10 of where black metal ended up.

http://images.amazon.com/images/P/B00000J7I7.01.LZZZZZZZ.jpg

heh. I had dinner with Ethan from SR two weeks ago (he plays in a band called F-Space now, with Aleph Kali, ex-Chrome). For me, a little Savage Republic goes a long way, but when they were "on," they were great.

here's Ethan two weeks ago:

http://homepage.mac.com/alexinnyc/.Pictures/Photo%20Album%20Pictures/2004-09-15%2010.21.09%20-0700/Image-BDAEA33C073A11D9.jpg

Ethan's a good chap, yes.

May Satan lash you 40 times with his lusty leather whip of despair.

* April Fool's Day
* Rozz Williams committed suicide
* Bauhaus announced their reunion and their first reunion performances in Los Angeles.

Yes, the latter two happened the same day.

Yeah, REFICUL! first drew the explicit connection between this album and those bands he mentioned in conversations with me years back, and he's absolutely OTM. There's also the Bauhaus and Birthday Party strands but Christian Death's influence is more appropriately homegrown, as it were.

To find out about F-Space, goto: www.mobilization.com

See my pics of them playing live (albeit without their signature pyrotechnics):

http://homepage.mac.com/alexinnyc/Summer2004/PhotoAlbum71.html

Haha. A show tailormade for me though I couldn't go.

You didn't miss much, Ned. You're better off listening to the not-that-great album.. 10 times more. The show was just a really bad rocked out third-rate Mogwai with really awkward rock dances and backing tapes of all the synth parts.

has anyone heard that other band rozz was in? pompeii something?

anyway, back to Christian Death.

So... what about that opening lyric to "Romeo's Distress" then? Uncalled for? Obviously, I would have given Rozz far more credit than to use the N-word and mean it. If anything, the context of the use of the "burning a cross on a [N]'s lawn" line was meant to decry the action if anything (that obviously being a popular KKK ritual), and that the band were never racists by any means (although I wouldn't put it past some of their "local" fans at the time to not listen to the lyrics past that line and live by it.. grrrr). Still though, it could be argued that Rozz went over the line with that one. I would never play this song at a party because of it, I'd admit.. even though it's pretty much the best song on the album. Thoughts?

As it stands, probably the next show I will see is the Hot Snakes next Saturday. I have no doubts there.

It's probably my ultimate acid-test of my 'lyrics are secondary' stance for pretty much the reasons you say. It is a fantastically great song but that line strikes me as the equivalent of Siouxsie wearing the swaztika early on -- yeah, shock value, but for what purpose and what result?

interestingly enough, my first exposure to christian death was by listening to "romeo's distress" in a college friend's dorm-room ... said college friend's dorm-mate being black (and present when the song was played). d'oh!

Singing along to Romeo's Distress is one of the more entertaining things in life.

hmmmm ... TS: midge ure singing "romeo's distress" v. rozz williams singing "dancing w/ tears in my eyes"?

hint hint -- an online link to this would be nice!

http://image.allmusic.com/00/amg/cov200/dre300/e328/e32854e52jo.jpg

anyway, yes Only Theatre Of Pain love. :) :) :)

valor could never produce something as stream-of-conscious/off-the-cuff brilliant as, say, "burnt offerings."

:-D

this is two years late but Pompeii 99 was actually Valor's band - Rozz wasn't in Pompeii 99, he just asked them to be Christian Death after the original band splintered

ahhh! thanks. so probably of little interest.

no idea whether you're asking for info in re: shadow project or what Ned!

no idea whether you're asking for info in re: shadow project or what Ned!

I only ever heard the first album but a friend saw them live around that time and said that the cover of "Holy Holy" was rather extravagantly performed.

The bells sound real nice too.

I actually followed their music for a number of years until there was so much of it that it capsized.

To quote GOTT PUNCH II HAWKWINDZ over on Rolling Metal:

"i am super curious about "cd1334" or whatever they're calling themselves this week - the only theatre of pain lineup with eva o singing, apparently reunited to tour and promote the reissue of OTOP....looking at the myspace page apparently there is/will be a vinyl reissue with the original french version's cover and then the cd will be a digipak with the original frontier records cover. only tracks are gonna be the original album + deathwish (just like the frontier cd version). kind of a drag."

http://www.cd1334.com/

oh yeah, AND AND AND cd1334 is supposedly working on completing the "unfinished second album" by the original lineup (before pompei 99 became christian death or whatever). looking at their myspace again, apparently it's agnew and the bassist plus eva o and others.

also! i'd like to say that having recently heard catastrophe ballet for the first time since high school (and a bootleg from around the same time), that stuff's way better than i remember.

Spiritual Cramp is a great tune.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AbezzQbWCTk&feature=PlayList&p=5A7B653FBAF7A0C0&index=0

Bump!

Having just listened to this for the first time in ages, I would recommend ANYBODY to listen to the brilliance that is 'Spiritual Cramp' which MUST be followed by 'Romeo's Distress' -in sequence, as the way they segue is a master stroke.

A goth - a laughable 'movement' if ever there was one- mate of mine introduced this to me way back then with an earnest frown and tear in his eyeliner . The pictures of them on the lyric sheet alone scared the shit out of impressionable me. These seemed like the real scary deal. i WAS ONLY 16!!!

What set this apart to me was the guitar - it was punk! - I picked up on the Adolescents a couple of years later - it all made sense then - Rick Agnew!.

Sorry to any Death fans out there ( a spooky ''where are you???'', but they never got anywhere near these two songs

Just had a thought, - the guitar wasn't particularly 'punk' - it was just brilliantly weird - and tuneful. Sorry, going now.

still prefer the entirety of Catastrophe Ballet and most of Ashes to this stuff, though the guitar bit on "Romeo's Distress" is nice

if they could've kept agnew on guitar...

http://www.lastplanetojakarta.com/2008/10/buried_treasure.html

he's right, too.

I got this album maybe 6 years ago, loved it and intended to get more but never did. Could anyone give a guide on how to buy the musical output of Rozz Williams. I've heard that some of his solo albums are very powerful.

Is anyone a big enough fan to have kept up with the long series of Lost Recordings? I'm amazed by how much stuff he made, I cant think of many goths who were that prolific.

somehow I conflated this band with Death in June in my head and hence never gave them any time but OTOP is great, hunting for Catastrophe Ballet now.

The frustrating thing about Valor-era CD is that he could come up with the occasional solid track (usually 2-3 per album) but even those he could never quite push over the top in terms of quality. It's like he really could've used a better songwriter to collaborate with because there are interesting production and instrumental choices on a lot of his stuff, but the songs just laze around doing nothing.

I like this one, kinda sunshine-goth-pop-metal:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=an8mm2b4hY8

And the track following it is a sludgy epic that sounds slightly ahead of the curve for 1990:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wpNnc52V9Bs

Anyone got any good Valor-era tunes to help fill out a theoretical CDR80?