Death In June
Heilige!

THE REVIEW

"To All Those Who Fight in Isolation"

Dedicated to all those who fight in isolation.

And then Douglas P., camouflage and gas mask, with a glass of white wine in hand as a toast. The glory of Nothing, the glory of Silence.

How can one not feel sympathy and eternal respect, or even compassion, for this man who, in solitude (indeed, in isolation!), outside the world, in distant Australia, perpetuates his struggle for psychic, emotional, existential survival.

How can one not recognize oneself, at least a little, in this solitary crusade against ghosts, children of a world that seems to disown us, defeated but not redeemed; how can one not feel united, in solidarity among all of us solitary climbers of our Calvaries, tyrants and prisoners, kapos of our worlds, entities unto themselves, yet connected by a terrible invisible thread: that of inadequacy, that of the bitterness that marks the distance between what is and what we wish it would be.

One pays for one's own hell alone: this is what Douglas P. seems to have always preached, a victim of an individualism elevated to such a point that it sinks into pathology; a man now far from the crises of the past, far from that Europe he loved so much and from which he was repudiated, yet always stubbornly, incorrigibly alone in bearing the weight of his own existence.

Melbourne (Australia), July 9 1999: "Heilige!"

"Heilige!" is a live recording from the promotional tour of "Take Care and Control," the album that in '98 marks a sharp stylistic turn in the artistic journey of Death in June, landing on the harsh post-industrial style in Blutharsch fashion. And accompanying Pearce in this live setting is the primary architect of this change: friend/disciple Albin Julius, commander-in-chief of the battleship Der Blutharsch, here called to juggle tapes, keyboards, backing vocals, and percussion. Lending a hand: percussionist John Murphy, a long-time friend of the Death in June family, a fixture in Death in June tours in recent years.

"Heilige!" comes to our ears bare and essential, totally devoid of studio tweaks, frills, or overdubs of any kind: "Heilige!" is an authentic, real, live work, absolutely uncounterfeited. In this lies its strengths and weaknesses.

But let's proceed in order.

The performance can ideally be divided into two moments.

In the first, the industrial side of the band emerges: understandably, the set-list focuses on pieces written with Julius. "Take Care and Control," the album to promote, brilliantly passes the live test, despite the massive yet necessary use of tapes and pre-recorded parts. Credit to an inspired vocal interpretation by Pearce and Murphy's explosive percussion, which revitalize tracks that would otherwise feel excessively cold and cerebral: "Smashed to Bits (in the Peace of the Night)," "Despair," "The Bunker," "Little Blue Butterfly," "Frost Flowers" thus make a significant impression, strong in powerful and raw sounds and a declamatory vigor that had no chance to emerge so vividly in the studio.

Among the tracks of "Take Care and Control," a minimal version of "Bring in the Night" (from "Wall of Sacrifice"), reduced to voice and percussion only, also takes space, along with an excellent reinterpretation of "Only Europa Knows" (from "Kapo!"), completely transformed: if the studio version appeared to us as a bleak and atmospheric acoustic ballad, here we see it resurrect in the chaos of percussion and sirens and the compelling hymns of Pearce and Julius.

What to say: this first section of the album is truly good, where the band proves capable of recreating live atmospheres that are not exactly stage-like, and reinventing, sometimes completely overhauling, tracks that are genuinely difficult to envision in a live setting.

Less convincing is the remaining portion of the album, an acoustic set that retraces the entire history of Death in June.

It starts right away with heavyweights such as "Death of the West" and "Heaven Street," but we immediately realize something is wrong: the sounds are poor and poorly equalized, percussion overshadows the guitar, Julius's contribution turns out to be more harmful than useful (disastrous the keyboard incursions, irritating the sound effects that undermine the acoustic charm of the pieces!).

"Little Black Angel," "Kameradschaft," "Giddy Giddy Carousel," "Ku Ku Ku" thus flow between the anonymous and the irritating (especially when thinking of the original versions), and even masterpieces like "Runes and Men" and "Rose Clouds of Holocaust" do not seem to pass the test, primarily due to a hurried and approximate execution.

The recovery is partial in the finale with ultra-classics like "Hullo Angel," "Leper Lord," "Fall Apart" and "Fields of Rape," whose renditions, although they present nothing sensational, on the other hand do not harm the original and effective simplicity of the pieces with foolish arrangements.

Grand finale with "C'est un Rêve," which revives industrial loops and closes the 50 minutes of this live in the spirit of the overbearing tribalism of military drums.

What to say in conclusion? A not excellent work, which might be of interest exclusively to those who consider themselves a completist fan of the band, or to those who never had the opportunity to hear Death in June live (an opportunity that will not occur again, given that Douglas P. does not seem inclined to undertake new tours at the moment).

Absolutely forbidden, instead, to those who do not know the band: as a first approach, the double "Discriminate" is rather advisable, an exhaustive overview of the good that Pearce has achieved in the first fifteen years of his far-sighted career.