OKKULTOKRATI is anything but a straightforward band when it comes to their psych-singed, heavy rock, post-punk instrumentation, and so it should come as no surprise to find their lyrical output is just as inspired to define. The band has unveiled a new video for the track “Hidden Future” – the longest track on their new LP Raspberry Dawn — as it premieres through the Quietus, and it draws upon 20th century sci-fi and cold war rhetoric to create a chilling, worldwide anti-war story.
As OKKULTOKRATI vocalist Henning elaborates, “The inspiration to the lyrics of ‘Hidden Future’ are rooted in ’50s and ’80s cold war sci-fi like Gerry Finley-Day and Dave Gibbons’ Rogue Trooper with its race of cloned enhanced humans bred for warfare and Robert Heinlein’s Starship Troopers, or even better Paul Verhoeven’s take on it. Now decades later, there are very few openly, hard-hitting dissenting voices to military engagements in pop-culture. You can go directly from playing Call Of Duty in your basement to piloting military drone strikes. Like something straight out of Ender’s Game, safely bombing a foreign population from the other side of the planet. We are pre-programmed to fear the unknown and to dehumanize the enemy. And there next to no critical voices to question or dispute these matters. Just knee-jerk, empty slogans about supporting our troops and the deafening patriotic chanting in its wake.”Henning continues, “So ‘Hidden Future’ tells the tale of this sad, pathetic, fool who joins the army, never settles in and is stuck there with his own contradicting thoughts about revolting, killing his superiors, greats feats of heroism or deserting but just ends up self-destructing and losing his mind. It’s about the harsh realities of the parasitic nature of the way military forces and military interests operate around the globe. It’s about how in many communities the military have set themselves up as some kind of sheltering corner stone business and provides jobs and homes for thousands of people. Their future depending on the well-being of the military. It’s about how for many disenfranchised and less privileged, with lower incomes and uncertain futures joining the military is the only way to get an education and to pull yourself out of poverty. It’s about how the military in a lot of cases have free access to come into schools and promote and recruit to their ‘cult’. It’s about how it’s all part in a pointless and cynical game of keeping inflated defense-budgets propped up because it ‘creates jobs’, ‘is good for the economy’ and makes the military industry a truly endless, ungodly, shit-ton of money. ‘Hidden Future’ is in essence about whether it’s Boko Haram, Isis, or the US Government or any other ruthless, self-serving military force; there is always a future antagonist or future enemy to be fear. There will always be a need for cannon fodder. And you are a candidate for future war!”
Raspberry Dawn is out now on CD, LP, and all digital platforms via the Southern Lord store.
OKKULTOKRATI continues on their Hard To Please, Easy To Kill tour of Europe this week. See all remaining dates below and watch for more tour updates to follow.
12/06/2016 Bärenzwinger – Dresden, DE12/07/2016 KAPU – Linz, AT12/08/2016 Klub 007 – Prague, CZ12/09/2016 Urban Spree – Berlin, DE12/10/2016 Incubate Festival – Tilburg, NL12/11/2016 McDaid’s – Le Havre, FR12/12/2016 La Zone – Liege, BE12/13/2016 Worm – Rotterdam, NL12/14/2016 MTS Citysound – Oldenburg, DE12/15/2016 Stengade – Copenhagen, DK12/16/2016 Plan B – Malmö, SE12/17/2016 Truckstop Alaska – Gothenburg, SE
