Not realizing that death metal focuses on confronting the illusions behind which we hide in a social bubble instead of accepting that life includes death and lies like equality, democracy, and consumerism lead to group suicide, Cambodians expressed outrage that a death metal band borrowed the name of the most notorious Khmer Rouge death camp:
The controversy over an American “Death Metal” band naming themselves after the infamous S-21 prison – where 20,000 Cambodians perished during the Khmer Rouge era – has taken a fresh twist when the band responded to criticism over their co-opting of the Cambodian Genocide, by posting up an image saying “we’re not changing our name” with Khmer Rouge leader Pol Pot crudely superimposed into the middle.
As reported before, the band has caused furious anger throughout the Cambodian and Asian community, by using not only the name of the infamous prison but also stolen artwork of Khmer Rouge atrocities by the revered Cambodian painter and peace activist Vann Nath – himself one of the handful of people who emerged alive from the S-21 prison – for their promotional material.
Internet outrage merchants have set up a petition to encourage official whining about this. The band Tuol Sleng is fairly reasonable old school death-doom. Listen for yourselves:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DCgSICrlJaQ
Tags: cambodia, death metal, khmer rouge, sat cong, tuol sleng
The black guy is clearly taking his cue from his white supremacist band mates in an overtly brazen display of anti-Asian hatred. The white guys should be sent to an S-21 like center to receive their comeuppance. Conversely, the black guy should be sent to the Simon Wiesenthal Center’s Museum of Tolerance-Beit HaShoah for reprogramming because this is also clearly a dog-whistle for anti-Semitic behavior. I don’t know how, it just is.
Pretty nice dark and grinding music. Decent compared to what passes for metal these days. Unfortunately it seems they are cucking out. What’s that gonna do? They probably won’t get their social media back. The way things are going, all western art and thus metal music is going to be on the chopping block soon, besides maybe Indonesian grindcore bands that make songs about blowing up Israel.
This demo is surprisingly good. I’m glad we have outrage merchants to help us easily find what’s worth hearing!