Gwar and Peace
November 24, 2005
by Amalia Nickel
“Your gods walk before you,” shouted Oderus loathingly, “and we hate you!” Thousands of fans wearing their fake-blood-and-semen splattered clothes like badges of honour lifted their arms in adoration, screaming the primal chant over and over: “Gwar! Gwar! Gwar!” The great belly of the beast squirmed with life. Feeding on metal riffs and testosterone, the moshpit monster moved in sporadic circles, occasionally spitting out a stumbling red kid from the hordes within it, dancing a twisted, pushing, crazy waltz.
I was at a metal concert of immense illusory proportions, trying to feel enthusiastic while my boyfriend Justin disappeared into the heart of the mass. Relationships are difficult when one member is happiest at a Gwar concert and the other would rather see a ballet. Sometimes it feels as though we keep desperately searching for the one connecting factor which will allow us to truly understand each other, but he gets bored in church and I don’t like drinking beer.
On stage, ancient rituals were taking place, feeding a primal urge to destroy the icons of authority while bloody warriors engaged in a devilish dance. The band members, dressed in repugnant horned masks and scanty armor, engaged the crowd with heavy guitars and phallic symbols. Flashing green lights revealed an apocalyptic vision, as political and religious figures were beheaded and an enormous green monster chewed on slaves, covering the audience with fake blood. To my mind came a vision of Dante’s divine comedy, as the lines “slay the whore together with that giant who sins with her” (Purgatorio Canto 32) floated into my consciousness.
Gwar was originally formed by a group of art and music students as an experimental marketing strategy: the crowd at the Commodore that night was a witness to the success of their fantasy. The band’s mythos is that the “Master” had created Gwar as god-like beings, and in a power struggle sent them to earth in his “Death Pod,” trapping them in the Antarctic ice until eighties glam rock set them free with the ozone depleting power of hairspray. They formed a band, and now purport to “slaughter” enough people to awake the World Maggot, which will take them back to the center of the universe to defeat the Master. Their pseudo-bloody concerts and primal, archetypal iconoclasms are not without greater meaning.
One of my concert companions used to party with the Gwar fellows back in the day. When asked for a comment, he looked at me as though I lacked any kind of understanding of the subculture– which, incidentally, is true. “What am I supposed to say,” he asked incredulously, “that I used to do drugs with them? That they’re crazy?” He recanted with “no, they’re funny guys, living in a comic book world. They’re interesting.”
The show had an intensity the likes of which I’d never seen; at times I was so certain of the presence of evil that I began muttering incantations as I laid my hands on and blessed the sticky souls brushing up against me. I did not understand these people; they seemed foreign. But the more I watched this community, the more I saw that I was the foreign one, thinking of Italian poets and archetypal ritual instead of enjoying an important cultural experience. The strangeness of the others was an illusion of my perception.
Every so often, Justin would emerge from the crush, an indistinguishable color, to entrust into my care another layer of clothing and a kiss before being sucked back in by the tendrils of the mighty crowd. I don’t think I’ve ever loved or understood him more than in those moments when his face displayed the intense joys of belonging.
I watched the rest of the show with eyes wide open, anticipating the spray of green liquid from the giant plastic penis or the red liquid from a mutilated corpse to hit me. But nothing came; I was passed over time and time again until eventually I stopped waiting for the sensation of cold wetness. And then, instantaneously, I was bombarded with a full stream, covered from head to toe. And I must admit, albeit grudgingly, that I had a great time.
Now you go...
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