G.I.S.M.
Extream Guerrilla Live Streaming
December 8, 2020
I vividly recall how difficult it was in the 1990s to get a hold of a copy G.I.S.M.’s Subj & Egos, Chopped video tape, let along Beast Art’s Performance and Bootleg videos from the 1980s. When +R, Regicide Reverberation was released in 2002, a trip was made to the local bank to obtain JP¥, which were sent by snail mail to Record Shop Base in Tokyo and it took weeks until the army ration packaged VHS tapes materialized and could be enjoyed.
Who would have thunk back then that in 2020, with the help of the Dommune live streaming studio, one could experience G.I.S.M. playing live via the push of a button?
Celebrating the re-release of G.I.S.M.’s classic debut from 1984, i.e. DeTestation, by Relapse Records, Sakevi Yokoyama assembled new musicians around him to play some of the most significant tracks of an album whose idiosyncratic melange of hardcore punk, thrash and hair metal, pushed the boundaries of what was thought possible within the confines of extreme music.
While it will remain forever impossible to replicate how Randy Uchida meticulously channelled his alchemy, especially as a far as the trills and taps of his solos are concerned, the backing band played a solid set, crowned by Sakevi’s on-point unique vocal delivery, which instantaneously connects both on a subconscious and abstract as well as on a literal level., as far as the piercing punchiness of his effortlessly delivered growls and trademark shrieks are concerned.
The fact that the Dommune studios usually broadcast streams centered around house and techno ensured that light effects added an interesting additional layer along with a perfectly orchestrated crisp sound, which was visually accentuated by what a crew of roving camera men captured as they meandered the band.
Once the implications the pandemic have been curbed, one can only hope that G.I.S.M. will continue to play live shows - the teaser that was displayed at the end of the “Extream” performance makes one hopeful, as it alluded to a five-hour performance to be streamed in 2021.
