HELTER SKELTER FANZINE No.5 : 1981
Extract from 'Dokument 1' :
"THE PROJECT IDEAL IS TO EXPRESS THE CONTENT OF VARIOUS PSYCHOPATHOLOGICAL CONDITIONS, ESPECIALLY SCHIZOPHRENIA, MANIC DEPRESIVE PSYCHOSIS, MENTAL RETARDATION AND PARANOIA."
Mmm... A long ramble through ineptitude... convulsive
literature...HAH!
"Oh, you're so PROFESSIONAL!" says Tone Generator, odd-eyed
member of SPK. Oh... DAMN RIGHT! YES, SIR! Can't even get the
bloody tape recorder to work, but I'm a PRO! YEP!
OH! CHRIST!.. inaudible. THIS IS GOING TO BE DIFFICULT!
Judith Bailey smiles wryly, seems to spend most of her time
helping this trembling wreck chaotically blunder his way into the
eponymous interview situation with Surgical Penis Klinik... she's
getting used to it. I'm so predictable: predictably inept! Jack
Chill, hideous replica of Mark Inmonger, tries not to worry - and
fails! 'I have a duty to my readers'. Oh dear!
"Get on with it! We want some INFORMATION!" (Not a bad
idea, actually - Ed.) Angry readers' jaws clamp around my throat!
GULP!.. And yet SPK tolerate my bumbling foolishness.. THIS IS
GOING TO BE WORTH IT.
Systems Planning Korporation convulsively writhing and foaming in
various outputs:
Operator -
synthesizers, rhythms, treatments, vocals.
Mr Clean -
technician.
Tone
Generator - synthesizers, treatments.
Wilkins -
guitars, bass, tapes, vocals.
Always, always evasive. And SPK skin changes so
rapidly that The Quest becomes harder and the road ahead is
peppered with concealed craters and ditches... but... THEY MUST
GO ON!... smashing through sneering ignorance, ignoring lack of
interest, making it harder, harder, always, always... every twist
and turn a new name, same initials, S...P...K... emblazoned in
their own blood. SURGICAL PENIS KLINIK was burned in a fit of
necessary self-immolation; SELECTIVE PORNOGRAPHY CONTROL rises
from the ashes... they have pruned themselves... new, more
fertile growth is the obvious result - RISK and CHANCE is their
new regime.
SYSTEMS PLANNING KORPORATION... A new name from an old order...
the US chemical warfare developments division. SPK have thrown
down the gauntlet, it is up to us to pick it up... their music is
our SALVATION! I really, really believe this; I have NO other
motive in writing. We all need to be cleansed; horror after
horror is thrown our way, the poison forced into our bloodstreams
in a so-called 'free society'.
Extract from 'Dokument 1' :
"INFORMATION OVERLOAD SUPERSEDES NORMAL RATIONAL THOUGHT STRUCTURES, FORCING DEVIATION INTO LESS RESTRICTIVE MENTAL PROCEDURES OF 'SO-CALLED' MENTAL ILLNESS."
Blatant pornography/drug side-effects/psychotropic
neuroleptic chemical warfare/paranoia/obsessive compulsive
neuroses/retards... desperate reality after desperate reality...
STRATEGIC PSYWAR KAMPAIGN is the only emetic and still they
refuse to preach, never NEVER condescending. Obscurity drenches
their work; Operator knows that ultimately the choice is ours...
"The audience is free to take whatever meaning they want
from whatever the sounds say."
SPK have dreams... a cohesive search for... for... PERFECTION:
bred out of disillusionment with almost everything they see and
hear around them, and yet they always seem to tell themselves
"Must try harder"... They all possess the three main
ingredients: heart, guts and vision. Where other groups soften,
SPK strenghten; weakness is not part of their make-up. They see
beauty where others see ugliness, pride where others see shame...
this group were BORN out of pain. Operator was a psychiatric
nurse ("Psychologists should be kept AWAY from mental
patients."), mostly alcoholics and senile dementia. WE turn
away, HE walks on... and still people laugh.
Systems Planning Korporation are a battering ram against mental
and physical prisons, but when one door opens, another one shuts...
MUST TRY HARDER... The only door still open, the chance to
attract people with records... one single, 'Slogun'/'Factory' (INdustrial
Records). BUY IT! BUY IT! As Al Robinson would say, "If you
ain't got 'Slogun', then you ain't got a record collection."
(Giggle) (Actually I think Al would say something to the effect
that 'Slogun' is a load of shite, Mark - ED.)
SPK: Throbbing Gristle copyists, an incestuous
relationship. LIES! RUBBISH! SPK are autonomous... the single is
on Industrial because they had no money. It was a re-release only
after much analysis.
SPK: "Shock! Horror! Gimmick!" Cliche after cliche
after cliche... banality butts and bruises them, yet is
constantly repelled! SPK are the most frighteningly REAL band
ever! They are unsettling, and no Anadin or Disprin is going to
help you THIS time, Bucko! THERE IS NO EASY WAY OUT... NO ESCAPE.
Distorted... derailing, the onlooker's senses are viciously
attacked! The group are surprised by this - they do not realise
their full power - and yet they will expel and destroy every
diseased particle in your mind and body... if YOU give THEM the
chance!
And... a new record... (record? record of what? Torment?..
Authorized torture?) is out now: 'INformation Overload Unit', a
not so hidden reference to schizo-jamming and advertising
saturation... "An everyday story of human existance..."...splutter...
choke CHOKE ON IT!
Still moving, swerving in and out, jabbing, jabbing, constantly
changing, instability of their own making/requirement; but now,
external pressures block their road - and yet these people STILL
PROGRESS! Anybody else would have crumbled by now... Clean goes...
Wilkins stays... Operator and Tone go back to Australia... they
are being KICKED out... out of their squat and out of this
country... fascists and SPK are obviously uneasy bed companions.
They lived in Coronation buildings, a tenement where the rats
ring up the Samaritans. All poverty is fragranted with the scent
of Royalty... enjoy the Royal wedding, folks... will the choirs
drown the noise of three million unemployed stomachs rumbling?
Despite the chaos, the group are convinced (I am convinced)
that they will continue the struggle... It will NOT be in vain...
It cannot be in vain... It MUST not be in vain... I'll be behind
them... Will you?
This nation's purveyors of good taste, 'the music
press', have been contacted. SPK rang them up, hoping to be able
to pass on information... Journalists, true to form, pass the
buck! This band do not need phoney critics, they need a demanding
inquisitive audience. Their music, their battering, crushing,
screeching, whining, forceful, careering, disrupting noise, cries
out to be heard, shrieks to be absorbed, a howl of pain above the
yells of aimless suffering, a flowering truth in a garden of
mendacity! SPK! Shocking! Persuasive! Kinetik!
Meanwhile, back on the floor, the emanciated Judith, entranced by
the single and subsequent hearing of the LP, was compelled to ask
if the original Italian futurists had any influence on the group.
Phew! Helped out by my thin friend again. This corpulent writer
breathes a foul-smelling sign of relief: that should keep the
conversation flowing! Hah!
At first, Operator seemed dumbfounded! Futurists suggested Naked
Lunch and their scummy ilk, but then he recalled Luigi Russollo
and his noise music... an impression was made by that, yes, also
German groups as DAF, but SPK are as original as any band can be.
They are walking their own tightrope, their lives are in their
own hands. For them, HONESTY is the ONLY policy, and there is no
room to be misconstrued.
Extract from 'Dokument 1':
"SPK IS TRYING TO BE A VOICE FOR THOSE INDIVIDUALS CONDEMNED TO THE SLOW DECAY OF MENTAL HOSPITALS AND CHEMICAL/ELECTRO/SURGICAL THERAPY, WITHOUT FETISHISING THEM INTO BLATANT ENTERTAINMENT PRODUCT. SONICS FOR MANICS AIMS TO BE A VEHICLE FOR EXPLORING MENTAL EXPERIENCES THROUGH SOUND."
And that is one thing they have to avoid. It
won't be easy, but they will try to smooth things out, to clarify
(one of Wilkins' many virtues), and to illuminate. With the
record comes 'Dokument 1', an information sheet. Imparting
knowledge to heighten the new indepence they have found with
their own Side Effects label... saying and doing what THEY want;
one of the few groups under NOBODY'S thumb. At last SPK are as
near as they will ever get to contentment with their sound; and:
I am sure that, for once, contentment will not go hand in hand
with complacency. Just the opposite... pushing forward...
continually changing... until finally... ECSTACY! This does not
mean futile escape from a dull existance - 'living for the
weekend' - don't let anybody tell you THAT'S what music's about,
but... but... what SPK will do is alter your perception... change
your reality... improve... make things better... HEAL! That is
the importance of music.
That is the function of SPK.
And when I am formulated, sprawling on a plo, when I am pinned
and wriggling on the wall, then how should I begin..."
(T.S.Eliot)
"I like violent change, convulsive thought, ripping from one
thing to another so that nobody can tie you down and say 'You ARE
this... You ARE that'"
(Operator - SPK)
Endnote: SPK would like to hear from anyone interested in what they are doing, especially those with an interest in the history of psychotic disorder. Write to:
Mike Wilkins
15 King Edwards Rd,
Hackney,
London E9 7SF
Mark Inmonger
