[Didez from Libido Airbag] Techno, grind and Rot’n’Roll

[su_heading size=”20″ margin=”0″]With courtesy of Turkish underground art fanzine Lopcuk: Erman Akcay investigates the starlets of industrial techno grinders Libido Airbag. [/su_heading]

I have been though that legendary GUT is dis-banded but I think the band is reunioned again after years, am I wrong? Do you still have any connection with the band?

They released some new stuff some years ago and played some gigs. They`ve been really active again for about two years or so. But now it seems that gut is dead forever. I know all the guys from gut and it seems that they will never will release something again due to some personal reasons.

As well as there were some bands who used drum-machine in 1990s, I think we can say that Libido Airbag is the first cyber-porngrind band. After that, many new cyber-grind bands or oneman band projects began to come like S.M.E.S., in this context can we say that Libido Airbag started a new genre/ or leading the cybergrind movement?

Well, it seems like that… but we never created that “cybergrind” – word. We never had a special name for this kind of music… on the flyer for our first demo we just wrote “porngrind from outer space”… I`d rather say “industrial techno grind” or something like that… anyway… we never had in mind doing something completely new which will influence a lot of guys doing the stuff like we do.

We just had fun doing the tracks with a personal computer… and we never thought about that we did something for the first time!

Unfortunately most of the so called cybergrind bands are crap, that`s my opinion. There has to be something more than making a blast beat in fruity loops, some crappy guitar samples and doing some growls over it. Erwin and SMES are quite unique, he does it very well!

How is the grindcore scene in Germany todays? If we want you to compare 90s scene with todays, what would you like to say? Are there still a big interest in this kind of music? How are the concerts? Are there any new bands that you like and want to recommend us?

I really cannot recommend anything because im not very involved in the nowadays grind scene. If i wanna hear good stuff i mostly take the old stuff from the early nineties when all the stuff was new... i visit some Grindconcerts with new bands now and then, but they dont kick my ass like the bands as all the grind stuff started.

How do you review/ criticise Turkish youth’s interest in hip-hop and rap music who living in Germany, specially in Berlin, Kreuzberg? This battle rap trend sometimes making me nervous, what would you like to say? Are there Turks in your living area? How do you view the relationships between Turks and Germans, does any distance exist?

I live in Berlin, near Kreuzberg and so I know much about that. If you mean the young Turkish people rapping at there freetime, its something good to do something creative until it stops before getting criminal. Its not so easy for the Turkish people here, because in berlin theres not much work.

I have some Turkish friends and there is no problem at all, mostly they live for a long time here now or have been born in Germany. But I know for Turkish people, raising up in Germany its not that easy to combine the culture where their parents come from and the German culture and mentality.

Grindcore scene always stayed against sexism for all these years but we can’t see the same attitude in porn/ goregrind scene; it looks like there is always violence against women specially in artwoks and lyrics, how do you criticise this? isnt this a paradox/ or a conflict?

Well, the metal scene has always been chasing some shocking issues… black metal startet with occultism, death metal with bloody stuff, grindcore with pathologic stuff and when that all hasnt been shockin anymore they came up with porn-stuff and sexism... so... for Libido Airbag... we... just dont care, we concentrate on the music and we developed with our song-titles and attitude in a way that everybody can see that we don`t take all that shit to serious and have a smile on our lips and our speical humor. (laughs)

Hippies, punk rocks and other youth and rebel movements took their places in history – in context of socio-cultural: they changed somethings, some were even accepted as art forms. However death metal and similar genres were mostly seen as noise and they didn’t have their voice as accepted as above, what is the reason of that?

The reason is just that all the scenes you mentioned had more an interest in a way of living, even political, than the death-metal scene. There is no rebelism or any critics to a system… i think Death-Metal Fans just live their live, work and wanna have some fun at the weekend.

Why death metal still appeals to people even after the post-modernist era. Do you reckon it is a some kind of a rejection of now? Do you see a real distance between the modern society and metal-heads?

Maybe… its just that the typical Death Metal Fan with his long hair, black shirts with special pics like skulls, bones and blood on it isnt that "normal" to the rest of the society... but i dont think that its that extraordinary as it was in the late 80s. In europe i think there has changes a lot. A Skull has become a very popular motive around here… you can buy shirts with skulls on it at almost every clothing shop.

Thanks so much for the interview Didez.

Thanks for the interview, Erman, and interest in Libido Airbag.

Our latest full-length album is “Testosterone Zone”. People who are interestes in our stuff just visit our homepage at libidoairbag.de or at facebook or myspace ! Cheers.

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