About Me
Formed in 2006 from ex-members of Sex Gang Children and Christian Death.The name was delivered to us by a friend of mine in Europe. The ‘Federation of Sorrow’ were anarchists in Italy circa 1900, who decimated government by their ghostliness. This destruction-gang appeared out of night and destroyed that which held power over their lives by taking out any kind of information gathering and record keeping designed to control the lives of everyday people. Seems like nothing has changed…We are unitized. A gang. Machine-gun fast, drinking electricity, esoteric magical thinkers; music is the soundtrack of our lives. We look for magic in the moment. We reflect an industrialized world by ramming sound through machines.I grew up on the music of the early Adam & the Ants; a nitroglycerine fast slip slide into the might of the three chord sexual tango that was London in 1976. Sets often made 15 minutes, most times less. We lived the fast life in an amphetamine rush, jumping instead of dancing, ripping our stolen clothing into shapes of shit because we cared about nothing ‘pretty’. But the pretty boys came anyway. We distorted our sexuality by painting our eyes with Newcastle coal. We created parties out of empty buildings, entertained long nights in wild reunions pushing out anything that we thought was sane. We liked the black and the white. Berlin. Sexual Objects. George Bataille. Guy De Bord. Naked cabaret. Noise. We drew on ourselves; slogans for emptiness. Joy Division. We formed bands, short lived shock machines. We formed the Sex Gang Children. We made records that imitated no one. We are still ‘the outsiders’.In 2005, Blue (drums) approached me with the idea of creating another new music. Friends of long standing, some 15 years, we insisted on 4 way splits and familial bonding. Born out of the same approach to life as I have always had, we started creating something different by beginning at the bass and the drums and writing strong atmospheric soundscapes. Then we added Seven (John Burns) a mighty, intensely creative guitarist who it seems can play anything; and always melodically but also as if his notes were ground through industrial blenders and spat out by machines. If the riffs sound unfamiliar; good. If the songs seem to come from a place no one else wants to go to; good. Nothing else is as important. Jump sturdy.By 2007 we had a series of pieces that were intensely fast, quasi-complex and magically different. All we needed was the voice. Always the hardest part of the procedure; how do you find The Voice? We tried everyone we could find, we asked on the net, we talked to people we ran into, in stores, on streets. Everyone can sing in Lalaland. Few hit the microphone and caress it, where words seem to float in from other worlds and texture and heart rise up from the dirt of nothing to fill the places we play in with so much longing and suss. Such was the moment when we heard dante drakul...tall, stalker, screamer, crooner...ripping at the air with words.You know the moment that it all makes sense is coming. Few times in my musical life have I heard ‘it’ but when I hear ‘it’ I know; it’s special. Its name is unknown, maybe some x factor, maybe the tears of angels caught in vials and drunk for creating moments of purity. If you could capture it and sell it, riches would surely flow. But you can’t touch it, hold it and fuck with it. Sell it, sure. People do.Nevertheless, like love, it comes fleetingly and most times won’t stick around long. We always hope it will but while its there we use it and for as long as it stays around, we love it. It only works when all four cherish it and treat it with respect. We will bring it to you because we have to." title="" s
