Part I: My Ultra-Heavy Origins
Once in a while, important music comes into your life right when you need it.
My best example of this came in 1999. I was 17. Boy, was I a lost soul.
A high school drop-out. Disenfranchised. Clinically depressed. Angry. Confused.
In February of ‘99, I got unceremoniously booted out of my first apartment. My roommate smoked half of the rent money, you see.
My only obvious choice was to crawl on back to my parents. After packing up all my shit, I slumped down into my car, head hung in pitiable defeat.
To process everything, I procrastinated my drive back to Mom and Dad’s with an aimless late-night meander around some 24-hour department store.
Serendipitous detour
Passing by the store’s CD section, almost entirely stocked with ubiquitous mainstream tunes, an impactful piece of album art popped right out at me. It was a KMFDM album called XTORT:
It called out to me somehow, its artwork profound and vibrant, heroic and sardonic alike. The bold “KMFDM” lettering struck me as iconic, infused with omniscient finality, in contrast to its understated mysteriousness.
I would realize in the decades to come, that finding a KMFDM record in a department store music section was a once-in-a-lifetime experience (believe me, after that night I always checked). This rarity factor makes it all so serendipitous to me. Fateful.
I rocked XTORT on repeat all night while I unpacked and settled into the parental abode.
Seed of obsession
From the get-go, I felt utterly smitten. KMFDM’s lyrics punched me right in the gut with their visceral, on-point articulation of my own societal angst, institutional disenfranchisement, and overall mental anguish.
Dynamic, hard-hitting music and creative genre-bending prowess called my name, revitalized me. Heavy beats with driving guitar riffs and brazen electronics pulsated through my being. The vocals soared with power, charisma, and experimentation that were formerly unheard of to me.
Immersing myself in the XTORT’s liner notes, I absorbed each and every lyric like it was food. I eagerly memorized the faces and names of these unique sonic architects, increasingly seduced by the iconography and atmosphere of KMFDM.
In retrospect, a few of KMFDM’s lyrics admittedly seemed cheesy to me, particularly segments that were self-referential, self-celebratory.
But as I got to know those songs, as well as the band and its culture (not to mention frontman Sascha Konietzko’s quirky sense of humor), that so-called cheese would end up a charming highlight.
Once lost, now found
Anyway, like I said before, I was such a lost soul back then.
In the recent aftermath of walking out of my strict, dogmatic Baptist high school, I vehemently rejected all aspects of my religious and political upbringing up to that point. Even still, I had no idea what to believe in or what to do with my life.
No practical life skills. Socially inept. I was desperate for love, acceptance, and guidance; meanwhile I rapidly fell into addictions to cope with feeling so uncomfortable in my own skin.
I had a massive heart, but I felt so hurt inside, deeply damaged by trauma. My chaos, neediness, and restlessness were on the rise. And I felt so insignificant and voiceless.
But in the sonic glow of XTORT, I experienced a surreal glimmer of hope.
KMFDM seemed to speak my mind more clearly than I knew how to speak for myself. It was a resplendent industrial lighthouse, guiding me home in the wickedest of storms.
After awakening the next day, I booted up good old dial-up internet—driven by the giddiness akin to a teenager in love—to dive head-first into KMFDM.NET. I had to know absolutely everything about this alluring new presence in my life.
Alas, most egregiously, I was greeted by a message dated on that very same day:
A message which simply read:
“KMFDM IS DEAD !“
That’s right. Somehow, I’d fallen in love with my new favorite band less than one day before they broke up!
