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February 7, 2001
Contributed by Matt Mernagh
Posted by Matt Mernagh on Thursday, February 07 @ 16:00:55 CST
News: The Rise (and Fall) Of Zim Zum & Pleistoscene
The lure of isolation and possibly some form of self-destruction lurks
inside Pleistoscene ringleader Zim Zum. After coming onboard for
Antichrist Superstar, he opted out of Marilyn Manson when it would
have been easier to simply accept a paycheque. During his
self-imposed exile in his hometown of Chicago, IL, he channeled all of
his emotions into crafting songs that might assist in redefining hard
industrial music for the mainstream. His intention wasn’t to do that,
instead it was to create something that came from within his soul. Zim
Zum has been coaxed out of hiding by SonicMonk to enlighten us
regarding the music we exclusively heard only ten hours earlier.
In an effort to decipher his work, SonicMonk opted to read him the
notes we made earlier in the day while we heard selected tracks. With a
trusty dog by our side the first track served up was "The Art of the
Bruise." Instead of opting to divulge the angle behind the song, Zim
Zum explained the creative process. "Nyxon [Ashur vocalist] there’s
about five songs where we did a weird experiment where I’d write a line
and then he’d write a line. Then we broke it down to writing every other
word. We did some non-traditional takes like that. Every one of the
songs starts with a title and a concept. I would sit down and then the
words and ideas would just come at once. I’d record the music, write
the lyrics and Nyxon would come in and do the vocals."
The songs didn’t start with lyrics. While one might assume a guitarist
would begin a song by writing and recording some sort of solo, Zim Zum
says, "The songs started with a drumbeat. I was just trying to entertain
myself and I based this on different time signatures, different sounds
of drums. I’m not a drummer, so I’m not going to do them in a
traditional drummer mindset. I’m going to do this from a listener’s point
of view. This is why some of the songs have, possibly, an aggressive
dance beat. I put the aggressive dance beat and then putting piano on
top and then sticking a distorted bass and have melodic vocals. There
are a lot of layers, but if you break it down, it breaks down to five
people who can physical do what you’re hearing."
Another advantage was that the finished album wasn’t constrained by
time or a financial budget. The studio he built in his home served as
their hideout or monastery. With no label A&R guys showing up
unexpected they could unlock their creativity and explore sounds.
"Whatever I could think of I at least tried it." The song "In Denial (Just
Like You)" expresses this well with its gritty/glam experimental David
Bowie feel to it.
Zim says, "To me it’s documenting moods and random thoughts. It’s all
different things put into one. There’s no one day when someone is
going to have only one mood. It’s up or down or happy/sad or any of
the applicable emotions that’s what I wanted to translate into the
songs."
Channeling these emotions Zim Zum seeks "to bring the listener into
that mood. Have them feel that emotion. The average length for most of
the songs on the 13-track disc are about four and half minutes and the
shortest is about three and half with the longest just under six. During
that time the songs don’t do the same thing."
This is something to adjust to as the traditional format of a Top 40 song
has been discarded. Instead, Pleistoscene went for creating a new
formula that works best for them. "Three or four minutes into the song
something repeats itself and then the song ends. It gives the listener
something to latch onto. The definite thing that I did was not to format
it as verse/chorus/verse. Some of the songs have three different
choruses. I could have dropped two of them, kept one and repeated it a
couple of times, but I loose interest. If it repeats to often for the wrong
reasons, I can’t handle it. I’ll just delete the whole song."
The problem with being non-traditional is that lugheads in the music
industry tend not see the artistic value of a project. That is until the
financial gain is un-covered and the "product" can be sold to the
masses. He defends his art by stating, "It’s not about product or how
many people are going to buy the album. It’s about one person getting
it. I’m willing to take that chance. I remember hearing some of my
favourite bands for the first time and being blown away by how
different it was, the attitude behind it, and picking up the different
vibes. That’s what music should be about."
While an enigmatic Zim Zum openly spoke about a few specific songs,
he steered us to more generalist statements. SonicMonk would like to
note that it’s difficult to discuss in detail songs you’ve only heard once.
Especially when the mysterious guitarist says, "There’s concepts that
run through the entire album. And it could run through a couple of
albums. Some of the art, concept and graphics that show up on the
web site are things that run through the songs. It’s something that I can
see projected live really well."
To do this one has to form a band that isn’t just willing to play with you
on stage, but share a van and spend almost every moment in your
presence. Enter into this claustrophobic world, vocalist Nyxon Ashur,
bassist Taylor Barrett, keyboard synthesist Tate Channing and
drummer/percussionist Haze L. Finn. Tour dates haven’t been
announced yet.
It seems apropos that Zim Zum ends his monastic life at this time.
While many are seeking to find the "rock" that has gone missing from
the music scene, he sums up the forthcoming mood this way. "There
are so many people you’re going to see a year from now who are going
to deny until they die that they don’t own boy-band albums. But they
were into it. That’s why I didn’t want to have anything to do with music.
I didn’t want to deal with it. I didn’t want to be a part of it."
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