April 18, 2007
By Michael Schmidt
At the K.O.B.U.S! launch
Long-haired K.O.B.U.S! frontman, Francois Breytenbach Blom, looms large through the purple smoke, rolling his eyes like the bastard offspring of wrestling icon The Undertaker and White Zombie bassist, Sean Yseult.
O ja, Suid Afrika! This is swaarmetaal for the masses, a storming foray into Afrikaner angst and demonic tongue-in-cheek that made the K.O.B.U.S! performance at Oppikoppi over the Easter weekend remind me so much of Iron Maiden playing Durban back in the late 1990s: self-deprecating theatre and serious heavitude united.
It was old-school metal the likes of which has made a comeback in recent years with the AC/DC revival and the emergence of shag-haired, Rayban'd Ramones clones in virtually every skate-park, shopping mall and rock concert across the country.
Instead of Maiden's iconic zombie figure, Eddie, however, Blom supplanted a cheap inflatable sex doll which was manhandled in various Kama Sutra positions onstage before being thrown to the baying midnight crowd.
K.O.B.U.S! champions the death penalty on Doodstraf, a loping wolf of a song on their new album, Swaarmetaal (Rhythm Records) that should worry the high priests of political rectitude far more than Bok van Blerk's ubiquitous and over-analysed De la Rey, tapping as it does into the undertow of discontent around crime.
But Witman is the song that has been getting radio-play: Witman loop deur die nuwe era strate / honger in die sakke en vloeke in die mond / Witman kyk na die nuwe vrygestelde slawe / vergete monumente, Bloedrivier Godsverbond / … / Witman loop deur die Trellidor Utopia / volkskonsentrasiekamp, onbewus euphoria / Witman loop ongemaklik in sy vel / elke tree wat hy gee 'n bietjie nader aan die Hel.
It's an anthem for an alienated people - though the unlikely surnamed Blom disputes that
. "It's not about just one person, neither an entire nation, and certainly not a generalisation of Afrikaners as some might hastily conclude …
"Witman is about nightmares, fears, beliefs, realities and the assumptions of a certain personality type within the white population."
Blom says he is not condemning the paranoid mindset hammered out in the song, but the album version ends with the term witman slyly supplanted by the grunting of a boar. Make of that what you will.
K.O.B.U.S! apparently stands for Kom Ons Besoek U Satan! which just has to be ironic - though there are the obligatory broadsides fired at the gospel music money- churning industry with its promise of heaven with every CD purchase, and at Christian hypocrisy in general.
Blom's own favourite on the album is the gothic horror Kinderhel, which features his 8-year-old nephew singing a creepy lullaby. Its quasi-operatic quality nicely offsets the thrash and grind of much of the rest of the album.
Overall, K.O.B.U.S! is mildly amusing to see on stage, but downright dangerous to play while driving. I've just converted a 21-year-old Indian girl to fan status, and that breadth of appeal makes Swaarmetaal a crucial local album for any metalhead's collection.
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