Affective Intensities in Extreme Music Scenes
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This file is to be used only for a purpose specified by Palgrave Macmillan, such as checking proofs, preparing an index, reviewing, endorsing or planning coursework/other institutional needs. You may store and print the file and share it with others helping you with the specified purpose, but under no circumstances may the file be distributed or otherwise made accessible to any other third parties without the express prior permission of Palgrave Macmillan. Please contact [email protected] if you have any queries regarding use of the file. PROOF Affective Intensities in Extreme Music Scenes March 1, 2014 18:37 MAC/OVE Page-i 9781137406767_01_prexii PROOF Pop Music, Culture and Identity March 1, 2014 18:37 MAC/OVE Page-ii 9781137406767_01_prexii PROOF Affective Intensities in Extreme Music Scenes Cases from Australia and Japan Rosemary Overell University of Otago, New Zealand March 1, 2014 18:37 MAC/OVE Page-iii 9781137406767_01_prexii PROOF © Rosemary Overell 2014 All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this publication may be made without written permission. No portion of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted save with written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, or under the terms of any licence permitting limited copying issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency, Saffron House, 6–10 Kirby Street, London EC1N 8TS. Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages. The author has asserted her right to be identified as the author of this work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. First published 2014 by PALGRAVE MACMILLAN Palgrave Macmillan in the UK is an imprint of Macmillan Publishers Limited, registered in England, company number 785998, of Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire RG21 6XS. 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March 1, 2014 18:37 MAC/OVE Page-iv 9781137406767_01_prexii PROOF To Duncan March 1, 2014 18:37 MAC/OVE Page-v 9781137406767_01_prexii PROOF March 1, 2014 18:37 MAC/OVE Page-vi 9781137406767_01_prexii PROOF Contents List of Figures ix Acknowledgements x List of Abbreviations xi Introduction: Affective Intensities and Brutal Belonging 1 Settingthescene–globalgrindcoremusic 2 GrindcoremusicinMelbourneandOsaka 5 Scenic homes – affective belonging and brutal belonging 9 1 A Grisly Scene? Extreme Metal Music, Belonging and Ethnography 15 Metal and belonging 16 Reflections on extreme metal and belonging 23 An affective ethnography 26 Research methods and sample information 31 2BrutalBelonginginBrutalSpaces 39 The spaces 39 Brutal representations 41 Brutal places 45 Fuck ...I’m Dead – brutal belonging in brutal spaces 51 Brutal belonging – homely and uchi spaces 63 3 Idiots and Wankers: Grindcore Sociality 73 Brutalsocialityingrindcorescenes 73 Grindcore and its others 76 4 I Hate Girls and Emotions: Brutal Sociality and Gender 93 Brutally gendered sociality 94 ‘Hate me’ in Osaka 103 Burning Emos: Disavowing articulated emotions in grindcore 110 5 BrutalBelonginginOtherSpaces 118 Flows between Melbourne and Osaka’s grindcore scenes 119 Australian ‘bogans’ and Japanese ‘warriors’ – grindcore and national belonging 126 vii March 1, 2014 18:37 MAC/OVE Page-vii 9781137406767_01_prexii PROOF viii Contents Representations of other spaces 148 Brutal belonging in other spaces 152 Making it brutal 165 Conclusion 170 Appendices 177 Notes 180 Bibliography 187 Index 201 March 1, 2014 18:37 MAC/OVE Page-viii 9781137406767_01_prexii PROOF Figures I.1 Shagnum perform at the Cathedral in Launceston, Tasmania. Photo: Rosemary Overell, 2003 6 I.2 palm and Edge of Spirit celebrating after a gig at the Arthouse, North Melbourne. Photo: Duncan Box, 2008 8 2.1 Fans in the circle pit at Freestyle Outro, 2010. Photo: Rosemary Overell, 2010 54 2.2 A band performs at Hokage, where there is little distance between the audience and the performer. Photo: Duncan Box 62 2.3 Toilet door at the Arthouse hotel in North Melbourne. Photo: Rosemary Overell, 2009 64 4.1 Fuck ...I’m Dead perform at the Tote. Photo: Rosemary Overell, 2013 102 4.2 Misogynist representations of women in Osakan grindcore fliers. The Umagundan event flier is on the top left.Photo:RosemaryOverell,2013 107 5.1 Graham (second from left) at an uchiage with Toshi (far left) and Bâbon (far right). Next to Graham is the lead guitarist from Tetsuo. Photo: Rosemary Overell, 2010 122 5.2 Australian band Pisschrist perform at Hokage. Photo: Duncan Box, 2009 125 5.3 Fliers using Japanese nationalist imagery and particularly incorporating the hinomaru (sun disc) flag. The upper right shows a flier for right-wing venue Sengoku Daitoryo. Photo: Rosemary Overell, 2013 145 ix March 1, 2014 18:37 MAC/OVE Page-ix 9781137406767_01_prexii PROOF Acknowledgements This project comes from my PhD research at the University of Melbourne, which I could not have completed without the Australian Postgraduate Award scholarship. I wish to especially thank my two supervisors, Associate Professor Audrey Yue and Professor Carolyn Stevens. Without their support and encouragement this book would not have been written. To my two examiners, Ian Condry and Marvin Sterling – I appreciate the care and depth with which you engaged with and critiqued my thesis. Though this project began in 2008, I was inspired much earlier by two of my teachers: Dr Alison Huber, who always encouraged me to write about metal; and Dr Fraser MacDonald, who introduced me to the wonderful world of NRT. Within the School of Culture and Communication I was also sup- ported by Chris Healy and Fran Martin. To my fellow School of Culture and Communications postgraduates and early career researchers, Peter Chambers, Dion Kagan, Sarah Taylor, Bobby Benedicto, Sufern Ho and Gemma Blackwood – your feedback and support with my thesis and my book draft were invaluable. Big thanks too to David Morris, who provided excellent feedback on my book draft. To my colleagues at my new home, at the University of Otago, Vijay Devadas, Brett Nichols and Holly Randell-Moon –, I am grateful for your support and understanding. My family and my husband also formed a crucial support network for my thesis and this book. Finally, I extend my wholehearted thanks to my participants. With- out your help, willingness and openness to the project it would never have happened. In particular, thank you to Duncan for initially intro- ducing me to grindcore, John for his support, particularly with making inroads into the Osakan scene, Christoph and Rebecca for helping me feel welcome in the Melbourne scene, Hide, Michi and Hiroshi for their assistance in translation and Yoshi too, for becoming a good friend in Japan. x March 1, 2014 18:37 MAC/OVE Page-x 9781137406767_01_prexii PROOF Abbreviations DTBM Dad They Broke Me FID Fuck ...I’m Dead KE Kagura Enterprises NER No Escape Records NRT NonRepresentationalTheory OL Office Lady SFHS Super Fun Happy Slide TDEBN The Day Everything Became Nothing xi March 1, 2014 18:37 MAC/OVE Page-xi 9781137406767_01_prexii PROOF March 1, 2014 18:37 MAC/OVE Page-xii 9781137406767_01_prexii This file is to be used only for a purpose specified by Palgrave Macmillan, such as checking proofs, preparing an index, reviewing, endorsing or planning coursework/other institutional needs. You may store and print the file and share it with others helping you with the specified purpose, but under no circumstances may the file be distributed or otherwise made accessible to any other third parties without the express prior permission of Palgrave Macmillan. Please contact [email protected] if you have any queries regarding use of the file. PROOF Introduction: Affective Intensities and Brutal Belonging ‘Brutal!’ The cry goes up in a cramped band room at the back of a Melbourne hotel. Since the banning of cigarettes in pubs and clubs, a strong smell of sweat, beer and vomit fills the space. Hands fling into the air in the metal salute. Long hair flicks and snaps against the foldback at the front of the stage. The grindcore band take a break to gulp mouthfuls of beer from glass jugs on stage. A girl climbs onto an amp to take a photograph. The patch on the back of her denim jacket declares ‘Captain Cleanoff’. Suddenly the amp begins to shake and drone. She jumps down into the crowd. The band starts up again, and the group in front of the stage becomes one giant body – of sweat, hair and denim. This next song is for the truly brutal fans out there ... Whether in Melbourne, New York, Birmingham or Osaka, the word ‘brutal’ is an integral part of extreme metal music fans’ vocabulary. It fea- tures in band names and generic demarcations. But it is most commonly used as an adjective, to describe the intense experience of listening to grindcore music. This book explores what it means to feel brutal. It examines what it is to experience grindcore music in live spaces across two continents: in Melbourne, Australia and Osaka, Japan. I suggest that to feel brutal is to experience belonging to the grindcore scene, and the spaces in which grindcore happens. This brutal experience is affective and moves through spaces (local, national and transnational) and between peo- ple to produce an intense belonging which scene members can only articulate through the word ‘brutal’.