REVIEW: W.A.S.P. – K.F.D. (1997, domestic and Japanese versions)

FLAMING TURDS

“Flaming Turds” artwork courtesy of SARCA at CAUGHT ME GAMING.  Thanks Sarca!

We continue with the WEEK OF FLAMING TURDS!  We’re looking at a collection of malodorous music.  Strike a match, you’ll need it for these stinkers!  This one smells like something went bad in that fridge….

W.A.S.P. – Kill.Fuck.Die (1997 Castle, 1997 Victor Japanese import)

W.A.S.P. sure started to suck in the 1990’s. 1995’s Still Not Black Enough was alright: It got the job done in putting new W.A.S.P. music on the shelves, though it was hard to find in stores.  Then Marilyn Manson came along, the new king of shock rock, and Blackie Lawless said “Hey!  I did that first!  I need to take back my throne.”  Caking on the makeup, he reconnected with erstwhile lead guitarist Chris Holmes.  Rather than playing to their collective strengths, the pair instead wrote and recorded an album of industrial rock that came off as a desperate attempt to be relevant.   The oh-so edgy album title Kill.Fuck.Die. had to be abbreviated to K.F.D.  The album packaging was clever in concept but crap in delivery.  A blurry picture of a fridge opens to reveal another blurry picture body parts and meat.  On the inside, yet another blurry picture of a pig carcass.  Go, 90’s!

Because this writer is a fucking OCD idiot, he owns both the domestic and Japanese versions of K.F.D.  This means I have all the different bonus tracks.  You get to read a one-stop review including all the tracks.  Good for you!

“K.F.D” sounds as if the band were playing in a shoe box full of stuffing.  W.A.S.P. are muffled, robbing them of the guitar excitement we’re used to.  Blackie’s voice is distant because…90’s.  As usual Stet Howland’s drumming is way too busy.  Fortunately the song has hooks, but who wants to run around singing “Kill!  Fuck!  Die!”?  Not this guy.  Sorry Blackie, but even as an angry young man I thought this was lame.

Skip the boring and monotonous “Take the Addiction”.  Do the same for “My Tortured Eyes”, a slow distorted drag of a song.  These tunes are necessary listening only for diehard Blackie fans who need to buy everything he burps and farts.  There are a couple good songs next, though the titles are pretty doltish:  “Killahead” and “Kill Your Pretty Face”.   The first is fast metal, but of course still with this annoying “industrial” production.  (I use the quotation marks because it’s really not industrial music per se…there are no interesting samples or loops to keep things moving.)  The second is a slow burn, that drags for a while before we finally get to the chorus, which is a good one at least.  Good enough to consider it a decent song.  “Fetus” is a waste of time, just a minute of screaming and noise.  It blends into “Little Death”, just noise trying to sound like Trent Reznor.  Wisely, the Japanese edited these two off, and included their own bonus track “Tokyo’s On Fire” in this spot.  Maybe “Little Death” could have been a good song if it wasn’t compressed and distorted into nonsense.  Thankfully they stuck to a rock production with “Tokyo’s On Fire”.  That does make it sound odd sitting in the middle of the album.  Suddenly, the music sounds alive, not strangled!  “Tokyo’s On Fire” sounds like W.A.S.P., not Marilyn-Trent Lawless!

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Another dumb title, “U”, masks an OK song.  The lyrics are pretty are pretty half-baked.  “U fuckin’ suck!” sings Blackie.  No wonder they didn’t include a lyric sheet in this baby.  Anger is a great emotion to express in rock music.  Get it out!  But “Kill yourself for me,” doesn’t cut it for lyrics.  Shock without purpose.  A molotov cocktail without a revolution.  It’s just shrapnel, nothing more.  “Wicked Love” is better, thankfully, with a good chorus and melody, but again the compressed guitars just underwhelm.  It would have been nice if Blackie had let the guitars sound like, you know, guitars.  The album closes out on “The Horror” which is way too long, and takes forever to go anywhere.  A good solid five minutes could have been trimmed from this coma-inducer.  It ends powerfully, but it’s basically just a reprise of “K.F.D.”.  So, if you consider “K.F.D.” and “The Horror” to be one song in two parts, and do the same for “Fetus” and “Little Death”, then…holy shit, Blackie only came up with nine new songs for this album, including the Japanese bonus track!

The aforementioned domestic CD packaging has two significant flaws.  One is that the cardboard fridge is hinged on a perforation, which usually tears after opening it too many times.   The other is that it is unfortunately not worth opening.  Keep the fridge closed, fans.

2/5 stars

33 comments

  5. I live in Japan and I don’t even have the Japanese (or U.S.) pressing of this album. The title alone put me off. I do have “Double Live Assassins”.

    Have you seen the “music videos” that Chris Holmes released fairly recently that were recorded in his new hometown in France?

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  6. I bought into Wasp for the first two albums as I was looking for a void for Kiss who ditched the makeup! Wasp somewhat delivered as being 16 I bought into it but by The time Inside The Circus came out I checked out …..Headless thougn was a pretty good one than I checked out again……for good

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  7. So, the WASP that made some “intellectual” albums didn’t work, right? And as you said, Manson came along so let’s do a Manson, shall we. Ahh, I guess WASP needs a theatrical image so let’s go all in. Good thinking, Blackie. Good thinking. Not.
    But where the old WASP image was full of dark humor and a twinkle in the eye, not to be taken serious, this new image was nothing but distasteful. There’s nothing cool about raping a nun a nun with a sword, throwing worms on the audience and having a pig’s head on the stage. Nothing at all. What a desperate move.
    The music went the same way. This is by far the worst album Blackie have ever released and mind you, he have released some really crappy stuff.

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    1. Yeah well said. I can’t really add more to that. Blackie was trying to shock for the purpose of shock, nothing more. There was no meaning to it all. But that’s his art, I guess. Hate me, but don’t ignore me, it screams.

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      1. …and it needs to be added that it would take the lawless one a whole bunch of records after this one to get back on track again…

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        2. Oh, the latest one, Golgotha, is great. And both its predecessors Dominator and Babylon are also both really good. So yeah, I’d say he’s back on track even though it’s not back to the glory days.

          The Neon God albums were horrible. Almost as bad as KFD.

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  8. I have never heard anything off this thankfully. I would assume it woukd be worth less than a 2 if it is half assed industrial which is usually crap anyway.
    I have heard good things about Golgotha though, and have thought about buying it.

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        3. Yeah, it feels naughty. Like some Faces of Death type shit that you know you shouldn’t be watching, but can’t turn away from. Like some dark underground secret you have to be in the know to experience.

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