To an outsider, a non-member of the coterie, crust - as a genre - can look quite cryptic. Think about it for a second. Crust has always been a very confidential affair and you could very well argue that its believers even thrive on this sense of secrecy, on the conviction that crust's cultic nature set them apart, make them special and grant them the superpower to withstand the whole Zyanose discography in one sitting (the exact number of casualties after such a spectacular and testing, even if willful, torment remains sadly unknown). That crust appears to be an enigma is logical. After all, no crust band has ever achieved proper mainstream success, even if Extreme Noise Terror and Doom (the highly successful Napalm Death moved too quickly from crust to really qualify) can be said to be well-respected acts in the extreme metal community, although one should probably point out that their respective careers leading them to such honorable recognition have been quite different indeed. And let's face it, the metal world is the only place where ambitious crust bands can even hope to approach, not to mention attain, some semblance of respectability, not to mention commercial success, probably thanks to similarities and connections with the above-named Napalm Death and Bolt Thrower rather than a genuine appreciative knowledge of the genre. But then, does any current crust band even want to achieve what the doxa sanctions as success, even in the only relatively important extreme metal sandpit? Flogging the 500 copies of their latest record to the patched flock must already be enough, innit?
Like any punk subgenre (or punk subsubgenre), in order to properly understand and interpret a crust artifact (like any split Ep from 1995, a pair of crust pants or a rusty Amebix badge), one has to be familiar with the rules and conventions governing the music, with the ideas displayed and even the shower-free lifestyle. Like many artistic entities, crust and its subcategories have their own fantasies of themselves and always engage in self-representation. Crust basically "does crust" in an act of referentiality and performativity. Of course, the split Lp between Zygome and Kaltbruching Acideath can be enjoyed on a sensory level by anyone (well, maybe not anyone, some predispositions toward the appreciation of gratuitous sonic brutality and human imitations of wild boars fighting are generally required). However, important elements such as the band's intent, their context of production, their position in the grand crust narrative, the meaningful abundance - or, on the contrary, the purposeful scarcity - of referential visual and sonic clues will be lost. To decipher and unravel the inner workings and contextual dimension of a crust curio can be a captivating task casting light and knowledge on a specific human experience. But it can also sound like a tedious ordeal and unnecessary convolutedness. As your average punter might say, as long as it gets the feet tapping, why bother with futile verbiage.
I suppose you know where I stand on the issue and today's piece must be read with crust's self-reflectivity in mind, and possibly a few cans of cider, as Nuclear Death Terror's self-titled album is a prime example of such a process, beside standing as one of the best crust Lp's that the noughties had to offer. The puzzling nature of the very name of the band has oft been verified and it might cause some deep concern among your eldest relatives if you happen to wear a NDT shirt at a funeral, even if black. And, well, if you read it literally it obviously means the extreme fear of a nuclear-related death like being reduced to ashes by the bomb blast, being burnt alive, vomiting to death because of radiation sickness in the aftermath and other Discharge lyrics. Why, why, why indeed. However, if you are already even remotely familiar with the codes of crust, you will instantly know that the three terms making up the moniker can be described as genuine clichés, but not only that, you will also make the assumption that the members were well aware of the trite derivativeness of the association and that, precisely, in act of conscious self-awareness, choosing such a name is a knowing and knowledgeable wink to the initiated, a purposefully cheesy and loaded name meant to indicate that the band understood the codes of the genre and decided to play with them in a tongue-in-cheek fashion. It is like a pact between listener and listenee. We know how crust is redundant, you know we know and we know you know we know. NDT implied a certain knowledge on the audience's part in order to be understood on a diachronic level, not unlike "just like" d-beat bands perhaps. Of course, NDT were also a very good band with a serious political message and commitment to DIY ethics that could be enjoyed, influence and inspire one on a synchronic level without one having ever heard of Extreme Noise Terror, Mortal Terror, Societic Death Slaughter, Final Warning, Final Massakre and crust's obsession with war - often of the imaginary nuclear variety - and eternal synonymy.
I first heard of NDT through two punks from K-town - meaning both Copenhagen and the yearly DIY punk festival that took place there and still does - who were traveling through Europe and had brought demo tapes of the band with them (a useful talisman to protect oneself against both dodgy wankers and hygiene). The tale behind NDT's conception was just as good as the band itself, if not better. Apparently, the members had written all the crust-compatible clichéd substantives and qualifiers they could think of on distinct pieces of paper and they then drew three of them at random and the winners eventually were "nuclear", "death" and "terror". I suppose they could just as well have ended up calling themselves Final Doom Massacre, Slaughter Grave of Mankind or Napalm Hell Fear (Extreme Napalm Terror was already taken), but Nuclear Death Terror can be rightly considered as a very fine and lucky pick. I am not sure that the story is true but its veracity does not really matter. First, it makes for a great story to tell and second, and more interestingly, it illustrates crust's traditional self-reflexivity, the conscious decision to "play crust", to "do the crust", to "perform crust" and to establish this pact based on a shared subcultural context with the audience that partly implies some sort of suspension of disbelief. But isn't such a pact part and parcel of a relation with any artistic creation? All this blathering notwithstanding, the phrase "nuclear death terror" sounds too good to be true, fraudulent and I think they cheated and the game was rigged.
In any case, following the band's enthralling origin story and the very high praises of the crust-loving Danes, I ended up with a copy of NDT's 2005 demo tape. I hadn't played the fucker for a long time (almost forgot I even owned it to be fair) before this post and had forgotten how deliciously raw and angry it sounded and how extreme and gruff the vocals were (although they are sometimes quite difficult to distinguish, which is my only real reservation about this recording). If you need a relevant description, let's say it sounds like raw metallic cavemen scandicrust with dual vocals (State of Fear and 3-Way Cum battling with Hellshock in a squat to keep it brief). The recording really has the direct feel of a demo tape to it which feels a little dumb and tautological to point out (this demo really sounds like a demo) but the quality of recording and production has so dramatically improved during the past decade, even for demos, that to formulate such an impression is not so irrelevant today. NDT's first effort is a demo-sounding demo tape in the best way possible. It was released in June, 2005, on local label Plague Bearer (that also put out the excellent first Skitkids' recording on vinyl, Martyrdöd's debut and the magnificent album of Uro, Requiem) who made 600 copies of the tape, a large number indeed by today's standards for a demo.
The album that followed was a massive improvement sound-wise and can be rightly considered as an 00's crust classics. If the demo's rawness can be thought to link somewhat the first recording to the 90's crust wave (and to some wild animals fighting in a crate), its successor was firmly rooted in the 00's. Recorded in nearby Malmö by Rodrigo (from Putrid Filth Conspiracy) at The Bombshelter studio, it was again released on Plague Bearer and, without losing its menacing sense of aggression and its spitting directness, the album offered a more intense, not to mention tighter, lesson in emphatic, insistent crustcore with a dark metallic vibe. This said, it should be pointed out that NDT did not sound like a metal band on this Lp for the sound and the production were definitely on the punk side of crust. Some songs certainly contained their fair share of proudly epic mid-paced metallic moments and there are enough shredding guitar leads borrowing lovingly to the metal tradition not to be mistaken on the goods delivered here, but the dominant gene of the album is savage crustcore for the punx. This skull-laden work delivers tastefully pounding crustcore with hoarse dual vocals that sounds just as angry, tornadic and brutally relentless as scandicrust masters 3-Way Cum and State of Fear (there is a fair amount of Swedish riffing in NDT) but with a heavier stenchcore influence reminiscent of Hellshock's first opus that clearly roots the band in the mid-noughties old-school crust revival. As a bonus to the crust as fuck bollocking, there is a hidden song on the vinyl with an ace cover of "just like Discharge" d-beat pioneers Disaster's "Inferno" that, considering that, considering that the Lp was recorded in early 2006 before War Cry's cd reissue, indicacte that NDT knew their shit indeed.
The visual aesthetics of Copenhagen's crust heroes strongly reinforce the referential web already woven through the moniker and their Disrupt-meets-Sacrilege-in-a-haunted-Swedish-forest music. Like Hellshock and Stormcrow, NDT assigned Mid, original crust artist extraordinaire, to "draw crust" or rather to include as many elements of the templates of crust imagery as possible in one single drawing. Rows of cracked skulls, dead babies, ruins of an alienating metropolis, deathly fumes, massgrave, gas mask wearing survivors carrying corpses, desolate-looking frame, almost all the boxes are ticked and act like a massive sign saying "crust ahead" (you might want to hang the poster on your wall to precisely achieve such effect). The crust for crust's sake stance is further reasserted on the backcover with a drawing done by Stiv of War that covers the few boxes that were not checked yet: a peace sign made of scythes, a zombified punk and a torn war banner. For some reason, the album appears to be devoid of any nuclear explosion but then I suppose there just was not enough room. Rather unsurprisingly given the metallic progression of the band, NDT's following ep, Ceaseless Desolation, recorded and released in 2008 on Plague Bearer again, was an even heavier and tighter effort emphasizing the band's mutation into a more openly Frost-metal crust act. Objectively a better record than the Lp, I still think that it wasn't as fun and "crust and proud" as the album, which is the reason why I selected the latter. Afterwards, I remember there were rumours of a four-way split Lp between NDT, Guided Cradle, Instinct of Survival and Visions of War (bound to become an absolute classic) but it never came to fruition. The three songs NDT recorded for this project belonged to the same session as the precedent Ep and were subsequently released as a new Ep in 2009, called Total Annihilation. Guitar player, singer and lyricist Cormy, originally from Dublin, relocated in Melbourne and formed a new version of NDT with a lineup made up of members of Schifosi, Pisschrist or ABC Weapons. They recorded the Chaos Reigns cd for Southern Lord in 2012 but, to be honest, it did not particularly grab my attention. Cormy later on played in the very convincing noizy hardcore machines Krömosom and Geld.
Enjoy this slice of CRUST.
