The Rock Blogger

I have recently acquired most of Godflesh’s catalog, having once again been fascinated by industrial metal, and I was amazed by the cover art for one of their more heavier albums.

An image of mourning, this apocalyptic pairing of the grave and industrial waste is a fitting visual description of the current technological and spiritual crisis that lies ahead of us in 2008. This album, created in 1996, seemed to anticipate the bleak forecast for the industrial-capitalist state, which currently is brewing in the dirty and over-consuming city centers of the West. They all risk collapsing into states of takers, and the thought of giving, the message of Christ, becomes overwhelmed by the mechanical roars of greed, profit or addiction.

The modern industrial representation of Christmas has slowly deafened the sentiments of charity. The Salvation Army awaits in our subway stations, because they know how much money we are throwing at each other. They are well aware of how much we consume and how much we waste. They are waiting for the scraps.

This Christmas I will pray for a more charitable spirit to come out of us, rather than being caught in the Christmas Machine that, for the most part, rewards the dominant minority of the top corporate and political class who continue to poison many of the airwaves,waterways and pathways that line our fragile world . I pray that in the new year we can open the dimensions of our thinking and contemplate what our true beleifs are and compare them to our wasteful, hateful and selfish behaviors and recognize that no one is free of sins, be they personal or social.

While their music is incredibly brutal and makes ample of use of thunderous baselines and punishing drum machines, Godflesh’s tone of opposition and lamentation seems to call to an aggrieved and existential mindset. Yet the message isn’t completely despairing, as I see it. Perhaps the imagery of Christ that Godflesh likes to juxtapose with the machinery of the state, or our bleak imperialist world view, is meant as a signal of hope amid a blackening sky of dirt and pollution, of noise and destruction. Perhaps there is still one candle that lights the others. Hope still burns in the ambers.

Peace be with you.

This entry was posted on Monday, December 24th, 2007 at 1:57 am and is filed under Moments, Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.