Can Boys Make Noise, Too?

Noise is a perpetual girls’ club, you say? Every show more of a clambake than a sausage fest? Not so! In recent years, men have been making inroads into the genre pioneered by such luminaries as Jarboe and Cosey Fanni Tutti. I’ve noticed a slowly increasing number of guys at shows, and some of them aren’t even there with their girlfriends! One new artist I checked out has proven that noise isn’t just for ladies any more.

I recently saw newcomer Verbis Diablo performing in support of his recent album Poison Pen, which consists of power electronics in the vein of other young male noise artists like Debased God and Lawnmower!Lacerated!Labia.

To be honest, I didn’t expect much from this guy when he first came onstage. Verbis Diablo is a one-man PE project consisting of a skinny, twinky, white prettyboy in his early twenties: with those tattoo sleeves, that Boardwalk Empire haircut, and that snug-fitting Fred Perry polo, I figured he’d be yet another ex-hardcore trendhopper who only got into noise after he read some article on Brooklyn Vegan or his girlfriend gave him a Puce Mary tape. But he ultimately impressed me with his command of that table full of fancy pedals he must’ve bought with Mommy’s money (although, ugh, digital processing, dude? Do you even analog? Guess he’s still a novice with electronics), and overall I was pleasantly surprised by his set. He gave off a noticeable masculine energy that distinguished him from the sea of female noise musicians. It’s kind of inspiring that men in noise are finally bringing something productive to the table.

Less interesting were his vocals, which consisted of repeated screaming at the audience: it was sort of ridiculous coming from such a handsome college boy. Why so much anger so young, dude? What would a good-looking guy like him have to be so upset about? Did his girlfriend just dump him? Maybe he was molested or something…? It was a little difficult to take seriously and he was clearly trying very hard to prove something to us. But hey, he’s young yet. Once he grows out of this adolescent phase, I think Verbis Diablo has the potential to be just as good as any woman noise musician.

Now, some would say there’s unfair bias against men in the noise scene, but I believe discrimination is only there if you put it there. I don’t see gender: I only care about talent, thank you very much.

That’s why I think you should really give your attention to Verbis Diablo instead of that other buzzed-about name in boy noise, the infamous Purgative. This little trust-fund prince is SO vastly overrated, you’ve got to wonder how much snatch he had to lick to get all those headline gigs and positive press.

I know it’s the elephant in the room, but let’s keep it real here: people are only into Purgative because he’s a beefcake with washboard abs. If he didn’t have a dick, nobody would care about his artsy version of “death industrial.” (And judging by the crotch bulge in a recent photo from one of his shows, I think it’s pretty clear that Purgative’s true appeal lies more in his jeans than his quaint little suitcase of gear.)

Everybody knows Purgative only got his big break because his girlfriend—who is herself a well-established noise musician—used to write for Pitchfork and hooked him up with a good review. Plus, he’s only been making noise for about ten years, yet people are acting like he’s some kind of veteran of the scene. Meanwhile other, far more talented artists (including a few men, FYI) toil in obscurity for decades, releasing limited-edition tapes out of their own basements without a fraction of the same publicity. Purgative isn’t really in it for the music: he’s only gunning for female attention and flaunting his hipster appeal with those super-cool leather jacket photo shoots for Vice. What next, playing a show backed by major corporate sponsors? It’s this sort of shit that’s killing the scene.

Granted, I haven’t actually seen him live or listened to any of his albums in their entirety, but a friend of mine (who is a man) went to one of his shows and said it was disappointing. This one track of his that I streamed on Soundcloud makes very apparent what Purgative is all about: just more moping and whining, presumably about his personal life, instead of tackling something serious and relevant like international geopolitics or string theory (which also begs the question of why noise must be “about” anything at all). Boo hoo, trendy art bros making emo noise: you’re totally deep and edgy. We get it. Now get over high school already and quit ruining the genre.

Victimizer

My debut novella, Victimizer, is now available for purchase.

Victimizer concerns the murderous desires and fantasies of a nameless protagonist motivated by a toxic mixture of deep-seated self-loathing, continual frustration, pervasive loneliness, and violent rage. It's decidedly not for everyone.

$15 each.
Limited to 100 copies. 40 pages with several original b&w collage illustrations.

To purchase:
NYC folks can pick up copies at Catland and Heaven Street.
Otherwise, send a Paypal payment to LCvonHessen(at)gmail(dot)com: $18 ($15 + $3) for shipping within the US and $20 ($15 + $5) for international shipping. Be sure to include the address you'd like me to ship to. (If you're NYC-local and want to pick up a copy from me in person--assuming you're someone I already know--payment is lowered to $15: no shipping required.)

Columbine's Legacy

On this day 15 years ago–half a lifetime ago now–I was taken out of class, interrogated, and ultimately suspended for a week, over what I would call “thoughtcrime” if I didn’t associate that word with the sort of mouth-breathers who unironically use the term “sheeple.”

Long story short, I was falsely accused of planning to shoot up the school. This was the direct result of paranoia surrounding the one-year anniversary of Columbine. This would become one of the defining events of my life.

The “evidence” against me consisted of hearsay, grossly misinterpreted minor details, and what amounted to profiling: they never found any guns or bomb-making materials or detailed school schematics and plans for murder because there fucking weren’t any. The school administration at the district office, where I had to attend a two-part hearing to see whether I’d be kicked out permanently, deliberately skewed everything to make it appear as though I had no thoughts or interests beyond violence and murder. Imagine being barely 15 years old and having adults who hold direct power over your life and future argue over a conference room table about whether or not you are, in fact, a monster that needs to be Dealt With.

My charges were “making threatening remarks about school safety” and “possession of a weapon on school property.” The latter was the result of the campus cop finding a paring knife in my backpack. (Note that the class I was initially pulled out of was an art class. In which we were using class-provided X-Acto knives.) Although, for obvious reasons, I told no one at the time, I had this in my bag because of a boy in my acting class named Tyler, who would “jokingly” hit on me, put his arm around me against my wishes, etc. when people were around and then mutter violent threats when no one else was within earshot: this sad little knife was my last resort in case he actually did “try anything.” (In retrospect I’m appalled at how massively fucked-up that entire situation was.) It didn’t occur to me to tell an adult because it would be his word against mine and, seeing as he was a generic preppy type (he would later be nominated for Homecoming King), he would absolutely escape punishment and possibly escalate his treatment. As a wee true-crime aficionado, I already had him pegged as the Ted Bundy type. And in an absurd twist, he would later end up dating the lying little cunt who had reported me to the administration in the first place.

My lawyer was ultimately successful and, after my week-long suspension was over, I was “allowed” to come back, upon which I had to refute various asinine rumors about what had happened multiple times a day every day. And I was still a target: about a month after that, a friend of mine dismembered a Britney Spears doll at lunchtime, and I was called to the office and “gently” interrogated. (If you think that’s absurd, you should read a laundry list of the supposed “evidence” against me during my hearing.)

For some time I’ve wanted to write about this experience, and how it’s affected my adult life, in long form. Perhaps this year will be the time.

Madame Deficit at Big Snow Buffalo Lodge - 6 May 13

Madame Deficit at Big Snow Buffalo Lodge, Brooklyn NY - 6 May '13.

Set list: "Infernal Bridegroom," "Owe You," "Leech Woman."

Madame Deficit in Providence - 23 Jan 2013

I'm performing in Providence a week from today. Here's the lineup and address from the Facebook event:

Madame Deficit (NYC) - Anxious hangman power electronics. First proper show in quite awhile: there will be new material.

Thanatology (RI) - The lighter side of Ric Royer.

Last Family on Earth (RI) - Somber folk by Ben Eberle

Yerri (RI) - Gerry Figueroa solo.

10 PM


$5
Psychic Readings
(2nd floor, 95 Empire)
Providence, RI

Untitled (3:36 AM / 20 Mar 2009)

Written under the influence of a certain pharmaceutical at the time and date in question. A bit "softer" in content than much of what I've posted here, but my work isn't all perversion and murder.

Seeking submissions for Mass Culture Vol. 5

I am currently seeking submissions for the next issue of Mass Culture, due out sometime in mid-late July.

Any quality visual art or writing (fiction, nonfiction, poetry, etc.) on the general subject of sex and/or death is welcome. The specific theme of Vol. 5 will be Middle America, which I'm defining here as the bland majority of the US that excludes liberal coastal cities, hip college towns, and the like, with an emphasis on suburbia and/or the Midwest. Note that this region has spawned any number of dreadful things, e.g. notorious serial killers, child abduction, school shootings, and so forth. Think along the lines of middle-aged married men seeking furtive blowjobs in cruising parks and truckstop restrooms, stalkers peeping on elderly widows in the bushes at night prior to their home invasion, bored and sexually-frustrated teenagers chugging Robitussin and plotting firearm mayhem, etc.

You need not have lived in or traveled through that region in order to contribute--for instance, in Vol. 4 I included a story set in Weimar Berlin despite the fact that I have never (yet) left the continental US or time-traveled--but seeing as I'm the editor and I did grow up in the Midwest, I'll be able to tell if you're just completely bullshitting. (Note that the photo above was taken circa 2001 on the corner where I used to wait for the schoolbus.)

Further guidelines:

-Writing: Try to keep it at 1,000 words or less due to spacing issues. DOC, TXT, or RTF format (or just copy and paste into the body of an email).

-Art: Mass Culture is designed at 7.5" x 5" with a resolution of 300 pixels per inch, so do keep that in mind if you're thinking of submitting a full-page spread (or more). B&W, greyscale, and color are all welcome. Format: JPEG or PSD.

Submit to lcvonhessen@gmail.com. The deadline is the 8th of July.

Baptism of Wisdom feat. Madame Deficit

I'm taking part in this performance on Friday, primarily to do the audio. My baby-head theremin will make its first appearance in quite some time.

Mass Culture Vol. 4 Reading / Release Party

On Friday the 13th of last month, I gave a reading at Gebo House in Brooklyn for the release of Vol. 4. (It also served as a party for my birthday, which happened earlier that week.)

By the time I arrived, I was already running late. I'd gotten about three hours of sleep the night before, having spent the past couple of days printing and assembling copies. (Yes, I edit and manufacture Mass Culture entirely by myself. As I lack steady employment, it's less expensive in the short term, not to mention the fact that I wouldn't trust someplace like Staples with some of my content.)

My voice is a little dry and hoarse in much of this footage thanks to dehydration and sleep deprivation: in order to combat both, I can be seen sipping from a shiny green tall-boy of Four Loko throughout the reading. That would be an original pre-ban Four Loko, which I'd saved in my fridge for a special occasion: I'd originally planned on drinking a nice bottle of Scottish seaweed ale as I read, but that evening I decided to fuck being classy because I badly needed the caffeine.

It's safe to say I was a bit wired during the proceedings. I didn't even realize the mic wasn't working, hence why the sound is somewhat muffled on video.

The projection of M in the background was someone else's impromptu idea, though it works well enough considering Vol. 4's theme of historical lustmord.

The first piece I read was "Hideous Things: An Act of Love," from Vol. 4, which was accidentally not recorded. After that came an excerpt from "Kindly Carcass":

"Kindly Carcass" appeared in Vol. 2, "the cannibalism issue." It was largely inspired by the case of Armin Meiwes, in which he solicited a man on the internet to take part in consensual cannibalism. Other influences include Krafft-Ebing-documented "necrosadist" Sergeant François Bertrand and my perennial favorite serial killers, Dahmer and Nilsen. The narrative alternates between the protagonist's recollection of a night with one of his victims and his rather dull daily life in an institution for the criminally insane.

"Dumbslut (Look How Pathetic)" appeared in Vol. 1. As I somewhat drunkenly attempt to explain in this video, a major catalyst for my writing this piece (performed here in a truncated version) was having recently read a biography of John Wayne Gacy, much of which was written in Gacy's vernacular (e.g., redundantly calling people "dumb and stupid"). That book, Buried Dreams, also demonstrates how Gacy would project his own deep-seated insecurity and self-loathing about his sexuality onto his preferred victims: all-American teenage twinks.

I also wanted to write a story in which the subject's background and experiences, which are seen as so normal, typical, and desirable as to never warrant any real questioning, are interrogated and exposed on the most absolutely base, disgusting, abject terms. It also serves as a polar inversion of the surrealist-poetic psychosexual romances I've written between, say, a serial killer and his prostitute victim (as in "Hideous Things"), or a lonely morgue worker and a beautiful corpse ("Erotopsy," below).

"Erotopsy (Tanzler's Revenge)" was also in Vol. 1, very loosely (I would even say subconsciously) inspired by the case of necrophilic German radiologist Carl Tanzler (as detailed in the video). It was written on an acid trip with only very minor subsequent edits. I've previously performed this with sound accompaniment as Madame Deficit. Audience responses to this piece typically range from nausea to arousal.

The necrophile in this piece is described as resembling Alfred Kubin, an Austrian artist of perverse imaginations whose work Der Todessprung was reproduced in the credits of Vol. 3.

"Bieber Rape Story," from Vol. 1, is probably one of my more infamous bits of writing. It was sparked by a particularly ignorant quote about rape and abortion that teen popstar Justin Bieber had recently given in a Rolling Stone interview. It could have been written off as an isolated case of celebrity idiocy but for the fact that, around the same time, adult politicians with real legislative power started working en masse to put those views into law (. . . which is still happening in America: in the video I mention that, if written a year later, it would have been called "Santorum Rape Campaign"). I actually could have taken this piece a lot further and gone into a lot more detail, but I kept it short at the time due to spacing limitations.

I reference St. Lidwina of Schiedam towards the end: curious parties are advised to seek out Catholic-convert JK Huysmans's book on the subject, wherein he describes her many grotesque afflictions in such lovingly-graphic detail that the work was almost considered sacrilege.

"Asking For It," from Vol. 3, was a sort of encore. You'll notice that my audience has gotten increasingly drunk and rowdy by that time, and I myself am shown here drunkenly telling them I don't care if they masturbate while I read and giving instructions on how to purchase amyl nitrate ("go to an adult bookstore and ask for 'head cleaner'!"). Apparently one satirical piece about rape wasn't enough for these fucking perverts, so I read this story, inspired by media coverage of the Cleveland, TX gang-rape of an anonymous 11-year-old girl around March of last year. Alert readers and viewers will note that the victim here is depicted as belonging to the demographic most likely to read Mass Culture: a young, white, vaguely-misanthropic city-dwelling man who favors "dark," "extreme" musical genres like metal and noise. Unfortunately the last few lines of this piece have been cut off due to the camera running out of memory.

After the reading came a fair amount of intoxication and debauchery, but no cameras were out for that as far as I know.

Merrily Gone Hunting, part 4

Part 4/4 of Merrily Gone Hunting (dedicated to Jack the Ripper), Feb-Mar '12. Inspired by various "Ripper letters," which were probably all fakes. Actual bodily fluids were used.

From p. 13 of Mass Culture Vol. 4.