TISM are back for some noise terrorism. MIKE WAFER takes no prisoners.
For 15 years TISM have been gracing Australian audiences with their own particular brand of 'wit' (in fairness to them, 15 years is a long time to stretch out one gag) that has both repelled and propelled people into two factions; those for, and those against. Love them or hate them, their dry sense of humour, which has been responsible for such songs as Would The Last Person To Leave Please Turn Off The Enlightenment, Thou Shalt Not Britney Spears and their most well known song He'll Never Be An Old Man River (which poked fun at the accidental overdose of actor River Phoenix) are reactionary if nothing else, and TISM are more than just a mere comic act; beyond the cheap giggles there is an irreverence that many people find refreshing.
Humphrey B. Flaubert, like his cohorts, maintains the irreverence both in and out of character, his 'proud to be an arsehole' vernacular being as much a trademark as it is a characteristic, and though it appears that the garbled spiel he and fellow TISMian Ron Hitler Barassi are so prone to spout is nothing more than a mere distraction from actually saying anything relevant, it is indeed the exact opposite. While much of Flaubert's thoughts are clouded in smartarse rhetoric and self-important drivel, that is exactly the point, as it provides fans not with the usual boring insight into the band, but with a few more cheap laughs that have underlying truths that need only be hinted at, their obviousness being otherwise glaring. Usually at someone else's expense, Flaubert's jabs are monolithic critiques of all things worthy of cynicism. All you can really do is sit back and listen, and try not to piss your pants laughing at the man who turns one sentence into a five minute epic.
"I think there is continual reinvention in rock music, and I think reinvention is a good word it's not just a buzz word come up with by marketing fuckwits to denote the clutching at straws of failed charlatan travelling-medicine-show cunts, reinvention is the true process of evolution it is the organic growth of rock music, from its original wellspring. When Elvis Presley sang 'I am like a one-eyed cat peeping in a seafood store,' he was not making some base sexual metaphor, he was talking about the problem of the Afro-American, and the hegemony of the white male in western society, in a patriarchal society, and the objectification of women. In today's society we have all these bands that start with the word 'the', and in the same tradition they all wear the same thing, and this is not to be seen as a formulaic attempt to jump on the bandwagon � like the Jews being put on to the cattle truck on the way to their terrible, untimely end � no, indeed. This is true indication that bands of today are able to present the cutting issues to today's youth, who are hungry for knowledge on these issues, which is why we have all of these shows on television about groups of bachelors in reality TV-style competitions with women looking to find the right suitor, but I digress, a great band is The Vines "
Here we go
"The Vines are introducing a great number of important issues to the youth of today. The bashing of one's head through the bass drum skin is not in fact, as some very cynical journalists have pointed out; 'A dickhead thinking he is doing it for the first time in rock history,' no, what in fact that is, is like the literary tradition of using iambic pentameter in romantic poetry and then being echoed through later post-modernist works. The head through the bass drum skin is, in fact, a symbol a symbol indeed of the growth of the indigenous people of Australia through the cultural stereotyping that has existed since the arrival of Captain Cook. That's one example. The slightly psychologically disturbed lead singer punching one of the other members; that is not in fact some immature dickhead, who has been told by his publicist that acting like a looney will sell more records, no, that is in fact, again another beautiful metaphor for the struggle of the feminine within the man, the struggle of the man to find his ever-changing place within society. So, TISM has been around for 15 years because we have been doing this thing for these cunts, and we're going to stick around until someone gives us credit for it. We've decided that wearing the same uniform is very important, and lots of screaming, and straight-ahead direct rock based on the great music from the late '60s /early '70s Detroit sound � The Stooges, MC5, John Farnham � that's the sort of musical influence on TISM."
Again, love them or hate them, there is no denying that there is something truly unique about TISM, and although the band is as far removed from contemporary rock as they have ever been, now more than ever the world needs TISM, not only for the odd crass giggle, but in order to defend the honour of the true artists of the world, such as their friends The Vines, so we as music fans can rest safe knowing that the men in balaclavas have our backs.
