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Velvet Acid Christ - whether you love him or hate him, it's hard to ignore Bryan Erickson. His music has been a dominant force in the industrial scene for over 10 years. Also a noted raw-food vegan and known to freely speak his mind and try to show the world the horrors going on in our everyday lives. I caught up with Bryan to talk about the recently released album "The Art of Breaking Apart", as well as quite a few other interesting topics such as pollution, 9/11, the food industry, and the state of the current industrial scene.
Jet: so tell me a bit about the podcast idea, how did that come about and how has the response been?
VAC: well we talked to metropolis, they wanted us to do all this net promotion, we did it, we tried to get it on itunes, and for some reason it got rejected, no idea, so honestly, it only reached people who come to my web site and read my blogs on vf, myspace, and my official web site, it got some good responses, but not that many people listened to it.
VAC: Also, we were like the only band on metrop to try it, they asked everyone to do it.
Jet: i like what you did with 'phucked up phreak', what was it like doing a remake of this classic VAC track? it seems to have a more organic sound to it now
VAC: Yes, i have learned a lot about sound production since we made that song long ago. I was making it into more of a live version, and it took on a life of it's own. We replaced one of the parts that was kind of out of tune before, and wrote this whole new epic spooky part, and mixed it different, made it have a more rocked out sinister vibe to it
Jet: vac has been around for quite sometime and it's interesting to see the changes in musical style from years ago. its clear you make music that feels right to you at the time so how do you feel your life is different now as opposed to a few years ago?
VAC: Well, wow. Totally different. I don't have friends now(in real life), I am 37, single again. Watching my family die off, feeling really broke because when I sold the most records during fun with knives, i had a really bad contract and didn't make much from an lp that was so successful, it jaded me so much. Depressed. Alone. Isolated, getting old. I feel out of touch, the scene has completely changed and shrunk, america sucks worse than ever, I wrote something that reflected all of this. It's honest.
Jet: i enjoy how you try to educate people regarding the world around us. from corruption in the government to what goes on to bring us the foods we eat. do you feel that we are just doomed or do you feel that people are receptive to these ideas?
VAC: Doomed. It is too late to fix society, and pollution. The coming purge that the ruling class wants, well, I bet we will see nukes used on our cities, and the will blame it on their paper dragon fake invisible terrorist organization they always blame now. The ruling class fears the working class, mostly because of history, what happens to the leaders who fail and there is a revolution? Ask Mussolini, ahahaha, Hitler, any of those fucks, they usually drag them out into the streets and kick them to death, kill the ruling class as a whole, and terrorize the people who got them into the mess.
So this is why the ruling class hates and fears the working class so much. They are killing us by denaturing the food by genetically engineering it, so their colds and viruses can attack more and more people with weakened immune systems, chemicals in the water, the food the air, they are trying to make us so weak so we need their drugs, while we fade into nothingness. They have been trying to figure out ways to end us since the beginning of civilization. If it were not for the technology, and the power they have, i think we could over come them. But this time, they have fucked every part of life up, the air, the water, the oceans, the soil. We will die sick, in poverty and at war.
Jet: ah that is a pretty dismal way of looking at it although i do see your point. do you not feel that people can make a difference though?
VAC: No way my friend, we are living in the end of humanity, this seed was planted ages ago, and it is a slow growing cancer that has snowballed, if you really have read history, and all the modern marvels of the industrial revolution, you can see this as plain as day, the over population, the lack of food, the divisions of labor, nations, banks, the ruling elite power, the rich families who call the shots for generations. The end of the world doesn't happen over night, it happens slowly. Once it started way back when, so many things are in place.
VAC: So much pollution, the human race has de-evolved into diseased fat sick pieces of meat that sits behind tv's, and computer screens. To many people are weak. It would take an army of millions and millions of people to undo the damage. People are so selfish and ignorant, that even if they could figure out how to fix it, they don't give a flying fuck, they just want to die and go to heaven. All this is written in their religions as what will happen. They have accepted this fate long ago.
Jet: i saw that movie 'food inc' yesterday, its pretty interesting how the food industry is so corrupt and how the animals are just treated like another cog in the machine
VAC: Humans as well, especially with the drug testing, they don't even test drugs anymore it seems like, humans are the guinea pigs now instead of the animals. Yeah, the food supply makes me laugh. The idea that people think they are predators. It makes me chuckle. I always tell these avid flesh eaters, if you think you are a cat, by all means, with no guns, no knives, no fire, go tackle a cow or a pig, and try and eat it with what your make believe god gave you(bare hands). LOL For some reason they all seem to decline my challenge. Humans are slow to, we can't even run down prey. Humans are in such denial. Like I said earlier, it is all in their plan to de humanize us, make us indifferent to pain and suffering in each other and other living things, to dumb us down to something that has no empathy for anything.
VAC: This is all why I refused to breed all these years, I feel that knowing all this, you would have to be a sadist to bring a human child into this fucked up world. The sad thing is, most people do not know all of this shit. I wish they did.
Jet: i saw you wrote that september 11th was a test. while i know the september 11th discussion has been done to death for some people, i do still feel that it hasnt been properly exposed. can you elaborate on your thoughts on the matter?
VAC: I paid close attention to that when it happened, I saw the guy on TV saying they pulled building 7, which means demolished it, which takes months of planning and wiring, oh and they just happened to have the building wired for that day like some kind of coincidence. The cover up, the government would not allow anyone else to look at any of the evidence, the plane that supposedly hit the pentagon video, it even looks like a missile. It's fishy, jet fuel does not burn hot enough to bring down buildings like that. They looted the place, and killed a lot of people, the military was on stand down, and they faked it to invade iraq, that was their plan from the beginning, there are even reports of politicians writing about this before it happen years and years ago. Don't kid yourself, it is not the US government, it is the ruling families, their banks and their world effort that is doing all this. Hell even some of the people they said hijacked the planes were found alive in saudi arabia. Some of this is net conspiracy shit, but a lot this makes more sense compared to what we were told by the government. Then look at what has happened since, 2 wars, we invaded two countries that never even attacked us? are you fucking kidding me, and the rest of the world stands by and does nothing. It's a cosmic joke.
Jet: yeah i agree there's a lot of evidence of government wrongdoing and it is a bit baffling that it hasnt become common knowledge
VAC: What can you expect when the media is run by the banks and the families, censored to hell
VAC: I am furious that they have not done shit to help the new yorkers who are sick from that pollution 911 caused. All those firemen and police, all the families in the area. I am fuming over the neglect.
Jet: yeah well not to mention the thousands that died eh? ok well the latest album almost sounds like 2 different projects, where some tracks sound very much like old vac with the hard / fast electro industrial sound to it, such as 'caustic disco', 'killed in space' and 'vaporized'. and other songs such as 'faithless', 'killing a stranger' and 'black rainbows' are more reminiscent of "the cure" with an acoustic, melancholic feel to it. tell you the truth i wasn't really a fan of the 'new' vac at first but it has grown on me. do you think that it might have made sense to separate it into 2 projects and is there a distinct difference in how the 2 different styles of songs are written?
VAC: Yes, i tried to make it a split lp, but the record labels didn't like that idea. The technology was a pain in the ass at first, so i wrote a lot of acoustic songs. I liked it a lot, it was liberating to do it so different. I really like the stuff I did, but i knew it would make some of the electro heads angry, it has. I feel like i did put enough electronic stuff on the record as well tho. I wanted to make the lp honest. I made it sound like I felt. It did. If you were expecting another typical lp, i really threw you for a loop. Problem is , I like all kinds of music, acoustic, electronic, metal, dance, you name it. I get sick of doing the same thing over and over. I was also making this lp appeal to a more feminine crowd as well. It doesn't have the psycho anger from my past on it at all. It's sad or psychedelic, or evil.
Jet: ah yeah i do find that girls usually arent really into the very aggressive music.
so what else have you been up to lately? what makes you happy?
VAC: Happy? LOL not much. To be honest, it's art and music. Running my media blog www.electricdethtripmedia.com , i like interviewing other bands now, meeting cool artists and helping out other musicians get some more exposure. I love good raw vegan gourmet food. I like the good people I know, my friend steve might move back soon and that will make me happy. This girl I like might move here in a year she makes me happy.
Bryan: I really love my ps3, I know that is cheesy, but any time I am single for more than a year, its video games that save my life. I like playing online with my toxic coma clan in socom, mag, and cod mw2. I love music gear. I love learning. I really wish I could change the world for the better, live in utopia and help people who deserve it. I really like helping people out. I love rubbing my gf's back  I love my puppies, all my dogies. I like going on walks with my dogs. I LOVE TOXIC COMA THE BEST BAND IN THE WORLD MORE THAN LIFE ITSELF.
Jet: hehe what is going on with toxic coma anyway?
VAC: Yeah toxic coma is going to start once steve moves back, and I also have done a few songs over the past couple of years inspired by krztov. LOL I hope to get it going again, but I am really psyched to get back in the studio for VAC and make another lp like cotd and fwk again, I am buying a lot of the old gear back that i used on those old lps and I will work that way again but make it sound even better. What is funny, the new VAC single for Caustic Disco has a couple of toxic coma tracks on the end, its a 7 track ep single that is itunes only, comes out in the beginning of january 2010.
Jet: i know you've expressed that the scene is not the same anymore, clubs are dying off, etc. what do you feel went wrong and do you think there is a solution?
VAC: The scene got to genre specific, and because of that, it closed the door shut on normal people in a lot of ways. The normal people have the good jobs and can buy the cds, the drinks, and keep the scene healthy. So if you make it too hardcore this will make the business fail. This is one thing. The other thing is, djs either play all this old shit everyone has heard a million times, hey i love old shit, but the same songs over and over? FUCK THAT. The new music, produced in bedrooms, lacks warmth and is hard on the ears, especially loud. I hate trendies, don't get me wrong, people who don't know what old school industrial is can really irritate me, but honestly, we need them, but we don't need them re writing history, this is another issue i hate, they want to do away with the old. The old is still better, and that is not my opinion, it's fact, the songs were catchier and produced better.
The new stuff needs its place too, but it needs better production, and the record labels are not helping with that either. The magazines have died, people pirate, the new generation of kids think that its uncool to buy music, i was even told this story by someone i know that says their kids are made fun of for buying music. THIS IS SO FUCKED UP. The kids need to be taught that with out the money, the music starts to sound like shit, because they cannot pay to produce it in good music studios by people who know how to make songs sound better. With out the funding music starts to sound stale. All these things are killing it off. You know like in photography, you can take your own pictures, but to get a pro like lithium picnic to do it, it cost money! If no one pays, quality goes down the drain.
The solution, get people to buy music, get people to go to good studios and producers. get new talent to get its chance to shine and get good production, mix the genres up more in the club scene. too many genre nazis ruin it! Also I am trying to hep the scene with my media blog Electric Deth Trip Media. people need to talk about music and expose it and promote it
Jet: well thanks for the interview bryan always a pleasure! and everyone don't forget to check out the latest VAC album, "the art of breaking apart"
Velvet Acid Christ on VampireFreaks
VelvetAcidChrist.com
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jet
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