MUSIC: KingDoom to lead ‘industrial revolution’ from Edmonton
Lex Justice
With one member who used to play with Marilyn Manson and another who played with Econoline Crush, Edmonton’s own KingDoom is hoping to lead a new “industrial revolution” for a genre of music that seems to be in a bit of a lull.
KingDoom plays Saturday at the Pawn Shop, on the heels of a less-than-spectacular performance from Marilyn Manson in Edmonton. Could’ve been the flu. Nine Inch Nails has been missing in action for a while now. Trent Reznor’s been doing film soundtracks and doesn’t need to tour to make a living. And Rob Zombie? No Zombie Apocalypse by press time, but the new album comes out in April. It will be called “Venomous Rat Regeneration Vendor.” Nice.
There’s not much of a industrial scene in Canada, laments KingDoom singer Lex Justice, which he says “is a crime.”
He goes on, “I think it’s a lack of fuel from the industry, which is bizarre. Canada has never an Ozzy Osbourne, or an Alice Cooper or a Marilyn Manson or a Nine Inch Nails, or anything like that. So my goal with KingDoom is to build an industrial revolution. I think the interest level in Canada is high enough. We’re trying to keep that alive. Once those guys are gone, who’s doing it?”
Justice formed the band with American drummer and producer Chris Vrenna (who also worked with Nine Inch Nails) just over a year ago, splitting their time between Edmonton and L.A. One imagines a big industrial metal clubhouse where every like-minded musician knows one another. Perhaps they share ghoulish make-up tips. For the uninitiated, industrial metal is like regular metal except with a “mechanical element,” sequencers and pre-recorded percussion and such. It’s a bit ironic considering how Justice gets so worked up about modern musicians who don’t do their own stunts.
Chris Vrenna
“We’re in an area now where for some odd reason it’s acceptable for some artists to get up there and lip sync and not have a band on stage,” he says, drawing the line “at Milli Vanilli and Ashlee Simpson where people are not singing.” The pre-recorded elements in industrial metal, he points out, are obviously pre-recorded sounds not found in nature with no fakery intended, and “it wouldn’t be industrial without a mechanical element to the music.”
The other hallmark of this sort of music is “subject matter that fits the sound.” Most of the aforementioned bands have some sort of dark and gothic elements, ghoulish regalia, spooky wardrobe, sinister topics and a horror movie stage show. KingDoom is no exception. You see it everywhere in the genre, including one of the industrial pioneers that happened to have come from Canada, Skinny Puppy.
Justice says he’s been in some pretty “polite bands” over the years – but KingDoom isn’t one of them. They will soon be shooting a video for a lovely little tune called “Go Fuck Yourself.”
He says, “This is definitely the most vulgar band I’ve ever been in. It’s vulgar because there’s stuff that should be said. Music has all sides of expression, but I think people are pretty soft right now, especially in the popular music category. When I was growing up in the ‘90s, bands had a lot of stuff to say and it wasn’t always nice – and I think that’s filtering into what we’re doing.”
