41 minutes, 10 seconds

Strength Through Joy
Salute to Light (CD 1 of 2)

You may know Strength Through Joy a bit better under its current moniker, Ostara. But that's not to make it seem as if the band merely changed names. In fact, one of the members of STJ, Timothy Jenn, left the band, and now Ostara's sound more closely resembles a sort of fractured alternative rock. It's a far cry--too far a cry for me--from the Death in June-inspired neofolk of their releases as STJ.

"Strength Through Joy," you may or may not know, was the name of the government leisure organization in Germany during the Nazi years. Couple the band's name with its early association with Death in June, and whammo! Instant controversy. Protests by anti-fascist groups at their shows, constant "are you or aren't you?" questions from the press, and all sorts of other scrutiny. This despite the fact that Richard Leviathan (né Richard Levy), one of the band's founders, is part Jewish.

But such are the wages of trafficking in fascist and Nazi-era symbolism, as many other bands working in the neofolk genre have discovered. Play with fire, and...well, you get the idea. In fact, it always strikes me as funny when these bands whine so much about people's misinterpretations of their music, their clothes, their demeanor. I mean, what did they think would happen when they dressed up as Gestapo officers on stage, singing oblique lyrics about heroism and war? These are the same people who'd likely cross the street to avoid a group of black kids in baggy jeans and tilted baseball caps. So to say that appearances don't matter is disingenuous at best.

Still--and I've posted about this numerous times--I think it's the ambiguity that attracts me to this music. Are these bands truly fascist? I doubt it, at least in most cases. But unlike, say, Laibach, STJ, DIJ, and others aren't mocking fascism either. They're doing something subtler and more confusing. More fraught with danger and open to misinterpretation. It's either very brave or incredibly irresponsible.

Also today:

41:09 Laibach, NATO
41:07 Supreme Court, Hypocrites & Saints (CD 2 of 2)
41:06 Brian Eno, Music for Films
41:00 Arcana, Le Serpent Rouge
41:00 Miasto Nie Spało, Pieśni Żałobne
New arrival! 75:26 OTX, The World in Red
40:56 Hedningarna, Karelia Visa
40:56 His Divine Grace, Eurydice
40:56 Plastic Noise Experience, Transmitted Memory (CD 1 of 2)
40:55 Haven, Naos
40:51 Sophia, Sophia