Artist: Endstille
Title: Infektion 1813
Genre: Black Metal
Release Date: 16th May 2011
Label: Season of Mist
Album Review
ENDSTILLE are back with a new album and as usual in their case what matters the most is the old question; are they either neo-Nazis or even extreme right-wing or neither of those? For many years the band has distanced itself from all that by suggesting that Black Metal is mainly apolitical and I cite the words of Mayhemic Destructor (the drummer of the band) “[Y]ou may see a tank or a plane or a machine gun, but that's just history, and it's history that inspires us... As far as the bands in the NSBM scene are concerned, if anyone is in any way connected to Nazism or fascism, I have no interest in hearing them. I don't want to support them in any way whatsoever. I want nothing to do with it.” In another place the same person says “Our music sounds like a war. There is no politically thing in it. And everyone who says that ENDSTILLE is a Nazi band doesn’t know anything. We are not from Germania, like you say. We are from Slesvigland.”(Schleswig-Flensburg, Germany).
Apparently this new era is the era of washed out History, Geography and of music of course. The ‘Infektion 1813’ consists in part of an attempt to re-write history as we know it and other parts that I will get to later on. Be ready to see the academia tear apart their credentials in order to be educated in this new version of history. 1813 was another year of the Napoleonic wars yet the band as it seems deliberately chose this one as some major battles were fought on the German soil and, according to the band, these very wars were the “infection” that was spread in Germany affecting the relationships of the European nations evidently leading to the WWI. For the information of the band, because apparently when they were taught history in high school they were skipping the classes, the Napoleonic Wars had little to do even with the Franco-Prussian war of 1870 and absolutely nothing with the WWI. But 1813 was a notable year for another event as well; the birth of Wagner, whose music was identified with the megalomaniac character of Otto von Bismarck.
The band also assures us that their music has the drumming speed of an MG-42, a weapon used mainly by the Wehrmacht during the WWII. Was it used for shooting during the Olympic Games? Not only it was used during the battles but it was one of the main weapons for mass extermination in the Eastern Front and all over the occupied Europe. Even more than that, in the ‘Bloody H (The Hurt-Gene)’ they describe the Battle of Hürtgen, one of the toughest battles of the Western Front, in the notorious Siegfried Line between the Americans and the Germans, and they describe it as “the largest American defeat in Europe ever” and they continue “Probably they (the Americans) found the Hurt-gene here”. According to my books of History the Americans (despite the many tactical mistakes they’ve made and their casualties) actually won that battle. The term “defeat” for that battle is used only, almost poetical licence, to describe the high cost of Allied casualties.
The attempt to neutralise the use of MK-42 and the role of Wehrmacht is part of the attempts during the last years of rewriting the history. The latest trend is that the crimes of the Nazis of the WWII should be attributed to the SS only while some people conveniently forget that the Wehrmacht was their direct accomplice and most of the times the sole provoker of murder and mayhem, leaving many areas in the state of carnage after executing entire populations. And the blurring of distinctions continues. In the last track, ‘Endstille (Völkerschlächter)’, there exists a big list of dictators and “dictators”, such as Franco, Tito, Stalin, Mussolini, Napoleon, Indi Amin, Hossni Mubarak, George Bush etc and after 4:45 min of name dropping the name of Hitler appears. Now what Castro, Tito and Bush have to do with Hitler, Mussolini and Stalin is beyond me but surely it can be used as another example of washed out history. In this new era everything is equal and apples are oranges.
Stick with that; everything is equal. In “Satanarchie” you have the impression that the brains of the band members are inhabited by a questionable combination of Aleister Crowley and Madame Blavatsky having small chats with Kropotkin and Bakunin ready for the satanarchie to “infect this fucking world revolt!” Once again, what Kropotkin, Bakunin and Anarchy have to do with these imbeciles? Have you ever read a serious book in your whole life? And that is despite if one agrees or disagrees with the Anarchy. As if all the above is not enough, we have this new-age approach which can be summed up as “shut up and enjoy the music/songs”. As if the music is not an activity charged with meanings, as if it is neutral and castrated from all possible associations and correlations. These opinions are the indirect triumph of the markets. I know of no band whatsoever which wants their newly released work to be treated with the rules of the market, which offers only a short period of life before the old stuff is replaced with the new.
The bands want their work to remain in the psyche of the listeners; they want their songs to be enjoyed as something more than mere songs. According to some YouTube “philosophers” to raise objections and concerns is to be pushed away with that dismissive label of “being politically correct” and “overreacting” over “minor” details, I suggest to them to find a decent bookstore (if they know what this word means) and read some books of sociology. It’s an excellent science... Summing up everything, probably it is true that the band has nothing to do with neo-Nazism, yet they hold a certain “naivety”, to put it politely about many things. As far it concerns their music throughout the CD the band jumps up and down, cursing and pointlessly provoking, like spoiled brats whose pocket money to buy lollipops were denied by their parents.
Tracklist
01. Anomie – 3:48
02. Trenchgoat – 4:15
03. Bloody H (The Hurt-Gene) – 3:51
04. The Deepest Place On Earth – 5:49
05. When Kathaaria Falls – 4:10
06. Satanarchie – 4:06
07. World Aflame – 5:03
08. Wrecked – 5:53
09. Endstille (Völkerschlächter) – 11:11
Line-up
Cruor: Bombenhagel (bass)
Zingultus: Agitator (vocals)
L.Wachtfels: Sturmgeschütz (guitars)
Mayhemic Destructor: Artillerie (drums)
Websites
www.endstille.com / www.myspace.com/endstilleband
Cover Picture
Rating
Music: 3
Sound: 7
Total: 5 / 10
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